The Moon Woman

(Source text: The Encyclopaedia of Fantasy by John Clute and John Grant)

Batman

(Source text: The Encyclopaedia of Fantasy by John Clute and John Grant)

Angel

Today I felt inspired to continue with yesterday’s supernatural theme!

Source text: The Encyclopaedia of Fantasy by John Clute and John Grant. The version I used is the weighty hardback. However, this incredible resource is now available online. It is worth checking out!

How To Be an Effective Ghost

Today’s NaPoWriMo prompt:

Many years ago, “didactic” poetry was very common – in other words, poetry that explicitly sought to instruct the reader in some kind of skill or knowledge, whether moral, philosophical, or practical. Today, I’d like to challenge you to write the latter kind of “how to” poem – a didactic poem that focuses on a practical skill. Hopefully, you’ll be able to weave the concrete details of the action into a compelling verse. Also, your “practical” skill could be somewhat mythological, imaginary, or funny, like “How to Capture a Mermaid” or “How to Get Your Teenager to Take Out the Garbage When He Is Supposed To.” Happy writing!

I was tickled by the idea of how to be a supernatural being. Source text: The Encyclopaedia of Fantasy by John Clute and John Grant. The version I used is the weighty hardback. However, this incredible resource is now available online. It is worth checking out!

Love Letters

A Royal Conversation

(Source text: 'The Willow-Wren and the Bear' by The Brother's Grimm)

A Family Portrait

Today's NaPoWriMo prompt: I challenge you to write a poem that takes the form of a family portrait. You could write, for example, a stanza for each member of your family. You could also find an actual snapshot of your family and write a poem about it, spending a little bit of time on each person in the picture. You don’t need to observe any particular form or meter. Happy writing!

I chose to do a blackout poem - one for each member of the family. (Does that count as 4 poems, I wonder?) For my source text, I used Storytelling & the Art of Imagination by Nancy Mellon (Which, by the way, is a fabulous book!)

The Bazaars

There were bazaars
laden with enormous bunches
of white grapes,
almost too intensely sweet
for folk of the early centuries,
and so these oases
became sand-buried,
washed down 
from the Kunlun Mountains
by time.


Source text: Silk Road Cooking by Najmieh Batmanglij.

On The Mat

Today's NaPoWriMo prompt: an old favorite – the erasure! This involves taking a pre-existing text and blacking out or erasing words, while leaving the placement of the remaining words intact … One easy way to get started is just to photocopy a page from a book or magazine, and black out words. Or you can copy a text into Microsoft Word, and turn the words you don’t want white. Erasures can feel almost like a game – carving new poems out of old texts like carving statues from blocks of marble — and so they take some of the anxiety out of writing. They can also lead to surprising new ideas, as the words of the original text are given new contexts.

If I had to take one type of poem away with me to a desert island it would be the blackout/erasure poem. (Although I wouldn't be travelling light. I'd also have to pack a stack of newspapers, magazines and books to use as my source material!) I have "written" several erasure poems already this month, including yesterday's poem. Thinking this was a bit naughty, I resolved that today's poem would not be an erasure poem. So, I had to laugh when I saw the NaPoWriMo prompt! Today's poem is meant to be an erasure poem. Hurrah!

The World I Know

Today's NaPoWriMo prompt: Today, I challenge to write a poem that states the things you know. For example, “The sky is blue” or “Pizza is my favorite food” or “The world’s smallest squid is Parateuthis tunicata. Each line can be a separate statement, or you can run them together. The things you “know” of course, might be facts, or they might be a little bit more like beliefs. Hopefully, this prompt will let your poem be grounded in specific facts, while also providing room for more abstract themes and ideas.

Today

It's Time

I don't know how it is

I am inspired by yesterday's foray into the Arabian Nights. The source text for this blackout poem is 'The Twelve Dancing Princesses' from the brothers Grimm. The text is already rich with story. I love how the process of erasure brings out new stories, secret stories, that are hidden beneath the surface.

Sindbad's Compass

Today's prompt is to write a poem about the stars. The source text for this blackout poem is 'The Seven Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor' from Andrew Lang's Arabian Nights.

As Dusk Falls

The Beauty Of This Island

The Promotion

An Emotional Bake-off

On The Menu At The Witch's House

Haute Cuisine