We’ve been assigned a pastoral this month — a poem both aware of the wild world but also naive to the complexities of our relationship with it.

I LOVE this prompt. I want to write a whole book full of pastorals. But I’m just back from a vacation (a dreamy one, to France) and am already off at a book festival, busy polishing up my slides for tomorrow’s school visit. So, I almost bailed.

But then Sara suggested I just post a pretty picture from France and I thought ok, c’mon, I can write a poem to go with one of those pictures. So I did.

Sunflowers

Tempted by the golden morning,
we step off the train into a language
we don’t speak and a hope
we don’t honestly possess
and I imagine this is what Van Gogh felt,
facing a field of sunflowers, bright
and wild until they went to seed.
But still, the stems are milky,
the paint dries yellow,
and we understand
enough to get by.

To read more, go here:

Laura
Tricia
Sara
Tanita
Rebecca
Andi

And Poetry Friday this week is at Library Matters. Enjoy!

Our prompt?
To write a poem comparing a snake to something it isn’t usually compared to.
In 8 lines.
Which means I basically broke all the rules.
But here goes….

Small World
By Liz Garton Scanlon


The snake as metaphor spells out the length
(the tight twistiness ) of a garden hose

to a world nearly impossibly small.

Want to read more??

Tricia
Sara
Tanita
Laura
Rebecca
Andi

And here’s Poetry Friday! Hurrah!

Summer time often means travel time, so it made sense to use trip pics as our poetry source this month.

More specifically, Sara offered up three images from a trip she made to Israel, all of which feature rock or stone structures. Beyond that, there were no specifications so you’ll find that our work really varies this month.

Here’s mine from the Wailing Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem…

The Wailing
By Liz Garton Scanlon

We stand shoulder
to shoulder, the tiny
and the tall, the mighty
and the meek, the feared
and the beloved, we stand
like blades of grass, like warp
yarns, each absolutely singular
yet woven together and wailing,
wailing into the cracks of our lives

Now, here are the others…
Laura
Tanita
Sara
Kelly
Andi
Tricia

Plus, you’ll find poems of all stripes over at My Juicy Little Universe! Enjoy!

Up this month — triolets! Little French poems of eight lines — one of them repeating thrice so the reader feels awash in it — plus a rhyme scheme and an awareness of syllabics.

We’re also going with the theme HEAT because, well, summer.
Here goes:

She slipped through folds in time and space
(it is tomorrow there already!)
and dropped her maps, her plans misplaced –
who needs them in this state of grace
where who-you-were’s left not a trace?
Like summer sun, white-hot and steady,
she slipped through folds in time and space
and it’s tomorrow there already!

And here are my pal’s poems. You’ll love them!
Sara’s triolet
Tricia’s triolet
Laura’s triolet
Tanita’s triolet
Andi’s triolet
Kelly’s triolet
Rebecca’s triolet

And Tricia is the host of Poetry Friday, too, so you’ll find an embarrassment of riches over at her place.

Sara gave us this month’s challenge, which was to write a French Dizain, a poem with a funky rhyme scheme, ten lines, and ten syllables per line — a square!
This made me think of my birthday — April 4th — 4/4.
I’ve always loved the date but almost aspirationally since it’s rather too orderly for me.
Thus, my dizain.
Enjoy…

Myself as Square: A Dizain Self-Portrait

To be born day four of month four, steady
like a kitchen table, solid and square
like the root, multiplying already
into parsed out parts, chromosomal pairs,
orderly goodness and everyday prayers.
But then I turned to fire – giant, hot –
I burned down all the systems I’d been taught.
No longer easily divisible
nor doused, what random figure had I wrought?
Mad entropy — it’s me made visible!

Please enjoy the other dizains here:
Tricia
Tanita
Sara
Rebecca
Andi, Laura and Kelly are taking a month off but will be back in June!

And our beloved Jama is hosting Poetry Friday at Alphabet Soup, so go see her for poems galore!

Fences separate
but I only see the space,
the glimpses of light

#lizsharespoems #30daysofhaiku
#nationalpoetrymonth

Ok, you guys… I’m outside with my dog when my husband pulls up and says, “Are you aware you have a lizard on your back?” I think I just took a 1/2 hour walk with this piggybacker! So… my haiku today:

If you stay awake,
companions are everywhere.
Let us be surprised!

#lizsharespoems #30daysofhaiku #nationalpoetrymonth

Is something this old
automatically precious?
Should it just be spent?

#lizsharespoems #30daysofhaiku #nationalpoetrymonth

Veins run unfettered
with delicious everythings…
What else do we need?

#lizsharespoems #30daysofhaiku #nationalpoetrymonth

What’s more important
than holding something fragile
with soft, open hands?

#lizsharespoems #30daysofhaiku #nationalpoetrymonth