Poetry Project — January 2025

All is not well in the world, that much is clear. But connecting to and conversing with each other? It’s something. It’s something we can do.

This year, my long-time poetry sisters and I are going to work with an overarching theme of conversation — and in an appropriately meta twist, we’d love for you to join us. Our prompts will go out each month like a call. Our poems — yours and mine — will be the answer.

This first month, we’re writing tankus — a fusion form that starts with a tanka followed by a responsive haiku. (See? Conversation!) I was happy to try these — I love Japanese forms (and very short poems in general) — so I have several, all linked.

Like so many folks all over, those of us in Texas just navigated a surprising winter weather event. Fortunately, this time (unlike in 2021), we kept our power and water, and the disruption was brief. But if we’re all really honest, we should no longer be surprised by these events, not the storms or droughts or fires or deadly freezes. Climate change is here, denial be damned. (And we’ve just left the Paris Climate Agreement and put the kibosh on the Green New Deal. It just makes me weep.)

Anyway. That’s what I was thinking about as I wrote this week. Weather, and what we’re doing about it.

Ice Strikes: Three Winter Tankus
Liz Garton Scanlon

Lantana blackened,
blue flame agave slipping
out of its own skirts.
The bitter cold unravels
well-rooted optimism.

Ice cracks like a voice,
an earthly adolescence
just inscrutable

Pipes burst and schools close,
not some storied snow-day joy,
just things freezing up –
knees, brakes, Earth on her axis.
We are stuck with what we’ve got.

This glassy snow globe,
victim to constant tumult
There’s no settling

Red-shouldered hawk screams,
her tender prey burrowed down
in cold denial
while meteorologists
repeat: unprecedented

We were invited
to make ourselves at home here
What a mess we’ve made

 

For the others, go here:
Laura
Sara
Tanita
Mary Lee
Tricia

And Poetry Friday is at Book Seed Studio (thanks, Jan!)

As for next month, we’ll be writing ______ is a word poems (inspired by Nikki Grimes.) Have a look at this post Laura did for more ideas, and consider using a term related to conversation if you want to play along! We’ll be posting on February 28, and invite you to do the same!

15 Responses to “Poetry Project — January 2025”

  1. Sara Lewis Holmes

    Ice cracking like a teenaged voice. The hawk screaming, the pipes bursting. Your tanku is filled with frustration and anguish, for all things blackened and uprooted and too early frozen. And how much do I love that image of the blue flame agave slipping out of its skirts? Well said, Liz, even though—sadly– I don’t have much comforting to add to this conversation.

  2. tanita 🌎

    Oof. We were invited, and we are the WORST guests. Like Sara, I love the action of a cracking voice, knees and brakes freezing, a hawk’s frustrated scream. The metaphor of the Earth as a snow globe that never settles into the beauty of the scene it contains is so apt.

  3. Buffy Silverman

    The mess is almost unbearable right now. But your example of being in conversation gives me hope for our glassy snow globe.

  4. Sarah Grace Tuttle

    I really felt your red-shouldered hawk stanza– unprecedented. Right. Sure. As if these events weren’t predictable and preventable. Thank you for your words.

  5. Jan Godown Annino

    Liz, hi, with wishes for a warm & wonderful weekend. Your Ice strike tan-kus are chillingly true. Unexpected off-kilter Earth responding to our soiling will visit every season.
    I especially am struck by this verse:

    “This glassy snow globe,
    victim to constant tumult
    There’s no settling”

    contrasting frothy/fun globes with our wrecked globe’s limping presence.
    Appreciaitons.

    Your contrast between the fun/glitter/lightness of snow globes
    & the damaged globe we’ve created is spot-on.

  6. Linda Baie

    That sardonic “unprecedented” encompasses your poem’s words, Liz, a slam & perhaps a shout to stop with the word, “there’s no settling”! You’ve shown what is true so poignantly.

  7. Carol Varsalona

    Liz, your three tha-kus find their voice;
    The bitter cold unravels
    well-rooted optimism.
    What a mess we’ve made.
    -Climate change is real but why would people deny that? I could read your poem over and over because it is well done.

  8. Karen Edmisten

    “What a mess we’ve made” … yes.
    It all makes me weep, too, Liz. But I’m thankful for the invitation to conversation, and I look forward to conversing with the Poetry Sisters this year. Art saves us.

  9. Laura Purdie Salas

    Liz! These lines:

    just things freezing up –
    knees, brakes, Earth on her axis.
    We are stuck with what we’ve got.

    and your final haiku. Wow. So very powerful.

  10. Rose Cappelli

    Your words say so much, Liz:
    “We were invited
    to make ourselves at home here
    What a mess we’ve made”
    How can there be so much beauty, yet so much heartache? Thank you for sharing.

  11. Denise Krebs

    Liz, your three tan-ku are stunning. My favorite are the haiku answers, especially the idea of “This glassy snow globe…” and the last one. “We were invited to make ourselves at home…” So sad and true.

  12. Michelle Kogan

    Your first tanku is really biting, you can feel the cold, burrr. And I hear a blood-curdling cry from Red-shouldered hawk. Yes, “What a mess we’ve made,” unfortunately you’ve summed it up.