NaPoWriMo day twenty three: ekphrastic poem

Civilization and Its Discontents

Moth eaten and ruinous:

the Arabic rug we once sat cross-legged on,

eating Chinese from tiny origami boxes.

You spilled red wine in the corner once,

that time we fell into peals

 of laughter

over something you’d said,

knees knocking together and apart.

I’d lie on the rug and think of Egypt,

dry sand dry mouth,

the heat of your gaze masking as

the Saharan sun

burning into me. I’d stay and practice my technique

of avoidance.

You’d relay verbatim the love notes from diner napkins,

and I’d count out the inadequacies

on my toes; run my hands up and down the carpet

and proclaim I wanted to take it with me.

When it began to unravel it started in the center,

“things fall apart; the center cannot hold,”

but what most do not know,

is that it begins at the center;

it begins at the beginning,

it starts when I say hello.

NaPoWriMO day fifteen: parody

I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed---and gazed---but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils. 

-William Wordsworth

This is surely what Wordsworth really meant:

I wandered lonely as a star,

Sloppily composed belt of Orion,
When all at once I looked afar:
A patch of flourishing dandelions,
Invading the garden, amongst the beets,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Popping up everywhere
choking out my peonies,
the yellow eyes a piercing glare
not a real flower but a phony:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

I knelt down and plucked up a head,
And I forswear I am not mad:
I heard “ouch!” as it cried with dread
And wept as if it were sad:
I gazed -and gazed -but little thought
what drugs Coleridge to me had brought.

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
those weeds ravenous and rude;
And then my cup with opiate I fill
And dandelions perform vaudeville.

NaPoWriMo day twelve: a homophonic poem

So I decided to tackle a poem by Baudelaire to homophonically translate.  This is not as simple as it may sound.  Translating a poem in another language based on sound is difficult when you know the other language, even partially.  I had to rid my mind of all the French I knew and read the language as if I'd never heard it or seen it before.  Anyways, I tackled the first stanza of "l’invitation au voyage."

Mon enfant, ma soeur,

Songe a la douceur

D’aller la-bas vivre ensemble!

Aimer a loisir,

Aimer et mourir

Au pays qui te ressemble!

Les soleils mouilles

De ces ceils brouilles

Pour mon esprit ont les charmes

Si mysterieux

De tes traitres yeux,

Brilliant a travers leurs larmes.

And this is how it turned out:

My own fault, my sweet,

Sponging up delicacies,

Tallying up violent enterprises!

I aim to lose,

I aim to mourn

Or patiently and quietly reassemble.

Lay silent moments

they say, briskly.

But man is free only of shame,

mystery;

but the traitor is you,

brilliantly traversing the length of my arms.

I took some liberties. I think next time I will try German or something a tad more foreign to me.  The challenge was fun though!

NaPoWriMo day eleven: the five senses

 9 am poetry

That first dip,

that first plunge into the unknown.

His skin so soft and smelling of honey and my rising chest,

Breathing punctuated by gasping.  I am aware of everything,

the sun shining through the curtains,

illuminating the dust in the air hovering above us, lighting the fuzz on your

lower back.  You asking me if I am okay,

my clumsy fingers, grasping,

tracing the outline of your arms, narrow shoulders.

Traversing the terrain of your body, a fearsome thing.

Skipping literature class to keep your skin on mine for a while longer.

I open my eyes while kissing you

and you’re looking back at me, a softly flowering guilt

blooming.

NaPoWriMo day ten: "Good poets borrow; great poets steal"

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;*
Shifting ghosts, gliding in and out of sliding doors.

Carrying briefcases, children, coffees,

their faces hazy, fleshy features morphing together,

moving in and out of private moments.  I slip in on their thoughts,

read the lines of facial creases like a text;

stranger’s faces become literature for the daily commute.

*From Ezra Pound's "In a Station of the Metro"

NaPoWriMo day eight: Westcoasting

So I slightly deviated from Maureen Thorson's prompt for today, mainly because the prompt was to go outside and it was midnight when I wrote this (and I was cozy in bed).  It still pertains to the outdoors and the weather, just not today's weather!

Westcoasting

us vancouverites, we are prepared with our miniature umbrellas

in our trouser pockets.  Eating sushi with sand between our toes and

chopsticks in our hair. Our poor cousins to the east,

lamenting the passing of august into the brutal jaw of winter,

we glide slowly, passively, into an endless grey month of

rain.

NaPoWriMo day seven: a colour

An avalanche of sorrys;
trees reduced to whispers.