Category: Poet Voice Blog 2023

Continuing to think about poetry–after April.

Day 9   Ode to My Bluejeans

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Ahhh a little sleep and a whole new attitude as Day 9 of the poem-a-day challenge arrives. A little lighter in the vein of Pablo Neuruda’s “Ode to My Socks” (see prompt from Maureen Thorson by clicking here at Napowrimo.net or below).

Ode to My Bluejeans

some stretch in the bluejeans required

bluejeans must be rugged but with style

often worn bluejeans can usually be revived

with a twirl in the clothes dryer

bluejeans pulled on for a knock on the door

bluejeans for a stroll in the “back forty”

bluejeans with a hat & sunglasses

for a trip to the mailbox

bluejeans & boots for a serious trek

in the overgrown field

bluejeans & flip flops

for a quick trip to the store

bluejeans to plant

rootbound dianthus, viola, & dill

hang bluejeans on a hook for easy grabbing

until one day bluejeans demand

their turn in the washing machine

to retain their usefulness & for

a reward of almost new bluejeans

skip the dryer—except for the twirl

for minor touch up

blue jeans you are a loyal friend!

Jacquelyn Markham (4/9/2024)

Prompt:

“Our prompt for today (optional, as always) takes its inspiration from Pablo Neruda, the Chilean-born poet and Nobel Prize Winner. While he is most famous in the English-speaking world for his collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair, he also wrote more than two hundred odes, and had a penchant for writing sometimes-long poems of appreciation for very common or mundane things. You can read . . .“Ode to My Socks” here, and “Ode to a Large Tuna in the Market” here.” (Napowrimo.net)

Jacquelyn Markham, poet & writer, author of Rainbow Warrior, Finishing Line Press (2023), Peering Into the Iris: An Ancestral Journey and China Baby, among other titles.

Day 8 the fates at their looms

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citation below: Brittanica

It’s late. This prompt has troubled me, and I have come up with a paradox, a conundrum, a riddle that has no solution, no answer, and is perhaps an exercise in futility. The question of “what if” is what I explore in this poem about “an encounter or relationship that shouldn’t have happened.” (Read the complete prompt after the poem.)

the fates at their looms

What fate is in store?

If only a different time, age, space.

If only Oppenheimer never met the atomic bomb.

If only the atomic bomb never met Los Alamos,

Hiroshima, Nagasaki, or Bikini Atoll.

If only Deepwater Horizon never met the Gulf of Mexico.

If only Hitler never met Germany.

If only Sitting Bull never met the U.S. Forces.

If only Frida Kahlo never encountered the bus that hit a streetcar.

If only Christa McAuliffe hadn’t met the Challenger.

“What if” questioning could go on forever.

But the fates weave at their looms.

If only we could tempt, bribe, cajole the weavers

who spin, measure, and cut the threads of fate.

Could we change these fateful times?

Jacquelyn Markham (4/8/2024)

From Maureen Thorson’s Napowrimo.net poem-a-day challenge: “Finally, our (optional) prompt for the day takes its inspiration from Laura Foley’s poem “Year End.” Today, we challenge you to write a poem that centers around an encounter or relationship between two people (or things) that shouldn’t really have ever met – whether due to time, space, age, the differences in their nature, or for any other reason.”

Citation for image:

Citation: Schadow, Gottfried: Fates sculpture,  Encyclopædia Britannica

(https://www.britannica.com/topic/Fate-Greek-and-Roman-mythology#/media/1/202442/202550

Day 7 Wish You Were Here

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at the shore – photo by poet J. Markham

wish you were here

after all I am solo

at the seaside grill on an island

a swirl of eclipse energy

wraps me up

in my thoughts of other times

but, hey, today is now & I’m alive

so wish you were here

to drink the chardonnay

to share the overflowing

crabcake benedict & grits

to cross the rivers

to meander the maritime forest

to find the path &

to walk the shore with me

wish you were here

Jacquelyn Markham (4/7/24)

photo by the poet

By the way, the prompt for today! Courtesy of Napowrimo.net

And last but not least, we’re taking it easy with today’s (optional) prompt. Today, we’d like to challenge you to write a poem titled “Wish You Were Here” that takes its inspiration from the idea of a postcard. Consistent with the abbreviated format of a postcard, your poem should be short, and should play with the idea of travel, distance, or sightseeing. If you’re having trouble getting started, perhaps you’ll find some inspiration in these images of vintage postcards.

Day 6 Weird Wisdom

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“And now for our (optional) prompt from Napowrimo: “Today’s we’d like to challenge you to write a poem rooted in ‘weird wisdom,’ by which we mean something objectively odd that someone told you once, and that has stuck with you ever since.”

Oh, how I struggled with this prompt! Truth is, all that weird wisdom has stuck! So here’s the poem for day 6!

Bird singing in the morning!

The Staying Power of Weird Wisdom

The trunkful of weird wisdom  

that I learned as a child never emptied.

My mother rivalled a character in a Flannery O’Connor story

with her wealth of proverbs, warnings, and clichés.

Maybe I lacked a dress for the prom, or a hat for Easter,

or a book for school, but never a lack of weird wisdom.

Necessity is the mother of invention, (how many times did I hear?)

A leopard doesn’t change its spots.

A fool and her money . . .(yes a litany of these!),

a bird in the hand, a journey of a thousand miles. . .,

Oh, and “all that glitters isn’t gold!”

Beggars can’t be choosy, daughter.

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket, now!

How many times?

Don’t cross that bridge ‘til you come to it?

If wishes were horses, we would all take a ride,

young lady! But the weirdest wisdom

of all that puzzles me still:

“Sing before breakfast; cry before night.”

What? We should all sing like birds.

Sing to sunrise! Sing to the morning!

Sing to the new day!

Moral of the story:

Some wisdom is not only weird, but better left unsaid!

Jacquelyn Markham (4/6/2024)

Day 5 The Blessing

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The Blessing of the Poet, the Delphinium, and the Jay

after Alicia Ostriker

To be blessed

said the poet

is to feel inspiration

flow into you

like the lyre of Orpheus

or Shelley or the angels

To be blessed

said the Delphinium

is to “knock their eyes out”

with a blue so deep and

vivid even the sea goddess

would be envious of you

though your indigo

is fleeting and hers

returns every sunlit day

To be blessed

said the jay

is to call out

jay jay jay

in a raucous entré

though you really want

to sing a melody like a lyre

in Orpheus’ hands

or the angels.

Jacquelyn Markham

(4/5/2024)

Delphinium

Thank you Napowrimo for today’s prompt:

“Friday is here, and so is the fifth day of Na/GloPoWriMo.

Now, let’s get to our optional prompt! Today we’d like you to start by taking a look at Alicia Ostriker’s poem, “The Blessing of the Old Woman, the Tulip, and the Dog.” Now try your hand at writing your own poem about how a pair or trio very different things would perceive of a blessing or, alternatively, how these very different things would think of something else (luck, grief, happiness, etc).”

Angel with lyre image credit: Image credit: http://www.dana-mad.ru/gal/image.php?img=5387

Day 4: Mermaid: Triolet

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Today’s prompt from Napowrimo (thank you Maureen Thorson!): “Our (optional) prompt for the day challenges you to write a poem in which you take your title or some language/ideas from The Strangest Things in the World. First published in 1958, the book gives shortish descriptions of odd natural phenomena, and is notable for both its author’s turn of phrase and intermittently dubious facts.”

Because, truly, I do think it a little strange that the manatee, or its cousin the dugong, ever looked like a mermaid to the lonely sailors of the sea, I chose this idea from the “strangest things” book.

Image credit: https://mermaid.fandom.com/wiki/Mermaids_(Mythology)

From the book, I chose the entry on “Mammal Prototypes of the ‘Mermaid’”

“The prototypes of the “mermaids” of legend are among the least known of all animals to naturalists because of their underwater habitat and their secretive habits. They are the manatees of the Caribbean region and the dugongs of the Indian Ocean. They constitute the only remaining species of the serenia, or moon creatures, distant relatives of the elephant. Both have a somewhat human facial appearance. They feed standing upright in the water, their flippers held out before them like arms. Sometimes the females hold their calves in these flippers. Seen from a distance, they have a curiously human appearance, which may account for the many reports of mermaids and mermen.”

And though, I think the sailors must have been hallucinating to spot a manatee or dugong and see a mermaid (less often a merman), I wrote my poem in response to this entry.  And because I spent a good part of my day in the dentist office, I decided to write a short poem, called a Triolet.

Not sure that was a timesaver, but here’s my triolet and poem for day 4. That intricate rhyme scheme with two refrains is a challenge indeed!

Mermaid: Triolet

She rises from the churning waves.

Ahoy, a maiden from the sea

What makes a mermaid act so brave?

She rises from the churning waves.

Will our ship she try to save?

Keep us windward and not lee.

She rises from the churning waves.

Ahoy, a maiden from the sea.

image credit: https://www.shared.com/9-pictures-that-prove-manatees-are-the-oceans-cutest-creature/

Note: (To learn more about the difference in manatees and dugongs, read this article by Emily Brauner.)

Day 3 Surreal poem

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“The dream world and the real world are the same.” (Remedios Varo)

Image Credit: National Galleries of Scotland

Today, Napowrimo has challenged me to write a surreal prose poem. Wonderful! It gave me the opportunity to do what I love to do–learn more about women artists, in this case, surreal women artists of Mexico. Check out this article in Art News if you would like to learn more about this intriguing artist, Remedios Varo and her artist friends.

I have decided to keep this poem private to revise for future publication. Did you try a surreal prose poem yourself?

Jacquelyn Markham (4/3/2024)

Remedios Varos, artist 1908-1963

I really appreciate that the National Gallery of Scotland is acquiring more works by women surrealists. And always, much credit goes to the National Museum of Women in the Arts for its contributions to women’s art. Thank you NMWA for featuring Varos in exhibits and events and for all you do for women in the arts!

Jacquelyn Markham, poet & writer, author of Rainbow Warrior, Finishing Line Press (2023), Peering Into the Iris: An Ancestral Journey and China Baby, among other titles. She offers writing & creativity guidance through Moonflower Mentoring.

Poetry & Empathy

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Can empathy change our world? Can poetry create empathy? I believe the answer to these questions is yes. I would like to share a poem with you that attempts to create empathy for one little island girl who is forced to leave her home–just one of the many stories from my work in progress, Bikini Laments.

Bikini Laments (and Rainbow Warrior, the shorter collection that includes some Bikini Atoll poems) is a series of poems about the impact of atomic testing on the South Pacific islands. The short 1946 film below gives some background on this atomic testing that occurred in the 1940s and 1950s.

My poetry in this collection attempts to create empathy for those whose life and culture on Bikini Atoll were lost. “A Child Speaks to Libokra” tells the story of one little island girl taken from her home as I imagined it. One of the poems from Rainbow Warrior (Finishing Line Press, 2023), it was first published by Hawaii Pacific Review as you see it here.

Credit: https://www.cnet.com/pictures/an-atomic-anniversary-for-the-bikini-atoll-pictures/
A Child Speaks to Libokra
The shocking story of Bikini Atoll & the Atomic Testing in a brief film:

According to Psychology Today, “Empathy is a sense that you can understand and share the feelings of another.” As I wrote “A Child Speaks to Libokra,” I became the child. I felt I was leaving my palm trees, my sister’s grave, and my simple home behind to board a big ship to the unknown.

In “Myth of the Infinite Sea,” also from Rainbow Warrior, the poet/reader becomes Eagle, hopefully to create empathy for the avian world that experiences oil on the water (specifically, in this poem, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill).

Could our world be saved from violence, war and environmental disasters with more empathy?

If so, I want to do all I can to encourage empathy with my art.

Jacquelyn ~ Poet Voice

Yellow Celosia of Hope Revisted

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October was as full as its Harvest Moon as it always is in our part of the world after the heat breaks.

I have missed my interaction with friends and readers at Poet Voice, but I am back!

Some of my time was devoted to the 8th Annual Pat Conroy Literary Festival, held every year around the late Pat Conroy’s birthday.  I was fortunate this year to take part in a Poets Panel with the amazing sister and fellow poets, Ellen Malphrus, Jennifer Bartell Boykin, and Tim Conroy.  What an honor!

I read from Rainbow Warrior, keeping my new book of poems alive and visible, as I vowed to do in my Vision Plan (check out my post on that process here).

Though I was away from Poet Voice for a bit, I also vowed to keep hope alive in my own way with a poem, proving that “poetry matters,” the topic of the poets panel I referred to above.

Over time, my most popular blog post was in April during the poem-a-day challenge in honor of National Poetry Month.  I wrote and posted “Yellow Celosia of Hope” which was chosen by Maureen Thorson as featured poem of the day on April 27, 2023. (There are many ways to participate in the annual Poem-a-day Challenge; I have been enjoying the camaraderie and prompts on NaPoWriMo, founded by Maureen.

On the April day that I wrote the poem, I did plant a yellow Celosia with “golden feathers,/hope waving from my garden.”

Alas, the hottest summer ever was hard on the beautiful yellow feathery thing!  And now, the world over, we need hope more than ever, so I planted two yellow celosias in my fall garden.  They are annuals, but in warmer climates may act like a perennial.  I will nurture them and replace the symbol of hope as needed. Here again, is the poem:

Yellow Celosia of Hope

I lose hope when the world

loses compassion.

I lose hope when I lose myself or

a belief in the invisible.

I lose hope when I don’t see

love, a solution, or an end.

When I lose hope,

I listen for my heartbeat.

I listen for the wren

announcing dawn.

I look for pinpoints of light

sparkling on the river,

galaxies in the dark sky.


When I lose hope,

I listen to music—loud.

I read the poets, I eat, I drink,

I pace, I cry, I imagine

hope returning.

I cook rice.

I bake biscuits.

I sweep the floor.

I plant Yellow Celosias,

golden feathers,

hope waving from my garden.

Jacquelyn Markham

Dear readers and friends, what ways do  you keep hope alive in your lives?

Can we all envision peace together and make a difference as Baba Jolie suggests in her 11/11 portal pick-a card-short video?

Baba Jolie speaks of envisioning peace together

And poets, if you believe as poet Denise Levertov (1923-1997) wrote in her poem, “Making Peace,” that “poets must give us imagination of peace,” then please fire up your imaginations like this Flamma Golden Celosia and let it burn with hope for world peace and harmony in our everyday lives.

Not only the long coral sky

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every night as autumn comes on

pecans drop plunk on the tin roof

proof another season’s past. . .

(from “October,” by the poet)

The South Florida Poetry Review, Winter 1985
-a black and white view of the old slave quarters I rented from a tobacco farmer, Concord, Florida
“October”

Now that Autumn Equinox has come and gone, days will be shorter and nights longer.  More time to read, write, and play music through the night! Or, more time to harvest and put away jars of vegetables.

With the cooler temperatures, the winds of change blowing through the oak trees, and acorns dropping on the tin roof, I was reminded of a poem I wrote long ago, “October”–one of two of the first poems I ever published.  I was living in a very old cabin, reportedly a former slave quarters, in a community in north Florida, 30 miles from the university where I was working on my doctorate in creative writing and poetry.

Although I lived in north Florida, the two poems were published in The South Florida Poetry Review, Hollywood, Florida. Sadly, the journal is now extinct though the Florida poetry scene is still vibrant. “Today This Jar of Pickles is My Poem,” which eventually became the title of a prize winning chapbook, was also published in this review. Now, understand, I was at the time growing food and also putting it up in jars for the future. At the time, I believe only 2 % of the population canned their own food and I was among them. Still, I questioned the time taken away from my creative projects.

Last line in second stanza became my dissertation title: “Lavender Blooms Turn Eggplant Purple”

Covid changed all that!

According to garden pals, “The Covid pandemic created 18.3 million new gardeners, most of whom are millennials.”

Check out these amazing statistics about new interest in gardening! That’s good news! What about you?

Gardening Statistics in 2023 (incl. Covid & Millennials)

In fact, I’m seeing more and more blending of gardening and poetry. Is that true for you?

This new book by Tess Taylor with a preface by Aimee Nezhukumatathil is on my reading list!!

Check it out here: Leaning Toward Light

I’ll close this story of poetry, gardens, seasons past, and Autumn Equinox with a poem by our U. S. Poet Laureate, Ada Limon. Read her poem here:

Ada Limon, US Poet Laureate

So, I close for now and wish you a fruitful harvest–in all ways.

Jacquelyn

The poet
Read more: Not only the long coral sky