Category Archives: free verse

April 11, 2019

who am i ? – NaPoWriMo 2019 #11

who am i?

sometimes i go barefoot just
to feel the earth murmuring,
infusing me with nature song,
lilting sweet, fierce…one day
i shall return to those cool, dark
catacombs below to cavort
with the worms and slugs

i’ve been known to hug a tree
or three or more, now and
again to remember how
to bend when tempests reel
and whirlwinds leave me
vulnerable to the cold, in
nakedness, learning to let go

i have floated in still pools and
on the edge of wave-rushed
shores learning to trust in
buoyancy and the rhythm
of all life’s ebbs and flows…
listening to chattering shell
shards dancing just below

i have counted on a thousand
stars, each night another wish
proposed, felt the moon’s
dizzying nudges, helpless as
the ocean tides, cursed the sun
on sweltering summer days
embraced the dusk and dawn

who am i, but flesh and blood,
carbon, hydrogen and air…to
think that i am separate from
everything i see and hear, the
universe is deep and wide, and i,
a blip in time, a dot in space who’ll
one day disappear without a trace.

~kat

NaPoWriMo 2019 #11 Prompt: write a poem of origin. Where are you from? Not just geographically, but emotionally, physically, spiritually? Maybe you are from Vikings and the sea and diet coke and angry gulls in parking lots. Maybe you are from gentle hills and angry mothers and dust disappearing down an unpaved road. And having come from there, where are you now?

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9 Comments | tags: free verse, NaPoWriMo2019, origins, Poetry, poetry challenge, poetry month | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 7, 2019

all i need – NaPoWriMo #7

By Kat Myrman

all i need

what a luxury to give myself
permission to have a dream
without a plan, indulgence,
never was my thing, survival
has its own demands, a never
ending rut of woe where time
moves slow and years pass
fast, the things that last, they
are not things, i’ll tell you true
what moves my heart to sing,
amber turquoise skies at dawn,
lilting bird song, smiles, a gentle
touch, it really doesn’t take too
much, the simplest of all life’s
gifts, bring joy to me when days
are long, three-score and two,
i’ve lived a few and hopefully
a few to come, it is enough for
me and some, to breathe deep
and exhale slow, a moment’s
bliss, that’s all i need to know

~kat

NaPoWriMo #7 Prompt: What do you deserve? Name it. All of it. What are you ready to let go of? Name that too. Then name the most gentle gift for yourself. Name the brightest song your body’s ever held. Summon joy like you would a child; call it home. It wanders, yes. But it’s still yours. Today, we’d like to challenge you to write a poem of gifts and joy. What would you give yourself, if you could have anything? What would you give someone else?

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9 Comments | tags: free form poetry, inspiration, NaPoWriMo2019, Poem a Day, Poetry, poetry challenge | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 3, 2019

It’s Been Three Weeks, But Who’s Counting? – NaPoWriMo #3

By Kat Myrman

Just Three Weeks, But Who’s Counting

it’s been three weeks, actually,
19 days, 6 hours and 27 minutes since
the spot made its villainous appearance,
19 days, 6 hours and 29 minutes since
“your doctor will be calling you,” the
technician said, careful not to spoil
the surprise…but she knew…she knew

what a wonderful day it was, it will
be etched in my memory forever, one
day I’ll say I knew her when…my
granddaughter, she was magnificent
in her school play…it wasn’t a speaking
part, mind you, but her portrayal of a
tree in the wind…it was breathtaking. I cried.

it was a voicemail on my phone,
a nurse, “doctor so and so would like you
to come in to the office this afternoon”…not
unexpected, the technician had warned
me, she had such a nice smile, kind eyes,
around my age, I’m thinking, we talked
about smart phones as she tugged my
floppy breasts onto an ice-cold plate to be
smashed for their photo shoot, “hold your
breath, 3…2…1” …funny how communication
has changed over the years…

the meeting is at 9:30 tomorrow,
I’ll assemble all the slides for the deck,
clean them up and send them to the
team for a final walk-through…btw…
I need to take a few hours this afternoon
I’ll have my phone with me if anyone
needs to reach me…

“nothing to be alarmed about just yet, but
we’ll want to run a few more tests, an
ultrasound, we can do it in the office today”

an ultrasound…I had those
when I was pregnant…now they’re
doing them in 3-D, you know. It’s like
a snapshot, well, a weird sort of
snapshot, where body parts are
sometimes elongated into distorted
shapes, but so much more advanced
than those first cloudy pictures…even so
two heads were easy to make out when
I found out I was having twins, with
a toddler and an infant already at home
I remember lying there in the dark, crying.

“We’d like you to see a specialist. Tomorrow, 9:30.
Here’s the address. They already know you’re coming.”

I’m going to miss the presentation. Maybe
we can reschedule. Although, they don’t really
need me there. Someone else can present it. No
one is irreplaceable, that’s a fact. I’ll get my
assistant to brief me on the take-aways
tomorrow afternoon. Should be able to keep
my lunch date with mom. Need to remember
to pack that book I told her she could borrow.
Great book, a really great book.

it’s been 19 days, 6 hours and 43 minutes
no news is good news, right? I keep telling myself that.
no news is good news when you’re waiting for bad news
19 days, 7 hours and 2 minutes, a message pinged from
the voice mailbox on my smart phone … doctor so and so’s
office, the nurse again, “no need to come to the office, nothing
to worry about, scar tissue was all it was”…who was worrying?

~kat
NaPoWriMo #3 Prompt: Meandering…to write something that involves a story or action that unfolds over an appreciable length of time. Perhaps, as you do, you can focus on imagery, or sound, or emotional content (or all three!)

22 Comments | tags: free form poetry, free verse, meandering, NaPoWriMo2019, poetry challenge, poetry month | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 2, 2019

Wouldn’t You? – NaPoWriMo #2

By Kat Myrman

Wouldn’t You?

how can it be? fluffy clouds
swirling past my outstretched
arms, the sky so crystalline
blue, I’m squinting, cool breeze
tossing my hair, sun rays,
warm on my back…flying,
I’m not sure quite how, lost,
my aversion to heights, here,
to take in the sights, a bird’s
eye view, where the niggling
every day is blurred into
a beautiful sea of green and
blue, wet, shiny rooftops,
and the shimmer of leaves
topping the trees…floating,
soaring…bUgs IN My teETth,
tOO cloSe, toO CLosE to the SUN…

SHIT!

WHAT TIME IS IT? I’M LATE! shit, shit, SHIT! Glasses, where are my…
teeth, brush my teeth, take a piss, bad hair day, bad, bad, bad, damn alarm…
damn fucking alarm…

Need to text work, tell them I’ll be…
SICK, taking a sick day…phone on mute,
going back to my soft, warm bed, back,
back to my lovely dream, it’s the
only sensible thing to do, don’t you agree?
Wouldn’t you do the same if you were me?

~kat

NaPoWriMo #2 Prompt: To write a poem that similarly resists closure by ending on a question, inviting the reader to continue the process of reading (and, in some ways, writing) the poem even after the poem ends.

24 Comments | tags: challenge prompt, free form poetry, free verse, NaPoWriMo2019, Poetry | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 1, 2019

offspring – NaPoWriMo 2019 #1

By Kat Myrman

Photo courtesy of barskefranck at pixabay.com

offspring

they don’t come with
instructions, and yet
we pop them out as if
life depended on it
(…well, it sort of does)
smelly, demanding,
helpless, tugging at our
raw breasts, depriving
us of sleep, sometimes
for years, testing our
patience, breaking our
hearts…if you’ve loved
one, you know what
I mean…and we do
our best to keep them
safe, to keep from offing
them ourselves when
they challenge us, no,
they don’t come with
instructions, and yet
somehow we manage
to survive the decades
until it is time for them
to leave the nest, literally,
(have you seen a teenager’s
room?) taking a piece of
our heart with them

~kat

NaPoWriMo Day 1: write poems that provide the reader with instructions on how to do something. It can be a sort of recipe, like O’Neil’s poem. Or you could try to play on the notorious unreliability of instructional manuals (if you’ve ever tried to put IKEA furniture together, you know what I mean). You could even write a dis-instruction poem, that tells the reader how not to do something.