NaPoWriMo 2017 Begins

And so we arrive at the start of National Poetry Writing Month.

Tomorrow the start gun will be fired on a thirty day race towards the end of April with (hopefully) thirty poems to show for it. As I've previously discussed on this blog, the goal isn't to produce collection-worthy poems, but to produce the highest number of poems. Whether I'll achieve it this year remains to be seen, but work has already begun. As I write this post I'm contemplating subjects for the first poem which will be posted tomorrow.

Writing a poem a day can be troublesome at the best of times, and if like me you try to add some variety into your output, it can become tiring as well. I found that out two years ago, but this time I have a feeling things will be different.

If anyone else out there is taking part in NaPoWriMo, I wish you the best of luck. See you tomorrow for the first of many poems to come.

Snow Leopard

A stream in the highest valley,
a glacier of the Himalayas,
frozen yet still running
thanks to a conscientious spring.

Prints in the snow betray
the path of a snow leopard
prowling along the valley
towards an intended victim.

A markhor buck drinks at the stream,
a lord of mountain goats,
coiled corkscrew snake horns
and a man fit for a horse.

A pale ghost, the spotted shade,
slinks along the rocks,
and surprises the thirsty goat,
chasing it headlong up a ridge
till claws and teeth seize it
just as it leaps from a ledge.

And he sits on his illustrious throne

And he sits on his illustrious throne,
fashioned from the great jungle cats of old,
thousands on thousands of fresh tiger bones.

Bought by the hands of the rich city men,
built by men sheltering from the night's cold,
and he sits on his illustrious throne.

Those eager to leave their village and send
spoils from the jungle to the mountain fold,
thousands on thousands of fresh tiger bones.

Snares, traps, guns, the tools of desperate men,
the buyer ensures his foes are not told
how he sits on his illustrious throne.

From Ranthambore to Pench and back again,
the flow of pelts and corpses always sold,
thousands on thousands of fresh tiger bones.

The last tiger hides in his bamboo den
until taken to the rich man's stronghold,
and he sits on his illustrious throne,
thousands on thousands of fresh tiger bones.

NaPoWriMo Approaches

So, it's that time of year again. National Poetry Writing Month, abbreviated to NaPoWriMo, is pretty much what its name suggests. It's similar to National Novel Writing Month, also known as NaNoWriMo, which takes place in November and challenges people to write a fresh draft of a novel in thirty days. In this case the challenge is thirty poems in thirty days.

I attempted NaPoWriMo in 2015, and reached the eighteenth day with a poem about a snail crossing a road before being defeated. The main point of the challenge is not to write exquisite verse on the level of Wordsworth or Plath, but just to write as much poetry as you can within the month of April. Most poets go for the write-a-poem-a-day option, which is what I did two years ago, and it's safe to say I wrote some really bizarre poems which don't really stand on their own very well. Aside from the aforementioned poem of the snail crossing the road, there were others about kaiju, witch's pools, a guide to make a cup of tea, and one about gray langur monkeys which was later turned into a video and posted on my YouTube page.

Will the quality be any better this year? I can certainly hope. In reality though, the chances I'll be able to edit and thoroughly check my work will be slim. Since the whole idea is to produce as much verse as possible, I'll be going through ideas faster than I can quality check them. It should make for some interesting reading either way.

Safe to say, I'm quite looking forward to it this year. NaPoWriMo starts on 1st April, so look out for the first of many poems to come. Also coming up I've got a few more poems before the start date, and another exciting development which I'll talk more about in the near future.

Hope you're all having a good week, and see you soon.

Dead Earth Sunrise

Seconds before the dawn,
the cool of the night
is still a simmering furnace.

The crest of the sun,
a red colossus of violent rays,
eliminating anything
with the will to survive.

The trees, the savannahs,
the tundra, the ice fields,
they all submitted to the genesis
of a global carbonised desert.
Lava seas destroyed what was once
a green a blue orb
on a vibrant solar chain.

The sun expands to engulf the sky,
the heat stirring the flames
as it swallows the atmosphere,
the last morning of a silent earth.

The Life Choices of Ming

Fun fact about being born in captivity,
you don't choose where you go next.

As it happens I left my cage
when I was still a mewling cub.
Somebody from the city thought
I'd be the perfect living decoration
for his flat twenty one stories up.

It wasn't as if I was along up there;
my alligator flatmate shared the space,
we even had our own bedrooms.
Al didn't get much exercise though.

Frozen chickens taste great in abundance,
and our keeper had plenty of those.
Sometimes he'd bring friends with him.
I'd introduce myself
regardless of their expectations.

Then that housecat arrived.

Clearly our keeper had forgotten
I had paws the size of plates.
It's a shame he got in the way,
otherwise I wouldn't have bitten him,
he wouldn't have gone to hospital,
a policeman wouldn't have tried to
parasail into the flat,
and I wouldn't have given him
a burglar's welcome.

My cage now is quite nice actually.
I get on well with the other tigers,
and my keepers feed me
more than chickens these days.

(This poem is based on the real-life story of Ming of Harlem. For further reading check out this New York Times article and this interview with Antoine Yates, Ming's owner.)

Desert Rains

Rain falls on the wastes
of the vast Rann of Kutch.
The dead salt flats become
a living marsh once more.

The empty land of salt and sand
sprouts the year's first green.
Trees and grass spring up
and line the new waterways.

Water floods the desert.
Its heart blossoms into pink
from the flamingoes gathering
on a newly formed lake.

Their ankles flex and bend,
their knees forever invisible.
In the humblest of nests
the eggs begin to hatch.