Last week I got an email from Rosemary, one of Lily’s teachers (who also happens to live in my neighborhood), asking if I wanted to participate in something called, Poemaday (created in honor of National Poetry Month). Here’s what the email said:
“Old people:Who’s in this year?
New people:A small group of us participate in what we call ‘Poemaday‘ during the month of April for at least 12 years now. Occasionally, we grow our group by inviting others to join us. What the heck am I talking about?
Here’s the invitation as sent out in 2011 by Shannon:
“Write a poem every single day in April and send it to other group members that day. Don’t write two every other day, etc. The daily writing and exchange is a large part of the fun.
If you don’t write a poem on a given day, you are not allowed to read the poems others have sent that day. Stone cold serious about this, people.
*If you quit, do so openly. If you need to keep a poem private or to skip a day, I think that should be stated. Quiet quitters are a thorn in the side of poemaday participants.)*
Only group members may read the poems. This is probably our most important rule. If you would like to share one written by someone else, ask for permission. If you have a shared email account, you must make sure the other person does not read the poems.
Read and delete. We are cranking out tries, not only sharing revised works. The poems are not meant to live on in other people’s email accounts indefinitely.
Comments are welcome but certainly not necessary. Don’t expect them. Group members sometimes send out challenges to the group. Take ’em or leave ‘em.
Poemaday is one word.*
(*Added in 2015.)
Let me know if you have any questions, and more importantly, if you’d like to join. 🙂
C’mon! You know you’re intrigued, right?”
In fact, I was intrigued.
I hadn’t considered myself much of a poet since I was in high school – though I’ve attempted to write poetry over the years (much of it sad and related to some heartbreak or another. So, you know, pretty much unreadable).
“On Being” frequently features conversations with poets from around the world – and listening to these conversations, I’m awed by how these writers are able to distill truths and cut to the bone of complex histories, relationships and situations. That’s what I’d love to do more of in my own writing. And I want to read more poetry, because it stretches the way I think and it’s beautiful and often it shares the stories of the things we don’t or can’t speak of in our day-to-day life.
So I wrote back.
“I’m in.”
I have to say I’m hooked.
Poemaday has given me an incentive to be more present in my day-to-day. To always be looking at the world around me with an artist’s eye. To question, prod and poke at the things that I’m confronted with. To bathe in the moments that bring me delight to make sense of the moments that cause me pain. It’s like literary therapy.
Not only has writing poetry been fulfilling, but reading the work of the seven other participants has been a joy. Every day I look forward to notifications in my inbox that tell me another poem has arrived. They’re like miniature dioramas of the lives of these women – most of who I don’t believe I’ve met. They write about experiences I totally relate to, share ideas I wish I had thought of myself, paint pictures with words I feel as if I can touch – on everything from the aches of motherhood to the pain of modern life to reflections on their lives years ago.
Some funny, some poignant, all poignant.
With permission from the poets, I wanted to share some of my favorites from the first week or so of Poemaday. Here they are:
The first one is by a poet who asked that I note use her name, and who claims that creative writing is not her strong suit – an assertion I completely disagree with. I love this poem. Love it for all that it says and all that we’re left to reflect on.
Untitled
America in the twenty-first century.
***
This one is from Tina – I loved the imagery and how it reminded me of my own mother and my own childhood. I can smell the sheets on the line. Feel the warm sun through the fabric. Summertime.
At the Patterson’s months ago,
Where two other children grow
A Grahammy Graham saw his mother’s toe …
And climbed up to her hip, you know.
At first she kissed him
And cooed “Hello”–
The Grahammy Graham would not let go.
She wanted time to watch a show–
The Grahammy Graham would not let go.
The others cried, “Where’s my grub, yo?”–
The Grahammy Graham would not let go.
Though I gotta pee
Like a normal schmoe,
The Grahammy Graham will not let go.
I drag him ’round each place I go.
And now, my girls, at last you know
I don’t know what I would pick
A different path perhaps
But which would do the trick?
I wonder now what would be right
For the girl I used to be
So much of what I used to think
Is foreign now to me
Is it too late to make a choice
One different from the last?
Or am I to live this present life
While questioning the past?
That I couldn’t be trusted?