Tag Archives: Judy Dykstra-Brown poem

Speaking in Signs

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Speaking in Signs

Fingers skewed into exclamations,
thumbs jerking questions,
thrusting forearms moving hands to interrupt–
signs are the ballet of languages.

Graceful syllables fall
from the ovals of fingernails.
Joints flex with exaggeration.

No division of dialect or prejudice of accent–
all voices are imagined the same.
What  parts of the mind unknown by tongue,
might express themselves in gesture?

Surely these graceful movements
of words expressed in images and signs
create a language that weds all art–
the music and dance and mime of hands
sculpting  poetry.


The Prompt: Take That, Rosetta–If you could wake up tomorrow and be fluent in any language you don’t currently speak, which would it be?

For other answers to this prompt, go here:
https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/daily-post-take-that-rosetta/

If A Poem Could Speak for Itself: NaPoWriMo Day 15 and “Mentor Me” WordPress Prompt

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“Ganesha” by Judy Dykstra-Brown, 11″ X 5″ Ganesha is the Hindu god who watches over writers and intellectuals and makes things go smoothly in life–something we could all use a bit of. The open books all contain real stories and poems or mathematical formulas.

The WordPress and NaPoWriMo prompts worked well together today. The Prompt from one was to write a poem that addresses itself or some aspect of its self, and the other prompt was to write on the subject of mentoring, so this poem fulfills both prompts.

If a Poem Could Speak for Itself

In me, your thoughts are broken into lines—
the cadences as vital as breathing.
At my best, June never rhymes with moon
and if there are flowers, they are never roses.
Peonies, perhaps or ranunculi.
No daisies, ever, and no bluebirds or honey wine.

Being in love is as common as work boots
or stilettos with one heel broken off.
Hearts in good poetry do not ache, pine, yearn or pound.
They are not worn on the sleeve but remain
inside. Alone. Running the same maze
hearts everywhere run every day.

What makes a good poem?
Avoiding tired words and familiar phrases.
Rhyme, if you use it,
must be impeccable.
Words should follow their natural order
and not be inverted just to force a rhyme.
And remember that just because it rhymes
doesn’t mean it is poetry.
Never take the easy way out.
Never settle.

Use one-tenth of the words
that it is your impulse to use.
No pretty language, flashy language, trite language
or language plagiarized from Valentines
or song lyrics  or others of my ilk.

And most of all, remember that
the thing you are really talking about
is rarely mentioned.
Do not over-explain.
Let me have my mysteries,
and have faith in your reader
to try to solve them.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/mentor-me/

NaPoWriMo 2015, Day 13: Riddle Poem–“Sort of Rhymes with Rimbaud”

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The prompt: Write a riddle poem that describes something without ever naming it.

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Sort of Rhymes with Rimbaud

If you speak my language, Ndovu is my name;
but in any other country, my name is not the same.
No fair using Google.  Save that for the end.
It’s more fun solving riddles if the rules you don’t bend.
I pack my own big suitcase, my own piano, too.
Once people thought I wasn’t smart, so that’s another clue.
Part of me’s a stocking. It’s what I’m noted for.
And I am also loyal–faithful to the core.
Sometimes I hold umbrellas, though it’s a cruel fate.
People like to look at me  in spite of all my weight.
I’m playful as a baby and a workhorse when I’m older.
Have you solved my riddle or are you getting colder?
If you haven’t guessed by now, I think you’ll never get it.
Why don’t you be my opposite?  Why don’t you just forget it?

Solution: 1-8, 3-17, 5-21, 7-1, 8-20, 9-22, 11-33, 12-32
Solution to Title: 2-3, 3-17, 6-24, 9-17, 14-5

The solution key: The first letter of the answer to the riddle is the 8th letter of line 1 of the poem. The second  letter is the 17th letter in line 3, etc. Be forewarned that the word hinted at in the title is in Swahili.  How else could I insure you wouldn’t cheat? Okay, now you hate me.

 https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/from-the-collection-of-the-artist/

Curl: NaPoWrimo 2015, Day 12

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Curl

Walls are the minds of other people.
I sit in piles on the desktop–
a black sun,
the leg of a poem.

A glass eye drops
to the bedside table,
having seen enough.

My rumpled bed
is full of poems.
My closet stuffed with words
in too many sizes
that go unworn.

They are purses never used,
these poems I have departed from.
Still, I slip into their pages
day by day.

I drown in these things
I have assembled a life from.
Prehispanic bowls on the mantel.
A tiny dried seahorse
standing on a curled tail

The Prompt: Describe in great detail your favorite room, place, meal, day, or person. You can do this in paragraph form. Now cut unnecessary words like articles and determiners (a, the, that) and anything that isn’t really necessary for content; leave mainly nouns, verbs, a few adjectives.

In case you are curious, here is my original paragraph the poem was culled from:

Around me on my walls are the minds of other people. A black bird faces an orange sun, a leg lies suspended over a poem. Fish swim by with hands and a woman stands bare breasted holding birds on the palms of her hands. A Bedouin woman holds three roosters and there is much more of other people’s minds on other walls. My mind sits in piles on the desktop. boxes, papers, heaps of contents migrated from other rooms. A case with hundreds of different DVD’s behind a TV with VCR player. my life piled around me ..what is not nailed onto walls. A half-empty glass with soda straw and eye drops on the bedside table. I am too tired of this room to describe it more. My backboard of my bed is a file cabinet full of poems. My closet stuffed with clothes in too many sizes. Belts that no longer fit. shoes that go unworn. Purses lined up but never used. Int the bookcase, poetry books I haven’t read for years. Words of friends I have departed from or who’ve departed this world. My house my room like a giant scrapbook of my life I slip into the pages of more securely day by day. Wondering about escape but questioning whether I really want to. We are all consumed by our lives in the end. My air running out. In my mind I escape seaward. Where I drown instead of smothering. No way out of this life in the end but t drown in something: life or death. Either way, we need to leave these things we have assembled a life from. Prehispanic bowls on a mantel. A clay warrior holding a lance, a tiny dried seahorse, standing on curled tail, and a Huichol painting of curled string.

As you can see, many of the images in the above paragraph fell away, mainly because I’d dealt with them in an earlier poem. Links tto hat earlier poem and to photographs of the room are given below:

For another poem about this room go HERE.
And for images of the room described in both poems, go HERE.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/interplanet-janet/

New World Miracle: NaPoWriMo 2015, Day 9

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Today’s prompt is to write a visual poem.  This is one I tried to publish earlier this year when WordPress was not accepting pingbacks, so perhaps not many have seen it, and certainly not in this form, as when I published it, it was all evened out into regular stanzas by the blog formatting.  It occurred to me to save it in jpeg and treat the pages as photographs and that seems to have worked.

http://www.napowrimo.net/participants-sites/

NaPoWriMo 2015, Day 8–Palinode Poem

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The Prompt: Write a palinode–a poem in which the poet retracts a statement made in an earlier poem. if you don’t have an actual poetically-expressed statement you want to retract, maybe you could write a poem in which you explain your reasons for changing your mind about something.

Of Stable Mind

There’s nothing I said yesterday that I’d like to retract.
Such wishy-washy thought systems leave me cold, in fact.
Those things that I believed in last week, last month, last year
are pretty much the standards that I still hold dear.
I’m not veering toward the right. I don’t like war games much.
Haven’t changed my taste for chocolate or changed to Greek from Dutch.
I still like Indie movies, the Avett Brothers and
prefer the beach to mountains as I like my walks in sand.
Though change is epidemic with apps changing every day,
when it comes to my beliefs, I think that I’m just going to stay
right here in the middle of the leftward slanting crowd–
where thinking for yourself is both encouraged and allowed.
No knee jerk either way, please, and respect for everyone
so long as they aren’t given to persuasion with a gun.
So I’ll post no apologia for anything I’m thinking.
I’ll row home in the boat I came in even if it’s sinking!

High Noon With Emily Dickinson

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The Prompt: High Noon–At noon today, take a pause in what you’re doing or thinking about. Make a note of it, and write a post about it later.

As it happens, I couldn’t sleep last night and so didn’t actually fall asleep until 5:30 this morning.  Therefore, high noon found me signing on to the NaPoWriMo site to get my day’s assignment. So, at high noon, that’s what I was doing.  The results you may find HERE.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/high-noon/

NaPoWriMo 2015, Day 5: Spendthrift

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Today we were to write a poem inspired by Emily Dickinson.  The first poem below is the one I wrote.  Hers is given last.

Spendthrift

I exist in silence­­—
rare life hidden from gross eyes
until an instant ambush
rocks me in surprise.

Pierces all my “shouldn’ts,”
spends my hoarded dimes,
melts my frozen assets
saved for future times.

We dare not look too closely,
lest we see adventure’s end.
If we knew what came of it,
we’d doubtless never spend.

We cannot live for endings
lest the story never start,
For all that lives in memory
is paid for in the heart.


The Prompt: Find an Emily Dickinson poem – preferably one you’ve never previously read – and take out all the dashes and line breaks. Make it just one big block of prose. Now, rebreak the lines. Add words where you want. Take out some words. Make your own poem out of it! (I chose the below poem:)

I know that He exists (365)
by Emily Dickinson

I know that He exists.
Somewhere – in silence –
He has hid his rare life
From our gross eyes.

’Tis an instant’s play –
’Tis a fond Ambush –
Just to make Bliss
Earn her own surprise!

But – should the play
Prove piercing earnest –
Should the glee – glaze –
In Death’s – stiff – stare –

Would not the fun
Look too expensive!
Would not the jest –
Have crawled too far!

 


NaPoWriMo 2015, Day 4: Internet Appetizers

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Internet Appetizers

Casting our nets wider,
we gather matching minds and hearts
like small silver fish–
just a tiny bite, each one,
trying to fill a big appetite.
No big fish
to struggle to land.
Just nibbles,
one after another,
taking the edge off our hungers.

The Prompt: Write a “loveless” love poem. Don’t use the word love! And avoid the flowers and rainbows. Try to write a poem that expresses the feeling of love or lovelorn-ness without the traditional trappings you associate with the subject matter.

This subject seemed to grow when it came time to do my Daily Post on WordPress.  To see more of what I’ve said, at greater length, go HERE.

NaPoWriMo, Day 3: In the Market

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I had a reading to go to this morning, where I read both “At 67” and “Once Upon a Lime in Mexico,” but you heard them both here first!  “At 67” will also be published in Ojo del Lago, Mexico’s largest English Language newspaper/magazine, which is both in print and online.  Before I left at 9:30 for the reading, I got part of today’s blog post finished and I completed it in the Walmart parking lot, where I’d gone to do a bit of shopping.  Dreading the stop-and-go Semana Santa traffic, I decided to finish it so it would be ready for posting when I got home,  which it is and I am!!!  So, here goes.

I’ve been trying to combine the NaPoWriMo and the WordPress prompts each day. The NaPoWriMo prompt today was to write a “fourteener” poem where each line consists of seven iambic feet (i.e., an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, times seven.) This form is also called a ballad.

No topic was given, so I took a WordPress Prompt and went to a friend’s book and turned to page 11 and took the 11th word, which was “Should,”  and started a poem entitled “She Should.”  I later changed the title and the first line, so the words that started the poem no longer are part of it. The purpose of a prompt is to start, not serve as an end-all. So, here is my ballad.  Please let me know what you think.

In the Market

Her mother tells her not to talk to strangers in the streets–
to count on all her kin to provide everyone she meets.
But this man has such lovely eyes, so what could be the harm?
And she’s not often left to stray this far from father’s farm.
When he walks by, she gives a smile and looks him in the eye.
He looks away, but his shy smile still gives away the guy.
She drops her basket, but he still continues on his way.
It’s only then that she decides that this one must be gay.

The store where she is going is not so very far,
and yet she takes the longest way that leads there from her car.
Although it should be blocks away, instead it is two miles.
She only has this route and back to practice all her wiles.
Whenever gentlemen of note meet her questing glance,
Her winsome smile becomes a grin, her walk becomes a prance.
Some of the men seem to be shocked. The others move away.
She’s sure it is just married men she meets this market day.

But finally, one man in plaid does not avoid her glance.
She smiles at him invitingly, afraid she’ll lose her chance.
She sees him turn as she walks by and follow in her wake.
It seems she’s finally hooked one. It was a piece of cake.
When she arrives and goes into the store, he follows her.
It’s just so he can meet her, of this she’s fairly sure.
Aisle after aisle she meets his gaze by boldly looking up
while he pretends he’s looking for food on which to sup.

Pork and beans he passes up, chili and green beans.
He adjusts his shoulders and hitches up his jeans.
She knows that he’s not used to this. He’s not so debonair.
He will not meet her flirty glance or even her bold stare;
and yet she sees him peeking when it seems that she’s not looking.
It’s clear enough to her that something’s definitely cooking.
She’s been around the livestock so she knows the signs and causes,
yet a bull just gets right to it and a rooster never pauses.

The action quickens in the aisle where the bread shelves start.
She finally takes the upper hand and swerves into his cart.
The metal baskets scrape and crash and make an awful din.
She does not mind that people gawk. She finally has an in!
He blushes when she talks to him, and she is sure he nearly
takes her hand and flirts as he says, “Pardon,” very clearly.
He turns and walks her down the aisle. It is a date, almost.
Side by side they stroll until parted by a post

that splits the aisle in two and makes them part, then join again.
Though she is small and portly, and he is tall and thin,
they make a handsome couple. She can see their wedding stills.
She will pick the gown and flowers. He will pay the bills.
When they approach the registers, he tells her to go first.
They chat as the checker works. It almost seems rehearsed.

He asks about her family and certainly seems rapt.
The lives of mother, father, brother, sister clearly mapped.
Details others might find boring are engagingly related
and all the while his pupils stay entirely dilated.
He puts his thumb right through a peach, then grabs up a red apple,
and tells her that he’s noticed her in front of him in chapel,
sitting by her sister and wearing a blue hat.
Her sister’s hat was yellow.  He is sure of that.

When she asks him home to supper, he says, “Yes,” in nothing flat.
He talks to all her relatives and even holds the cat.
When her annoying sister talks and talks and talks,
he responds politely–he never even balks.
He finally admits that he’s engineered their meeting,
but still the news of it does not set her heart to beating.
Now it is family legend, the story of this mister,
with an unexpected ending. He was there to meet her sister!

 https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/three-letter-words/