OctPoWriMo - Theme or No Theme?

Photo by Morgan Dragonwillow 

Are you planning on having a theme for your poetry during OctPoWriMo? It isn't something you have to have just something to think about while you are preparing for your month long journey.

Some themes to think about:

• Love
• Mischief
• Sisters
• Family
• Transformation
• Feminism
• Dogs
• Cats
• Pets
• Dating
• Music
• Ghosts
• Halloween
• Fall
• Food
• Children

And those are just a few of the possibilities.

Have you thought about a theme? Are you a, "seat of your pants" poet writer or will you be choosing a theme?

11 Days until OctPoWriMo!

Morgan Dragonwillow is a poet, author, foodie, urban gardener, and recovering perfectionist, that (mostly) doesn't let her fears get in the way of her passion for writing and creating. She is team leader at @StoryDam, creatrix of  #OctPoWriMo You can find her Playing with Words on her blog. She lives in Marietta, Ga. with her loving and patient partner, their dog that thinks she's a princess, and the cat that reminds her that she isn't.

You can also find her on Google+

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Poetry - Your Muse - And Dance

"Dance came first, the words came later. It was dance that freed my words, freed my soul." ~MDragonwillow

You knew that I would be talking about this, I talk about it every year - at least once. My Muse is just happier with music and dance and gets my poetry flowing!

If you have hopped over to my blog recently you know that I have been making a lot of changes. I am finally claiming my dancing self, completely.


I.am.              The Dancing Muse.              

There I said it.

Dance is an integral part of my writing and poetry process. Today I am going to share some of my favorite music mixes on YouTube that I write and dance to. They inspire me. I can't be still when I am listening to them, even when I'm writing I'll stand at my writing station and bounce, bop, tap, and sway to the music.  No it isn't a desk, it's a rolling kitchen island I have in the dining room because I often would rather stand than sit, though I have a bar stool for when my feet say they've had enough.

Even if I am sitting on the couch typing, as I am now, my feet are moving on the footstool while I rock my shoulders back and forth as I type. The music dances in my blood and my body and fingers (typing) get pulled along.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I do, that you find yourself up and moving to the music, and then pulled to the page to download the words that are hopping to come out. Even if you detest my music, I hope you find yourself either going through your own music or checking out different mixes on YouTube for you to dance and write your poetry to.

Dance, write, repeat! My Muse loves it!


This is "2 Hours of Celtic Music" and no I don't dance for two hours (though there have been days that I have danced more than two hours over the course of a day) but I often have it playing in the background as I type.

 

And this is when I really need to stir things up, James Asher - Tigers of the Raj (full album)




I recently (sometime in the last few months) discovered Epic Music Mixes on Youtube and this is one of my favorites. 2-Hours Epic Music Mix | The Power of Epic Music - Full Mix Vol. 2




Hope you have fun listening, dancing, and writing!

Count Down: 3 Days until OctPoWriMo!

Time is going by quickly, are you ready for this poetry challenge, will you be sharing your poetry on your blog? Make sure if you are on Twitter that you share your poem posts with the hashtag #OctPoWriMo so that other participants can find you. You can also share and chat with us on Facebook in our Writing Poetry Group.

Morgan Dragonwillow: Writing rebel, stress relief explorer, recovering perfectionist, cooking as therapy, poet & author that (mostly) doesn't let her fears get in the way of her passion for writing and creating. She is team leader at @StoryDam, creatrix of #OctPoWriMo, and you can find her at, A Poet's Kitchen, cooking up simply delicious meals. She lives in Marietta, Ga. with her loving and patient partner, their dog that thinks she's a princess, and the cat that reminds her that she isn't.
You can find her on Google+

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Poetry Writing Prompt 15: Sharing Your Passion for Poetry with Those You Cherish

“Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood. “

T. S. Eliot

“Poetry is the primal literary art form, the oldest and arguably the most supple.”

Willard Spiegelman

My father once told me he didn’t like poetry. It was too complicated, he said. He could never figure out what it meant. I get angry at those literature teachers who shut down the young minds who show up in their classes, like the “mathematical poetry text book” I remember so clearly from The Dead Poet’s Society that showed the students how to graphically declare the quality of a poem.

Naturally this made me quite sad. This was my Dad’s declaration and I, his younger daughter, am a poet! 

I wanted to be sure he could read and understand my poetry or rather anyone’s poetry.

Who is the person in your life who you want to understand your poetry or your passion for poetry?

What would you write about to interest him or her?

For my father, it was to write of train whistles and his father. All seven Jordan Boys worked on the railroad. I equate the love of railroad with my father and his father and all the Jordan Uncles. I was working on a sonnet – playing with form like I always do – and I asked for my father’s input.

“How might Grandpa describe this?” I asked him. I needed a two syllable word.

I thought “wretched” was a good thought. He wrote back, “I don’t know if he would use ‘wretched’. He might instead use something like “tiring” or “endless”.

Even though he didn’t think he understood poetry, when I sent him that sonnet about his father, he shared it with his sisters so that when they were all together, whenever they heard a train whistle – which was every day, one of them would recite lines from my poem.

They understood. They welcomed more poetry even when before they "didn't understand".

Prompt:  Write a poem for someone who would not expect you to write a poem especially for them. Think of a concept or theme which would grab that person’s attention like I chose Train and my Grandfather. 

Write a simple poem including word pictures and other sensory descriptions.

This is not the time to write an esoteric poem filled with jargon, this is the time to write down to earth words that communicate your love for both words and for the person receiving your poetry.

Word Prompt: The name of the person you are writing for today.

Sentence Prompt: “When I hear” (or see or feel or taste or touch or smell) object of your person’s interest… I…..

You may want to take a couple tries at this poem, perhaps eliminating yourself from the poem and only leaving your loved one and the object, concept or theme that compels them AND compelled you to write this exact poem.

Now, watch this:

Poetry Prompt #8 - A Tasty, Yummilicious Writing Experience

Did you have a poetry filled weekend? No, this isn’t a trick question, it is to let you know you are not alone if you didn’t.

I didn’t. I had so many activities on my plate that I managed to write a couple haiku. I barely had time to read or comment anything.

I could feel guilty about that and call myself “done!” with the OctPoWriMo adventure, but I know better than to do something my mother would say would be like “cutting off your nose to spite your face.”

With that in mind, step one in today’s Monday poetic adventure is this: Let go of any resistant and self judgment. Take a moment now to get on your feet and stretch or stretch from your seated position. Work on relaxing your chest, shoulders and face. Breathe deeply…. And end with a “THANK YOU”… and…

Here we go.

Let’s dive into using more specific – and possibly playful -  images into your poems by using our senses. Today’s prompt will focus on the sense of taste.

Our taste buds collect vivid imagery when we savor our food. There is a reason there is a dessert called “Better than Sex” although I highly doubt anything tastes better than really excellent sex.  (Did I actually write that?)

I have also found that throwing word-spaghetti on my page makes me hungry for more words, it builds anticipation when I let go of “being in control” and just start throwing out more spaghetti – more word combinations, tighten what I have written and trust my creative process, not unlike what my friend Igor Stravinsky says, “Just as appetite comes by eating, so work brings inspiration, if inspiration is not discernible at the beginning.”

If I feel resistance to creating a “poetry banquet” or even some “poetry a la carte” I know if I start creating analogies and metaphors, ideas will start flowing.

I found this in one of my notebooks which I wrote after eating  pancakes for breakfast:

The taste of pancakes always says to me, “everything is going to be all right, you are safe. Pancakes can be trusted, like the old lady next door who knows all the comings and goings yet simultaneously minds her own business.”

One step further - My children love Mrs. Butterworth’s syrup on their pile of pancakes because she is a character from my childhood table. They want to look into the mirrors inside the mirrors inside the mirrors of their DNA, stacked and stretched across the centuries from one table to the next to the next.

Poetry Writing Prompt:  First, Go to your kitchen and look for something you can eat simply a bite of right now. A piece of celery, a spoonful of applesauce, a fork of leftover spaghetti.. whatever is convenient, available or simple.

Next, eat “one bite” slowly, with your eyes close. Savor and experience it more fully than you have in the past. Taste it as if you are greeting a dear friend after a long time apart or taste it like it is the very first time.

When you finish with your “one bite” write whatever  analogies  or thoughts come straight from your eating experience onto the page, creating a list of sorts, such as:

• Egg salad reminds me of Mrs. Nussbaum when I was in kindergarten.

• I remember when I was pregnant with Samuel & all I wanted was egg salad.

• Egg salad’s texture says “soft, lumpy and more than slightly perfect, like Grandma”….

• Egg salad tastes like (something that one doesn’t eat).

• Egg salad tastes like being tucked into bed at the end of a long, tiring day.

Allow the ideas to flow for a bit. Sentence starter prompt (Insert Name of Item you tasted) is..... (or) (Insert the name of item you tasted) makes me feel.... 

Word Prompt(s) Item .... Taste

To create your poem, let yourself take what you started about egg salad and begin to weave those thoughts/words/ideas into a poem.

Enjoy your word banquet. I'm hungry for your poems even now!

A couple links for your descriptive poetry writing pleasure:

Yummy exercises for using the sense of taste in all your writing

Descriptive Writing Using the Senses