April 28, 2017

NaPoWriMo Daily Challenge: A Poem for Ruth and Don

April 28, 2017/ Lisa Rizzo

I have been writing (or trying to) a poem each day for the NaPoWriMo daily poetry challenge to commemorate National Poetry Month. As of today, April 28, I have written 24 poems. This year instead of posting all my sometimes feeble attempts to the public, I've only been brave enough to share them with other poet friends who are on the same journey. They know the struggles of trying to be almost brilliant every day.

Now that National Poetry Month is drawing to a close, I thought I'd take the plunge to share a few of my poems here. For Spring Break this year, I took my first trip to Hawaii to visit my good friends Ruth Thompson and Don Mitchell of Saddle Road Press, the publishers of my book Always a Blue House. There were a few days there in their lovely house on the Big Island when Ruth and I would be writing our poems on different floors.

So here is one for you, Ruth and Don:

Day 12

Silver Swords

Ruth raved about them,
thorny globes glistening
among lava falls
on the slope of Mauna Kea.

We bumped our way
along a rocky track,
like the roads in Tanzania,

distant plains spread out before us
green and gold like the Serengeti.
How could this be Hawaii?

Then there they were, shining
like unsheathed blades,
presence potent
as she had promised.

April 12, 2016

Slice of Life: NaPoWriMo

April 12, 2016/ Lisa Rizzo

Hello Slice of Life community! Happy National Poetry Month!

This is my third year of participating in NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Writing Month. The goal is to write a poem every day for the entire month. This year, coming right off the Slice of Life Story Challenge in March, I wasn't sure I'd make it all through April this year so I decided not to post every poem as I did last year. It turns out my instincts were correct. So far, I've done fairly well but have missed a couple of days. Since sharing is part of the fun, I joined a private Facebook group with a several of my friends. We're posting our almost-daily poems and commenting on them. Because it's private, the pressure is off. They will still like me if I don't show up every day.

Writing a poem a day means quite a few mediocre poems, but once in a while there's a keeper that could turn into something significant. And sometimes, there is something that is just plain fun. For Day 10, the prompt was to write a poem based on the titles of books taken from my bookshelf. Since I have a stack of poetry books sitting next to my writing chair, I decided to use the titles of those books. Here's what came from them:

Ask Me

Dear Girl

How to Read a Poem

it is

Difficult Fruit

this Crazing

of The Human Line

Ordering the Storm

Like a Beggar

The Sharp Edges of Knowing

blurred with

Smoky Inky

Felicity

it is the

Taste

and Shift

Small Things:

Owls and other Fantasies

flying like angel

Ariel sending out her

Cry of the Nightbird

I thought this could be a great prompt to use with students. If you try it in your classroom, I'd love to see the results. Happy writing.

April 01, 2015

National Poetry Month: April 1, 2015

April 01, 2015/ Lisa Rizzo

It's that time again: National Poetry Month which means I'll be participating in NaPoWriMo once again. Last year I posted a haiku on my blog every day in April. This year I'm determined to post different types of poems each day.

And if any of you want to write a poem to me, I'll post your work as well.

So taking courage in hand (who in her right mind would post poems when they are newborn?), here goes.

Day 1:

Washing Dishes

White shards shattered,

scattered over the tile floor.

The plate flew past his head,

like in a movie

she had once watched,

like she had often imagined.

How it started doesn’t matter.

A bird trapped in her cage,

approval the worm she craved.

Not his half hidden glance

as he turned away,

derision written in the curve of his lips.

As she wiped that plate dry,

warm from its bath,

porcelain smooth,

this time her hand

knew the reply

she had never dared.

April 30, 2014

Day 30: Haiku Continues While Saying Goodbye to Poetry Month 2014

April 30, 2014/ Lisa Rizzo

National Poetry Month has been more of an adventure than I had expected. I took up the challenge of posting a poem every day for 30 days to prove to myself that I have the writing discipline to follow through. After having proclaimed my intentions to my entire online community, I had many, many witnesses to watch my progress.

Of course already having pledged to write a haiku every day in 2014 helped. My haiku practice was already in place, but before April those poems had been posted only in a private Facebook group. For the month of April, I had to find the courage to send my little haiku out into the big, bad online world. And I admit at first I was very nervous. After all, it's difficult enough to write a poem every day, much less a good one. Sending out any poem, the good, the bad and the downright uninspired seemed like a huge risk.

But the response from readers has been more positive than I could have imagined. I've gained more followers on Twitter and have had some of my haiku re-tweeted to spread them even further. That amazed me. In a workshop I attended about creating an online presence as a poet, the director of Poet's House in New York advised tweeting lines of poetry. He was so right. There are actually people out there who are looking for poetry online. I just had to give them what they wanted.

I even have some readers who want me to continue posting my daily haiku for them. The encouragement and readership I've gained makes me feel the need to keep sharing - perhaps just less often. I have cringed when posting poems that I didn't think were worthy, so from now on I'll just share the highlights of my weekly practice. And keep the others to myself. But I promise that I will write a haiku every day for the rest of the year. I'm up to 119 with only 246 to go.

And so on this last day in April, the 30th day of haiku postings, I bid National Poetry Month 2014 adieu with one more springtime haiku: