Friday, April 19, 2013

Day 19 ... NaPoWriMo / Poem-a-Day 2013


Graphic by
Stefan Friedrich Birkner
(Wikipedia)
Day 19. Can you believe after today there are only 11 days left in National Poetry Month? It's sure gone fast.

Well, the number 19 is this very cool mathematical thing: a centered triangular number. Look at the picture to the right. If you take 19 colored balls and arrange them in a triangle shape with 1 ball in the middle, all the balls line up symmetrically around that center. Starting from any of the triangle's sides, there are 4 balls in a row (blue), then 3 in a row (green), then 2 (yellow), and finally the 1 in the center (red). Isn't that amazing?

19 is also a centered hexagonal number; I'll let you explore that on your own, if you like.

Oh, any golfers among us? 19 refers to having a drink after playing 18 holes, right? Everyone's favorite, the 19th hole.

Okay, let's go on to Day 19's prompts. Maureen Thorson says, "Write a poem in the form of a personal ad [or] any kind of want ad. Personal ads, though, do have a kind of poetry to them" (NaPoWriMo). Robert Lee Brewer's suggestion is "a burn poem. . . . burn can represent many things – from getting burned by a bad deal (or a friend) to feeling the burn when working out to physically burning from fires" (Poetic Asides).

Going light verse again today, with both prompts. Not just light verse but nerdy light verse. Linked haiku. This was a lot of fun to write.

Personal Ad by SWM
Milky Way Spectator



M-class star named Sol,
in quadrant D, with great view
of Andromeda,

seeks 8 planets for
platonic relationship
only. 4 rocky,

2 gas giants, &
2 ice giants preferred. Moons
& rings OK too.

No red giant burn
expected for 10 billion.
Promise to burn small.

Friendly, yellow, warm,
I love piña coladas.
Sorry, just kidding.

Seriously, I'll burn
well, faithfully, & gently
a long time. Call me.

—Draft by Vince Gotera    [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.]

Hope you enjoyed these geeky haikus. In my defense, I was (almost) an astronomy major in college.   :-D  

In a bizarre coincidence my facebook cover photo right now is of the Sun. All through April, I've been posting photos celebrating NaPoWriMo. So the image shows sunspots, flares, and prominences with a little plug for NaPoWriMo in the same colors. I bet this picture subconsciously and serendipitously triggered my solar haikus today. The muse works in mysterious ways!

Looking forward to the last third of National Poetry Month, friends, though at the same time I hate for it to end. Thanks, everyone. Won't you comment, please? Look for a blue link below that says "Post a comment"; if you don't see that, look in the red line that says "Posted by" and click on the word "comments." Ingat, everyone.   ;-)



POEM-A-DAY 2013 • Pick a day in April: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30


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