Robert Lee Brewer’s Poem-a-Day prompt: “Here are the Two-for-Tuesday prompts: 1. Write a Make Sense poem, and/or... 2. Write a Don't Make Sense poem.”
Maureen Thorson’s NaPoWriMo prompt: “write a poem about a mythical person or creature doing something unusual — or at least something that seems unusual in relation to that person/creature.”
Today's effort mixes all three prompts for another aswang poem in my novel in progress. As on Day One, we have Clara, a manananggal vampire, who is traveling with her son Malcolm, as they seek a new home in the Philippines. They are in the Philippine province of Capiz, which according to longstanding Philippine myth is the home and origin of the aswang monsters.
Almost, Almost
Malcolm and I had been in Roxas City
for less than a week, days spent relaxing
in our vintage hotel, with its Spanish
thick walls covered in flowering vines.
The sweet Capiz air awakened in me
long-buried urges I had not felt in ages.
My heart yearning in the dark upward
to the full moon. With Malcolm asleep,
I separated my torso from my hips and
slipped out the window, my black wings
invisible in the night sky, their susurrus
whisper the only clue to my presence.
I wheeled in a circle above Immaculate
Conception Church and the famous
fountain nearby, gurgling like an infant.
My tongue sinuously snaking ahead,
I tasted the air, seeking the slight scent
of a young woman with child, asleep.
Yes, there! A modest wooden house
on the edge of the city to the north,
by the Sibuyan Sea. The salty tang
in the air could not mask the perfume
of sweet womb liquor emanating
from her body, nectar of my kind.
I hovered outside her window,
listening to her breathe evenly
and slow. I was in moonshadow,
soft under a bamboo overhang.
I extended my hollow tongue
toward her, its prehensile tip
moving in serpentine curves
toward her succulent belly.
And then I stopped. I smelled
her amniotic fluid in the space
between us. But instead
of piercing the smooth muscle
over her womb, I reached up
and caressed her cheek.
She moaned slightly and
turned away from me.
Reluctant minutes later, I
reconnected my two halves,
breasts again one with yoni.
And Malcolm slept, unknowing.
—Draft by Vince Gotera [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.]
Immaculate Conception Cathedral
Roxas City, Capiz, Philippines
Regarding the prompts, it makes sense that Clara would be moved to resume her aswang monster ways and then it doesn't make sense that she would relent at the last second from her attack. This is the unusual action by a mythical creature asked for in the NaPoWriMo prompt. In the novel, this poem would probably come right before "Final Flight," the Day One poem.
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2 comments:
I'm really starting to get drawn into this mythology. I've been doing something similar with bringing in my project as a "third prompt". I did it againfor today (DAy 6).
Bruce, I'm amazed at what you're doing with the Elbow material. Are they still together as a band? You should tell them what you're doing!
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