Day 24 ... NaPoWriMo / Poem-a-Day 2024

Another blog intro from Day 24 of 2013 . . . that was a fun year! Day Two-Four. Let's see, 24 hours in a day, 24-carat gold. Of course, 24, the TV action series starring Kiefer Sutherland in which each episode comprised the 24 hours of a single day. And from our childhoods, the 24 blackbirds in the nursery-rhyme pie. I remember being freaked out by that as a child. I didn't have trouble with the blackbirds being cooked, but then they would sing. So they were still alive after being baked. Horrifying! Maureen Thorson’s NaPoWriMo suggestion: “[O]ur (optional) prompt for the day is another one pulled from our 2016 archives. Today, we’d like to challenge you to write a poem that begins with a line from another poem (not necessarily the first one), but then goes elsewhere with it. This will work best if you just start with a line of poetry you remember, but without looking up the whole original poem. Or you could find a poem that you haven’t read before and then use a line that interests you. The idea is for the original to furnish the backdrop for your work, but without influencing you so much that you feel as if you are just rewriting the original! ” Robert Lee Brewer’s Poem-a-Day suggestion: “For today's prompt, write a maximum poem. Some people may recall that we wrote a minimum poem back on day 6; this takes that concept and brings it back the other way. In fact, one possible way into today's poem would be to see what you did on day 6 and turn it on its head. Or go somewhere completely new. Whatever you do, take it to the max.” My poem for Day 6 had to do with something my father used to tell me all the time when I was growing up. I've taken the opening lines of that poem and taken them "back the other way," as Robert said above. Today we have, again, a curtal sonnet (rhymed abcabc dbcdc), with ten-syllable lines. Maximum Love Papa's mantra: “You have to be better than them.” But what does better mean? I know he meant well. To him, better meant book smart, more accomplished, more clever, whatever it takes to be best, be top dynamo. All my life, I’ve done that. Stand tall, apart. But as I got older, I’ve found it’s not enough. Competing doesn’t help you grow. What does? A warm, crackling fire in the hearth, sitting next to the one you love. Sweet thoughts                                               overflowing your heart. —Draft by Vince Gotera    [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.] Friends, won’t you comment, please? Love to know what you’re thinking. Thanks! Ingat, everyone.  ヅ

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