Day 24 ... NaPoWriMo / Poem-a-Day 2025 // Stafford 98

Maureen Thorson’s NaPoWriMo prompt: “write a poem that involves people making music together, and that references – with a lyric or line – a song or poem that is important to you.” Robert Lee Brewer’s Poem-a-Day prompt: “write a time of day poem. You can pick a specific time of day (like the songs "3 A.M. Eternal," by The KLF, or "12:51," by The Strokes), or it can be a more generalized thing (like "early morning" or "lunch time" or whatever). Snack time is one of my favorite times of day, for sure. (And don't forget poeming time!)” Today, I'm fulfilling both prompts with a tanka, untitled, of course. The prompts came in here about 11:00pm last night — midnight, I think, in the time zone where both Maureen and Robert happen to be. I was still up and had written a decent draft by about 12:05am (in the wee hours of this morning) and then finished the poem today. Several times of day in this one. The Bangles sang, “Six o’clock already,” like I do. I wake each morning at 6, take pain meds. Then again at 12, 2, 6, 10, and 12. Just to make it through one more day. —Draft by Vince Gotera    [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.] The lyric "Six o'clock already" starts off the song "Manic Monday" by The Bangles (1986), composed by Prince. One of my favorites of The Bangles' songs. Here's a video of them performing the song live in 2011, twenty-five years later. Friends, Alan has "gone rogue" today, meaning he's not working from the day's prompts but instead going with a theme of his own, dealing with the James Weldon Johnson novel The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. UPDATE: I had misunderstood how Alan was working with the prompts today. He was working with the music prompt and not going rogue. So sorry, Alan! Playing by Ear As a youth, the Ex-Coloured Man in Johnson’s novel learns by ear to play piano, the one his white father gives him when he perceives value his blood has granted the son he has sired by his black mistress. Later reading notes under duress but even then inventing improvisations, later and in love he became entrapped within measured bars while accompanying a girl who could not improvise with his young virtuosity. We think of love as liberating until we have fallen into it. Let it extend us as far as it can, the tie holds, a securing tether, each path becomes reconnaissance and each echoed misstep resonates. —Draft by Thomas Alan Holmes    [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.] Incidentally, I got some cool poetry news recently. My book Dragons & Rayguns has been nominated for the Elgin Award from the SFPA (the international Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association) for best speculative poetry book published in the last two years. Wish me luck! Friends, won’t you comment, please? Love to know what you’re thinking. Thanks! Ingat, everyone.  ヅ

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