My 2016 GloPoWriMo Favourites

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Going Home

We conspired to stay here forever,

but the house crumbled around us.

The house is gone from the maps.

The river rose and washed it away.

We found ourselves, stranded,

at the top of the hill,

A newborn sea raging beneath us.

They said in the papers

the sparrows were coming back.

They built a home for the sparrows

high up in the oak tree.

Now we have to wait.

We have nightingales and flamebirds,

but no sparrows yet.

Some people don’t believe in sparrows.

They say those are just stories

told to children at bedtime.

I am going home.

My decision is final.

I will find my home

exactly as I left it.

Not a brick will be missing.

My home, as I wrote it down.

My palace, as I painted it.

GloPoWriMo Day 16

The Old Witch’s Mare

I am the mother of dragonhorses.

My children can fly into the clouds and over the sky.

No man can keep me.

I have flown with eagles and run with wolves.

So you fell asleep and lost me?

You knew that would happen.

Look under water, maybe I have grown gills.

Maybe I am hiding with foxes or sleeping with bears.

Maybe those are my eyes lurking in the dark.

You have found me twice already, but

you can’t keep running after me forever.

What kind of life would that be?

Sooner or later you will lose me again

and that will be your head on the stake.


I am proud to say that I was the featured poet for Day 21  on the NaPoWriMo website with The Old Witch's Mare. This poem was inspired by Gold Apple and Nine Peacocks.

GloPoWriMo Day 21

Unhelpful Advice

How to Build a Butterfly House

I hate to be the one to tell you:

Butterflies

don’t live in houses.

How to Dehead an Iris

Before you dehead an iris,

give it a fair trial.

Everyone deserves one.

How to Create a Dream Garden

To create a garden of your dreams,

You must learn to dream

in your garden.

How to Be a Domestic Goddess

You either are,

or you aren’t.

Nothing I tell you will turn you into one.

GloPoWriMo Day 19

GloPoWriMo Day 30

Photo on Flickr by Andrew Hurley

It is the last day of GloPoWriMo. Our challenge today was to translate a poem. This is the first time I have tried my hand at poetry translation and I have chosen Critique of the Metaphor by my favourite Serbian poet, Branko Miljkovic. But before that I wanted to write a poem of my own on this last day of our poetry challenge. It is a found poem which has been patched together from various translations of Serbian poetry I found online. The sources will be listed underneath.

Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=294350

Mining for Silver

This morning I have forgotten a song.

The song I kept hearing through my dream all night,

Through the midnight air and densely woven trees.

In Maydan where they mine the purest silver

dream is an ancient and forgotten truth

that no one can verify anymore.

I seek mercy

for the simple and guileless,

Oh, my sunny ancestry, that sunken blood.

The little box which contains the world,

She has no one but the Sun and me.

This is indeed the greatest love poem,

yet there is not a word about love.

Nothing is lost in fire

it has only been interpreted.

Here are my sources:

http://www.rmaks.zikic-stiftung.de/assets/pdf/SheSleepsPerhaps.pdf Vladislav Petkovic Dis, "She Sleeps Perhaps", translated by Rajko Maksimovic https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/dhura-jaksic/kroz-ponoc Djura Jaksic, "Through the Midnight Air", translator unknown http://www.kosovo.net/history/battle_of_kosovo.html, "Musicic Stephan" (Serbian Epic Poem), translated by John Matthias and Vladeta Vuckovic https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/branko-miljkovic/poeziju-ce-svi-pisati Branko Miljkovic, "Everyone Will Write Poetry", translated by Aleksandra Milanovic

Desanka Maksimovic, "For Those who Stumble over the Treshold", translator unknown https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/branko-miljkovic/dis Branko Miljkovic, "Dis", Translated by Gavrilo Dosen

https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/vasko-popa/poslednja-vest-o-maloj-kutiji Vasko Popa, "Last News about the Little Box", translated by Charles Simic https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/branko-miljkovic/pohvala-vatri-1 Branko Miljkovic, "Ode to the Fire", translated by Aleksandra Milanovic https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/miroslav-antic/najljubavnija-pesma Miroslav Antic, "The Greatest Love Poem", translator unknown https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/vasko-popa/the-rose-thieves Vasko Popa, "The Rose Thieves", translated by Anne Pennington https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/vasko-popa/na-kraju Vasko Popa, "No Final", translated by Charles Simic https://sites.google.com/site/projectgoethe/Home/vasko-popa/vrati-mi-moje-krpice Vasko Popa, "Give Me Back My Rags", translated by Charles Simic

And now, my translation followed by the Serbian original by Branko Miljkovic.

Photo on Flickr by anneheathen

Critique of the Metaphor

Two words touch as soon as they are said

And melt into unknown meaning

Which has nothing to do with either of them

Because there is only one word on the brain

And a poem is only written so

That that word wouldn’t have to be said

That’s how words teach each other

That’s how words invent each other

That’s how words lead each other astray

And a poem is a string of blinded words

But their love is more than obvious

They feed off your complacency

They get more beautiful, the more powerless you are

And when all your energy has drained off when you die

People say: damn, he wrote such great poetry

And no one is suspicious of the word you never said.

Kritika metafore

Dve reči tek da se kažu dodirnu se

I ispare u nepoznato značenje

Koje s njima nikakve veze nema

Jer u glavi postoji jedna jedina reč

A pesma se piše samo zato

Da ta reč ne bi morala da se kaže

Tako reči jedna drugu uče

Tako reči jedna drugu izmišljaju

Tako reči jedna drugu na zlo navode

I pesma je niz oslepljenih reči

Ali je ljubav njihova sasvim očigledna

One žive na račun tvoje komotnosti

Sve su lepše što si nemoćniji

A kad iscrpeš sve svoje snage kad umreš

Ljudi kažu: bogamu kakve je taj pesme pisao

I niko ne sumnja u reč koju nisi rekao.

GloPoWriMo Day 30

Mulberries

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Mulberries

The first feature film I watched was about a girl who couldn't speak. When I went for a walk in the park, I liked to pretend that I was lost. I hated meat. My grandmother never let me talk about dead people. There was an earthquake and that winter we slept with our street clothes on. I tasted mulberries for the first time from a staircase in my aunt’s garden. The janitor was killed in a car crash and his daughter came to stay with us for a while. When they finished the foundations for our holiday house, I went around with a broom and swept the sand away. I was trapped inside the rectangle that was going to be a house. On my first day at school, I sat on fresh paint. Some children went across the railway tracks to smoke cigarettes. Mulberries make your lips turn blue. I was always thirsty because frogs lived inside my stomach.


GloPoWriMo Day 29

His Name Was Yani

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His Name Was Yani

The music had started playing again.
A girl was spreading an orange beach towel.
New people were here now.
The ambulance came and took him away.
His name was Yani.
The woman called his name one more time.
The music stopped.
The beach boy put his head in his hands.
“Why do they keep trying. He is long gone.”
His name was Yani.
The woman kept calling his name.
The beach boy gave him CPR.
They used a beach bed as a stretcher.
His name was Yani.
The woman kept calling his name.
He had drowned, I saw his face.
“What have you done to me?” said his face.
His name was Yani.
A woman was calling somebody’s name.
We went for our first swim that day.
The sand was pink, the sea without a ripple.
 “This is the closest we will ever get to paradise.”


GloPoWriMo Day 28 - our prompt today was to tell a story backwards. 

How to Feed the Fire

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How to Feed the Fire

You feed the fire slowly, you never put everything in at once.
You want it to keep yearning, reaching out for more.
You tantalise it with love letters, poetry books, torn photos, and pressed flowers.
Then you add the wood, small items first, starting with that Chinese box you got for your last birthday.
After that you break the furniture, piece by piece – the favourite armchair will go last.
You need to be careful not to choke the fire by throwing in everything at once.
That would put it out, and you will want it to keep raging.


GloPoWriMo Day 27

The Trees

The Trees

They know who I am.

They have been around for a while.

It is all right to be afraid.

It is dark and I am alone.

Everyone would worry at this point.

The silence is complete.

I can’t hear my footsteps on the forest track.

As if I was gone already,

invisible, washed out, merged

with this silence, my body

absorbed, digested, entwined 

with theirs.

We are together now.

We are one.

Being lost becomes the way to be,

staying still the only thing to do.

GloPoWriMo Day 26

Two Poems for Day 25

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Our challenge today was "to write a poem that begins with a line from a another poem (not necessarily the first one), but then goes elsewhere with it." Here are my two attempts (I have linked the two first lines to the pages where the original poems can be found):

The Mountain Is Alive

My ancestors, meanwhile, are eating cabbage. High above them, the mountain is alive. My ancestors scrape the last remains of the soup from the bottom of the pot, then they wash their hands in the river, which has turned red by now. They curl up and fall asleep immediately, so they don't see the bloody sky that has ripened above their heads.

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The Forgotten Song

This morning I have forgotten a song. 

It was a good one, about a mountain.

I search for the notebook I keep by my bed,

but there's nothing inside.

Funny, because I can remember

how I got up in the middle of the night

and wrote it down, word for word.

My notebook is empty, the song is gone.

I remember the chorus,
which now makes no sense.

My bed is warm and I am still drowsy.

I think I’ll grab a few more hours of sleep.

GloPoWriMo Day 25

The Sky Tonight

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The Sky Tonight

There is nothing sublime about the sky tonight.

No harbingers of hope.

No covenant of the rainbow.

There is no one to fix this heavenly leakage.

The stars are soaked in dishwater.

The moon is wearing a dirty paper bag.

And this dripping from the roof is hardly a musical masterpiece.

GloPoWriMo Day 24

147, Deconstructed

147, Deconstructed

I do not approve of this at all.
it is frantic,
random,
even desperate.
You cannot just give in to your desire
to steal and corrupt
to contort and deconstruct.
It is important to preserve the order
in the discourse
as it once was,
as it was meant to be.

GloPoWriMo Day 23

Source: Sonnet 147

Procedure: I ran Shakespeare's Sonnet 147 through Vocab Grabber and I ended up with this:

I used only the "red words" in my poem.

I Am the Garden

 

I Am the Garden

I am the garden.

I am sure you have guessed this by now from the way

I keep lamenting about the change of seasons,

the fallen apples, the broken branches,

the general asymmetry of trees

and the way the birds repeat themselves.

I am the garden.

The metaphor is not original.

I know you expected more,

but weed tends to take over

if you are too forgiving

or sentimental.

  GloPoWriMo Day 22

The Old Witch's Mare

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I am proud to say that I was the featured poet for Day 21  on the NaPoWriMo website with The Old Witch's Mare.

The Old Witch’s Mare

I am the mother of dragonhorses.

My children can fly into the clouds and over the sky.

No man can keep me.

I have flown with eagles and run with wolves.

So you fell asleep and lost me?

You knew that would happen.

Look under water, maybe I have grown gills.

Maybe I am hiding with foxes or sleeping with bears.

Maybe those are my eyes lurking in the dark.

You have found me twice already, but

you can’t keep running after me forever.

What kind of life would that be?

Sooner or later you will lose me again

and that will be your head on the stake.

GloPoWriMo Day 21

(This poem was inspired by Gold Apple and Nine Peacocks.)

Who Am I

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Who Am I

Red bleeder

green gracer

blue waver

gray shader

sun painter

heart writer

screen tapper
hole puncher

eye liner

ear holder

tooth stopper
back poker 

head scratcher
error catcher

paper lover

ruler feeder,

I fear  nothing

but an eraser.


(Answer: pencil)

GloPoWriMo Day 20 

Unhelpful Advice

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How to Build a Butterfly House

I hate to be the one to tell you:
Butterflies
don’t live in houses.

How to Dehead an Iris

Before you dehead an iris,
give it a fair trial.
Everyone deserves one.

How to Create a Dream Garden

To create a garden of your dreams,
You must learn to dream
in your garden.

How to Be a Domestic Goddess

You either are,
or you aren’t.
Nothing I tell you will turn you into one.


GloPoWriMo Day 19

The Unhappy Ending

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The Unhappy Ending

A tree of solid gold apples,
the king’s youngest son,
soft rustle of velvety wings.
As the apples started to ripen,
a luminous peacock,
burning with desire,
alighted on the young prince’s bed.
“Awake my darling!”
The prince slept on as if he were dead.
Tomorrow he can see us here again, but nevermore.
With these words the peacocks flew away.
He drew his sword and cut off his servant’s head.

Before midnight the apples ripened, lighting up the whole garden with their dazzling brightness. She mounted the dragon king’s horse and returned to her kingdom, where she reigned until the end of time.


Source: http://de-construct.net/e-zine/?p=8007


GloPoWriMo Day 18

Fatal Outcomes

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Fatal Outcomes

Abandoned child,

bay window,

double glass,

absence of voice,

fatal outcomes.


GloPoWriMo Day 17

Sources:

http://www.homebuildingmanual.com/Glossary.htm

http://www.online-medical-dictionary.org/

Going Home

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Going Home

We conspired to stay here forever,

but the house crumbled around us.

The house is gone from the maps.

The river rose and washed it away.

We found ourselves, stranded,

at the top of the hill,

A newborn sea raging beneath us.

They said in the papers

the sparrows were coming back.

They built a home for the sparrows

high up in the oak tree.

Now we have to wait.

We have nightingales and flamebirds,

but no sparrows yet.

Some people don’t believe in sparrows.

They say those are just stories

told to children at bedtime.

I am going home.

My decision is final.

I will find my home

exactly as I left it.

Not a brick will be missing.

My home, as I wrote it down.

My palace, as I painted it.

GloPoWriMo Day 16

My Pantry

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My Pantry

My pantry is empty.

The winter was long.

I ate through

the cheeses,

the nuts and the chutneys.

I finished my water supplies.

My pantry is empty,

but it is nice and cool here.

I think I’ll stay for a while,

and maybe they’ll stop looking for me.

GloPoWriMo Day 15

Random Facts

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Random Facts

Odontophobia is the fear of teeth.
The king of hearts is the only king without a moustache.
Every year about 98% of the atoms in your body are replaced.
When snakes are born with two heads, they fight each other for food.
The oldest star is 13.8 billion years old.


Source: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~bingbin/


GloPoWriMo Day 14

What the Fortune Cookie Said

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What the Fortune Cookie Said

Good things take time.
The best is yet to come.
Happiness is an activity.
Those who walk in other's tracks leave no footprints.
Things are never quite the way they seem.
Digital circuits are made from analog parts.
A feeling is an idea with roots.
Before you can be reborn you must die.
Someday everything will make perfect sense.
Land is always on the mind of a flying bird.
The man on the top of the mountain did not fall there.
Rivers need springs.
If winter comes, can spring be far behind?

Source: http://www.fortunecookiemessage.com/archive.php?start=150

GloPoWriMo Day 13

Guess What I'm Talking About

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Guess What I'm Talking About

Dream dictionary.
Getting to know you.
Myths and legends.
Coded message trail.
Alien vocabulary.
Big events.
Book titles,
unlocked achievements.
Virtual world tourists.
Grammar safari.
Minimal pair poems.
Normalisation,
against all odds.
Schwa what?
Someone I know.
Message from the past,
meaning of words.
Crazy poems,
testing me,
testing you.
Do you dream?


Source: Stanley, Graham. Language Learning with Technology: Ideas for Integrating Technology in the Language Classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Print.


GloPoWriMo Day 12

A Lazy River

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A Lazy River

A lazy river
on a summer day.
Blue skies.
Sleepy bees and dizzy swallows.
A deep shade of a willow tree.
And in the thicket,
swaying gently,
a pig’s head in a sack.


GloPoWriMo Day 11

The Only Problem

                        

GloPoWriMo Day 10

         

                                  

Addiction

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Addiction 

You are my hideout.
A cocoon,
a dreamless dream.
Sweet on my tongue at first,
you leave a bitter aftertaste.
You are not a person, or a thing.
You are oblivion.
You promised once to make me immortal.
You gave me nothing.
It was the hope that destroyed me.
I chose this dungeon willingly.
I keep waiting in the dark.
You say you will come
and bring me something.
So I wait.
I have always been naïve
that way.


GloPoWriMo Day 9

Sunflowers

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Sunflowers

You say it takes courage
 to stare at the source,
 to know its face this intimately,
 to dissolve and die,
 each day a little,
 until the only thing left
is the black essence
of light.
You say they are pretty,
almost divine.
But they hide a dirty secret.
They are cold blooded.
They can never get warm enough.
They devour the light
and turn it into something
small
and dark.


GloPoWriMo Day 8

Urban Legends

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Urban Legends

Fear not the howling
or the shadows.
This is just night

playing tricks, just night.
This ghastly howling,
these horrid shadows,

hollow-eyed shadows
at midnight.
It’s the dead howling

the shadows of the dead howling at the moon all night.


GloPoWriMo Day 7

Two Poems for Day 6

                                     Roots by Frida Kahlo

Out of This

I don’t know what will grow out of this.
I asked, but they wouldn’t tell me.
So I wait.
I lie there patiently.
I slap mud onto myself.
I am wide open
for everyone to interpret
as they will.
As a metaphor,
I might be predictable and plain.
As a process,
I am unstoppable.
One day there will be fruit.
I can’t wait to see what grows
out of this.

2016 April PAD Challenge, Day 6

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Is It Edible

What is this fruit?

Is it edible?

I wonder.

I have never seen anything like this.

It is red and juicy.

It smells sweet.

Maybe it’s poisonous?

I will never find out.

It’s beyond my reach.


GloPoWriMo Day 6

Love-Lies-Bleeding

Amaranth, Love-Lies-Bleeding

Love-lies-bleeding

It was love that lied.

Her love let her down.

Now love lies,

love lies bleeding,

her love lies bleeding

in broken colours.

It is four o’clock.

Morning glory.

NaPoWriMo Day 5

August

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August

Scorched grass.
Fallen apples.
The beginning of decay.
That’s when it all started.
It didn’t seem like much at first.
It got dark early
and we had to go inside.
The next day
the wind picked up
and the birds were silenced.


GloPoWriMo Day 4, 2016 April PAD Challenge, Day 4

The Three Pebbles

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The Three Pebbles

The first one will cut your skin.
The second one will break your toe.
The third one will trip you
and make you fall over.


GloPoWriMo Day 3, 2016 April PAD Challenge Day 3

A Cliché

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A Cliché 

This was a school assignment.
I borrowed my father’s camera.
Normally, he wouldn’t let me touch it, but
this was important.
You are kneeling on the grass.
There is a yellow car in the background.
You are smiling.
We were friends for a while.
Then we were enemies.
In this photo, however, you are smiling
and I am holding a camera.
Everyone can take a photo nowadays.
Back then, you had to wait.
The moment had to be perfect,
the light and the distance taken into account.
You had only one chance to get it right.
We missed ours.
We probably thought there would be time.
This is a cliché because you died young
and we never talked again.


NaPoWriMo Day 2, 2016 April PAD Day 2

Bottled Up

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Bottled Up

It cannot escape, or
so they say.
Ignore the hissing from within.

The bottle is sealed and
if handled carefully,
it should last you forever.


NaPoWriMo2016, Day 1