Apr 10, 2016 NaPoWriMo, Original Poetry
Words and Worlds
©April 10th, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
The Book Thief
Speak(s) with Wicked Words
In a Different Voice
On the Origin of Species,
baring White Teeth.
Self Comes to Mind.
While The Prophet is Reviving Ophelia
Into the Looking-Glass Wood we go.
Like An Anthropologist on Mars,
I find my way with The Golden Compass
and use an Amber Spyglass to spot
Garlic and Sapphires, which I put in my knapsack,
but The Ruby in the Smoke
makes my eyes burn, and there’s
Fire in The Ashes, which
The Warmth of Other Suns ignites.
Ishmael, I cry, I’m Waiting for Godot,
Invisible Cities were Slouching Towards Bethlehem
But Their Eyes Were Watching God,
As they sang Amazing Grace
While they waited for the Beloved to come Home.
And The Things They Carried as they
Walk (ed) Two Moons
made The Soul of the Night
glow like Numbers in the Dark
While The Once and Future King finds
Strength in What Remains in
The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Descartes’ Dream is
The Sound of a Wild Snail
Eating.
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P.S. All the titles of the books are italicized.
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This “Poem” was in response to the NaPoWriMo prompt for Day 10 (today), which reads thus:
And now for our (optional) prompt! … Today’s prompt comes to us from Lillian Hallberg. She challenges us to write a “book spine” poem. This involves taking a look at your bookshelves, and writing down titles in order (or rearranging the titles) to create a poem … If you want to take things a step further, Lillian suggests gathering a list of titles from your shelves (every third or fifth book, perhaps, if you have a lot) and using the titles, as close to the originals as possible, to create a poem that is seeded throughout with your own lines, interjections, and thoughts. Happy writing!
Tags: #BookTitleOriginalPoem
Apr 10, 2016 Original Poetry, The Daily Post
In response to The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt: Misplaced
Misplaced – A (sort-of) Fairy Tale Poem
©April 1oth, 2016
By Vijaya Sundaram
She walked on to the cliff-edge sheer,
The slope to sea was steep.
She went to where the winds blew drear,
And fished in waters deep.
In waters deep she went to fish,
For she had lost her soul.
A witch told her, to get her wish,
She’d have to sing hers whole.
For long ago, she’d lost her heart
To a sailor lost at sea.
She wept, for they had grown apart –
They were not meant to be.
He’d toyed with her, and made her sick
With love that he’d well-feigned,
Then went away sans word, so quick,
She’d languished and felt stained.
Her soul had crumbled to a shell
And crawled away to sea.
Her body, to her, felt a hell –
She could not bear to be.
For all around her, people stared
And spoke in soft, quick tones,
For outcast she had been declared,
She was exiled, alone.
She fished by day, by night so blind,
She fished all summer long
Her soul was what she’d hoped to find –
She sang her lonely song.
She saw a strange new fish one day
With scales of silver-blue.
It sang her song, and bade her stay
To see her wish come true
So stay she did, and came one night,
By moonlight, she did glimpse
A shadow walk with step so light
From sea to shore, a nymph!
No nymph it was, but just her soul,
Which she had sought to find,
Come tripping over waves so cold,
And through her body twined.
She cried aloud in joy and pain
When united they did stand,
And then the waves pulled her again,
And soon they left the land.
Now, down within the ocean deep
There lives a strange new life
Resembling a girl who keeps
Her soul devoid of strife.
But when her memory is swirled
From ancient grief and pain,
The ocean comes to flood the world,
And hearts are torn again.
And those whose souls are oft misplaced
In those who break their trust
Are cast adrift, from life displaced,
Until they turn to dust.
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Submitting simultaneously to The Daily Post and to NaPoWriMo
Tags: #Displaced, #Heartbreak, #Loss, #Misplaced, #OriginalPoetrybyVijayaSundaram, #The Daily Prompt, #TheDailyPost, fairy tale