NaPM April 05 2016

[milo]

Rules: Write a poem for national poetry month on the topic or form described. Each poem should appear as a separate reply to this thread. The goal is to, at the end of the month have written 30 poems for National Poetry Month. 


Topic 05: Write an "ekphrastic" poem - a poem inspired by a piece of artwork. Provide a link to the artwork if you can.

Form : any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more

Questions?

[Leanne]

Creed

And from the dirt, we see
our molecules pressed into the soles
of Your departing feet as You
rise toward power, past the oceans
-- barren now -- that fed You, 
past the sun that burns
the flowers; You stretch to devour
the dove, consume the Queen
of Heaven and begin the storm
that will baptise the world anew,
so that all mankind is equally
ground beneath Your feet. 




The Ascension of Christ by Salvador Dali

[cidermaid]

She is not there.
At dawn she blushed the grass
as she passed.  Pausing
under the aurora of dawn,
which dappled her downy skin;
she inhaled
a sample of oak scented air,
rich with light crushed greens.

She is not there.
Long before you arose,
She posed, framed
in a half-light halo.
Full daylight will soon
erase her imprint,
that lingers in the shadow
of your picture.

[billy]

WTF

I hadn't shit since two weeks past
and though i strained i couldn't cast
a poop on floor; a plop in sand.
Could it be my cat food's canned?

I drank a lot of full fat cream
enough to make a kitty scream.
Whoever left the Cheddar out
deserves a solid bloody clout.

Now I'm at the vets in pain
he said my explanation's lame.
The way he treats me is a farce;
oh FUCK! His fingers up my arse.

[bedeep]

I was thinking, it would be cool to use an image prompt, I enjoy those! And here one is, how about that.

I'll be back....

hahahahaah just read yours, Billy. LOL!

[billy]

it's my revenge for all those cute cat pics

[Weeded]

Goddammit Billy you murdered it 
 I was gonna do something comedic but there ain't no coming close to that, the poem or the picture 

---

Dizzily stepping into a blur
of blissful swirls taking my feet
down an unraveling trail to the tree
of the body, of the Earth.

I bounce along, radiating
every inch of spectrum,
I learn every inch from rectum
to tongue, freely aviating

without worry. My limbs stretch,
I see the sun like I've never seen,
I feel every blade of grass careen
to the point its unsettling. I retch,

a natural reaction,
these types of interactions.

[bedeep]

Smart Food

"Say cheese!" they shout,
grinning like bacon.

But where is my banana,
where is the pitcher that calls
the sink black, oh where
is my other hat?

I have teeth? Oh blessed
vine of my body, how
bleeds this meat of choice
sauces? How open
must I become?

Never have I been.
Never, I say! Howdy,
all you chickens,
let's have that wishbone now,
come on, don't be coy.

I have no seeds.

It's over.

Bury me not.

[Achebe]

painting: Bacchus and Ariadne, Titian


Would you deny? 

Would you rebuff the dimpled god
halfway towards you flung?
In the Aegean noon, the sea is
blue as Iznik tiles,
and blue the bright varnisher's sky,
and high your coronet hung.

Would you deny the rimpled god
in the six foot canvas strung
from the whitewashed wall of the gallery - 
crop the Sylvan revelry,
disperse the mob, empty the square?

I'll still be sitting in this chair
looking at your face endlessly –
Ariadne, my Ariadne,
blue as the crocus flowers.

[RiverNotch]

REPRESENTATION



Isolate -- turn of the century
prostrate to past and present -- tears
rolling down windless slopes -- wings, loins
hacked, scattered -- off the immortal

I AM -- desiring no malice
seated, flying, fallen -- peacock eyes
filled with hateful flame -- with rueful power!
and skin glowing copper
turned tarnished tin --

Though my skin is earth
and Venus is my favored planet,
Saturn cannot conquer. There is
only Love within this fire,
misplaced, cracked, consuming,

yet nevertheless Hallowed,
for I AM nothing -- a child
still, enjoying -- sunset flowers
in the shattered forms of dusk --



WILL

--

[paintings, second The Demon Seated, 1890, oil on canvas by Mikhail Vrubel,first The Demon Downcast, 1902, oil on canvas by Mikhail Vrubel, both to be found in The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia. I was lucky enough to discover these in Russia, neither being Russian or in Russia -- bloody magnificent! and for the interested: http://artinrussia.org/dueling-demons-mi...-downcast/]

[Keith]

My train of thought

Three pairs of thin boned legs
hung over the marble monument,
a tribute to the first death on a railway.
“A rocket up the arse” someone joked.

Seed heads swayed like flotsam
sticking to the oil soaked sleepers,
the overgrown sidings wilted in the heat
flattened by ripped seat bikes.

White rocks, so big they were hard to walk on
lined the polish-topped rails,
our pennies had been placed in a row,
sitting back we waited for the train.

That was when I first felt it,
a steel echo, an unstoppable tremor.
Of course now I look back there were signs,
the counting down before I spoke,
the checking of my wardrobe door,
clothes folded, bed sheets with hospital corners.
What child does that?

The ten tonne press hammered the queens face smooth
and sent the coins spinning,
as the tail of the train rattled away
we flocked like seagulls over a fishing trawler.
I couldn’t find my penny and I couldn’t leave
I turned each stone on my knees, bleeding
in the heat, scoured the track for hours,
compelled to keep riding my derailment.

I don’t think I ever
really came out of that tunnel.



Sculpture by Thomas Wightman

[just mercedes]

What Yeats saw in Millais’ painting


Ophelia lies
under the willow.
Leaf shadows flicker
where dragonflies and flowers
hover.

The shells of her ears,
half-hidden in the secret
weeds of her hair,
hear nothing.

Her sightless gaze reflects:
a fish-eye image, filigree
of shade and sky,
all of time since Caesar’s mind
moved in silence,
a long-legged fly.


https://www.google.co.nz/imgres?imgurl=h...ks%3Ds1200&imgrefurl=http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/asset-viewer/-wGU6cT4JixtPA%3Futm_source%3Dgoogle%26utm_medium%3Dkp%26hl%3Den%26projectId%3Dart-project&h=816&w=1200&tbnid=fpF7mdwMEBnIHM:&tbnh=136&tbnw=200&docid=78KU74HLSQmy7M&itg=1&usg=__sobka6AyNj68gF0h10yePgRA44w=

also referencing Yeat's poem http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/long-legged-fly/

[ellajam]

I and the Village by Marc Chagall (1911)


Questions My Father Wouldn't Answer

She's set apart, she's floating upside down.
All else seems right, a thriving farming town
with goats to milk and fields of hay to scythe,
together animals and men are blithe:
a happy world, why does she tumble 'round?

Her feet sit high above her like a crown
but still a smile when turned becomes a frown,
why would she fret with such a peaceful life?
She's set apart, she's floating

underneath her house, its roof points at the ground.
Within the wedge split by her bright blue gown
her face is blank. Her empty arms are lithe
but though her husband's near he sees no wife.
Her head's so low when spring rains come she'll drown,
she's set apart, she's floating.

[heslopian]

The Dreamer and the Critic

Peter Getting Out of Nick's Pool by David Hockney http://www.artfund.org/assets/what-to-se...llery1.jpg

The line of dream is crisp and clean,
a diagram of thought and lust,
given to us without a preen
(like that belonging to a naughty bust,
allowed backstage by the pantomime dame).

'It is perfect' agree critics,
'much too perfect and crystalline.
It holds us as critics apart,
without an agreeable gaudiness.'
But is not that what dreams are meant to do?

The mind arranges, tidies up,
it gives us shapes on which to gorge,
squares and rectangles. Let me sup...
a dreamer below these critical hordes.

[Tracy Mitchell]

http://uploads5.wikiart.org/images/man-r...!Large.jpg

[heslopian]

I really enjoyed that Teagan, and your post crosses over into visual art very well. As a poem first and foremost, though, it's very good, conveying what is almost a stream-of-consciousness response to the artwork.

[Tracy Mitchell]

Thanks, Heslopian. I am still wallowing in the relief of surviving the Danse.

[heslopian]

NO-ONE SURVIVES THE DANSE, CHILD.

[Weeded]

[heslopian]

This one reminds me a bit of Anne Sexton's poem "Her Kind". The use of surrealism and magic creates a sense of unease that matches the painting, but also distorts the reader's perception of reality in a pleasing, interesting way. She's in this ordinary world of farms and farmers, yet she's apart and breaking the conventions. Thank you for the read

I and the Village by Marc Chagall (1911)


Questions My Father Wouldn't Answer

She's set apart, she's floating upside down.
All else seems right, a thriving farming town
with goats to milk and fields of hay to scythe,
together animals and men are blithe:
a happy world, why does she tumble 'round?

Her feet sit high above her like a crown
but still a smile when turned becomes a frown,
why would she fret with such a peaceful life?
She's set apart, she's floating

underneath her house, its roof points at the ground.
Within the wedge split by her bright blue gown
her face is blank. Her empty arms are lithe
but though her husband's near he sees no wife.
Her head's so low when spring rains come she'll drown,
she's set apart, she's floating.