2023 NaPM 11 April

[RiverNotch]

Here I'll be more selfish than usual: this 2016 prompt got me to write something that got spotlit.

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 10: Write a LIST poem.
Form : any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more

I'd like to think my non-poem reply to milo's original thread was pretty clever, too   

Woulda been cooler if we had to make a Liszt poem. xD

[Mark A Becker]

1968 in America – Bullet Points

“We are not coming to tear up Washington.
We are coming to demand that the government
address itself to the problem of poverty.” … MLK

It was the last sermon he delivered, on Palm Sunday,
March 31, 1968, at the Washington National Cathedral.
Five days later he would be assassinated

and DC would be torn up; it would burn.
The largest military presence in a US city
since the Civil War would ensue.

Already, on January 31st, the most American soldiers
had died in a single day during the war in Vietnam.
War protests were roiling across America.

Just two months after MLK,
Democratic presidential candidate, RFK
would be assassinated in LA.

Police in Chicago would brutalize protesters,
and the press, on national TV,
outside the Democratic convention.

An independent candidate from Alabama,
George Wallace, would run on the premise,
the promise, of segregation.

Richard Nixon, the ‘Law and Order’ candidate,
would win the presidential election.
Apollo 8 would leave earth's orbit

before the end of the year. The furthest
that humans would have travelled from Earth
in history.

Other than that, 1968 in America
was a fairly normal year,
as I prepared to enter high school...

[CRNDLSM]

acoustic electric guitar
electric guitar, Electric bass
drum set, djembe, bongos
Steel drum, crash cymbals
Kalimba, keyboard, wind chimes
Pan flute, bull horn, melodica
Stylophone, digeridoo, rainstick
Hurdy gurdy, tambourine, clappers
Kazoo, accordian, collected over time.
Today my dad came to visit
For the first time in ten years,
Out of prison, to pick up his things.
He left me his flute, not sure I want it.

[dukealien]

From Mid-Continent


north      frigid, on which all revolves;
nor’east   dour foggy rains and lobsters;
east       whence      far too many come;
southeast  dark triple coast, recovering;
south      hidden pole and liquid warmth;
southwest  burning    arid     emptiness;
west       many go,  to set with the Sun;
northwest  rain     blizzard     iciness;
home                                    .

[Wjames]

In My Bunker

Shotgun, shells, lighter & fluid,
hatchet, knife, water bottle, backpack,
seeds, salt, beans, tuna, granola, oats, jerky, dried fruit,
tent, jacket, blanket, boots, sweater, jeans, socks,
flashlight, batteries, aluminum foil,
map, compass, journal and pens,
rope, hammer, saw, nails,
harmonica, book, moonshine, hope.

[Valerie Please]

40
An uncountable number in ancient literature 
A French game of solitaire 
The number of thieves you can trust to keep a treasure safe
The number of nights it takes to drown the whole world
The year you die

[RiverNotch]

A narrow strip of tissue paper.
The dried pith of a rush.
A cotton braid soaked in tallow.
A bundle of olive twigs.

A rosewood beam riddled with bugs.
Stalks of corn after harvest.
A dusty haze in a grain silo.
A trail of black crumbs.

[TranquillityBase]

hardly a peep
television groans
dog jerks in his sleep
Are you getting this down?
once more
simple things
incomplete orbit
memory of nicotine
Close that door.

[Semicircle]

Mouths betray word in lustful revengeance;
romantic drama reposed against the wall
strutting away like an opposing magnet.
Apologies pour out in a grocery list--
her dark head turns to the light.
Then hands clasp each other,
promises are made,
and end with a kiss.

[Quixilated]

Tethers

Item 1.
You have a duty of care.
It matters.

Item 2.
That time old Bill said,
“what dreams may come.”

Item 3.
_________?