I don't really remember any dreams that sparked poem ideas, but here's my best attempt!

the relationship between dreams and reality is convoluted at best--

it is twisted up and refracted and evaporated until there is no one way to see it

like a hall of mirrors you can see a dozen self-reflections like a metaphor

like opposites, reflections, parent and child, sculptor and statue, far and yet close

like a tesseract or a dozen other things they are never quite in balance

the closest we can imagine is the waking moment (if dreams are so much

shorter than they seem, is the waking moment so short it disappears like

fickle memories lemon juice steam color time)

when the line is so blurred it it disappears like--

when everything is foggier even than dreams but just suddenly becoming familiar

like a telescope coming into focus before you realize it is a kaleidoscope

or was it the other way? see, it is too blurred to see but still

they are almost balanced, a grain of sand or maybe several like a fraction of the stars in the sky

is the only remaining difference and suddenly they are of equal consequence when

for a single confused moment you try to reconcile the irreconcilable

you try to make sense of the two worlds that do not take the other as valid and they are both valid in that moment they are

both.

and then it is gone and you are awake and forgetting.

(but you are not quite forgotten, and you may wonder years later what made those stolen paintings like

rose boys or maybe messengers or messenger bags or contraband or so many

so important that you tried to tell the first person you saw, tried to stop something you will never

know again,

quite like that,

again,

again?) 

I'm going to try to write a poem for the "20 little prompts" from yesterday, both because I didn't have time yesterday, and because I don't understand today's. Maybe I'll take another stab at the dream one or enter the CB poetry contest if I still feel like catching up afterwards. Here goes!

words are people

because they have a personality and a history gifted to them by humanity and time and still more words create words create words create--

everything is a name for something someone has loved

and anything you have ever loved has a name.

because they are distinct and varied

from a tick of the second hand up to the hour hand up to almost a year's worth of square miles of the ocean, even synonyms are never quite interchangeable

in a way that demands respect. 

but I digress, after all, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet,

right? words are really just sounds,

the economic credit of language; they only hold meaning because we give it to them.

but how are we not to find meaning?

I cannot imagine a fragrant rose called filth--

the flower would surely rebel, it would surely start to stink or scream

"I am here! see me for what I am! I am not filth!"

and aren't names words?

don't you see how she feels when you call her the wrong name, "Dav? Dav? Dav?"

like being forced into an abrupt monosyllabic skin so small it itches

and when you hear the song claim words from across the Atlantic like a crow snatching household treasures from the wrong language "tudo bom? tudo bom? tudo bom?"

and you want to speak and speak until your words form fangs in your mouth and roar your dissent like a lexical lioness

because the world was built on credit, and so we were built on words, and so words were built on meaning

so strong you can almost hear the petals, smell the lack of fragrance, see the implications like ripples in an endless pool of words you could bathe in your entire life,

so strong you can taste them on your tongue.

(because you, too, are a person, and you, too are alive,

so that you give them your life, imbue them with your light, create worlds with your words and words with your worlds create still more words create create create until the word no longer has meaning)

(so that you will seek out to find it again and again) 

@Admins, would Leafy be able to just mention the site where I can find the prompts without a link? 

Well, we have posted the fact that there is such a site, but we aren't supposed to post the name of the site. Maybe Leafy will post some of the prompts here on Chatterbox.

Admin

So since not all of you may be able to go to the NaPoWriMo blog/website, and since their prompts are kind of vague, I have a list of prompts from this thing called Escapril that is basically the same as NaPoWriMo but with more specific prompts.

Escapril prompts

1) dawn

2) growth/decay

3) is anyone listening?

4) earthly pleasures!

5) the view from up here

6) obsession

7) chemical reaction

8) hometown

9) natural light

10) parasitic

11) heaven/hell

12) submerged in water

13) the city

14) pink, like your brain

15) euphoria

16) bearing fruit

17) grief

18) how did the sky look?

19) tough to be a bug

20) moon

21) hands, wrists, teeth

22) into the woods

23) focus on the texture

24) black hole

25) extinction

26) serpentine

27) fight or flight

28) ______ as a weapon

29) monochrome

30) dusk 

I've been using some of these when I try to write. I feel like for me they're more inspiring than the NaPoWriMo ones. Enjoy! 

The NaPoWriMo prompt for today is to write a concrete poem, so here's mine! (I did miss a couple of days, but I'm trying to avoid giving up anyway.)

Note: I attached a screenshot of the poem. I'm hoping it'll work, but I can never tell. :) 

Here's mine for today!

You

are here

in the song

You

love like

I love you. 

Thanks so much for the Escapril prompts, Leafy! I was really liking the NaPo prompts at first, but more recently I've been strugging. Here's mine for "submerged in water," but it's also a triolet, as the NaPo prompt was today. I might return again with another triolet, or something similar to this in free verse, as I'm not entirely satisfied, but at least I tried!

the only real stillness exists suspended in limitless blue

with nothing to do but swim upward

it feels time has stopped with your hair floating about you 

the only real stillness exists suspended in limitless blue

when you have fallen so far you can't tell if you fell or flew

nothing but silence and pulse as the world flows unstructured

the only real stillness exists suspended in limitless blue

with nothing to do but swim upward. 

I remembered that the NaPo prompt was "Language of flowers" yesterday, so I went a little crazy with flower meanings, haha!

make a bouquet of my soul

I'll start in crocuses and daisies and daffodils like shocks of excitement so strong

I need to pick as many as I can hold and put them in water to prove that spring is here at last,

rife with fields yellow with so many buttercups 

even though they'll wilt in crystalline vases as spring fades into summer

of explosions like chrysanthemum and hibiscus and lily-of-the-valley

and I'll spin in all of them and smell them until they all smell the same and speak their names like foregin treasures

until they fall out of season and the clouds block the sun--

even columbine is better than a garden of wilted blossoms 

but even a garden is restrictive

but what can I do now that I'm alone beyond its walls 

for surely I can't avoid stopping too many times to smell the tulips so red

until I'm off the walk in search of purple heliotrope to fall into

how can I resist the call of camellia of white and carnation of pink

and flowers that bloom over and over again but wilt over and over too--

the climate is never right after one snapdragon too many 

I don't care how thorny the rose as long as you don't give me yellow--

but thorn-pricked blood is thicker than tea

and so autumn is full of herbs and steam

that smell more beautiful than any petal in pink lace

healing smells of clover and chives and mint and honeysuckle

lemon balm and sorrel and sage

and warmth the color of tarragon blossoms

that fades slower than ever into winter like the invisible sound of bluebells ringing

quiet nights with edelweiss for stars and valerian for snow

endless fields of thyme, and later

anemones and then soil that remains barren for so long

forget-me-not seems like a blessing. 

Today's prompt is to "write a non-apology poem," which I really liked the idea of!

dear universe: I'm not sorry

for the sunshine I secreted away under the cover of clouds;

you have so many days of it and I needed it to calm my trembling fingers,

for the rainbows I plucked up from my memories;

I'm saving them for something.

I'm not sorry for the straight backs, for the easy pride;

you know I deserved it

and anyway, I wear it so much better than you

you, who has so many better days it makes you infinite

you, who never seems to hand it out for free

you, who forces me to take it from you,

but I need these flowers for my love,

I need this song for my friend

I need this laugh for my sister

in truth I will never have enough,

but I'm not sorry for the bits of happy clinking around in my pockets

finders keepers so no one has to weep

I won't apologize for the crow-like collection I keep under my bed

you will not make my confidence a crime

you say it is wrong to want so many crowns when I have never been a king,

but I say it has always been human nature to take as many smiles as possible.

(you say I am a petty thief, that my nimble fingers can never hope to snatch enough colorful moments to ever be seen in the too-long monotone of time,

but I say that life's too short to let beauty sit just within reach.)

Stardust, your poetry is exquisite! It's so captivating and your style is lovely and I just love it. I've been sorta stalking this thread, one, because I love reading poetry, and two, because I had been wanting to do NaPo, but I've kind of been in a poetry rut for a long time and I feel sort of lost, like I don't really know how to write poems anymore. Perhaps it's just because I'm out of practice and it's probably one of those things I can only fix by doing it until it makes sense again, but I was wondering if you have any tips for the process of writing poetry or just any poetry advice in general? And that goes for any of you--any advice would be much appreciated!

Nugget says urmpf, which pretty much sums up how I'm feeling about writing poetry right now.