ReadWritePoem’s prompt #71 asks to dig on a solid first line, either yours or someone else’s, in order to generate some new work. I offer the following, which is courtesy of me whyfe:

“Can you start early? I have to leave for the funeral soon.”

Granted, that’s two lines, but still it leads to one thought. Of course, she’d originally written it as:

“Can you start early, I have to leave for the funeral soon?”

Which is probably closer to how it would read if you could read words in the moment they flung from a mouth.

This all leads to an April project, in honor what some call “National Poetry Month”. Taking lines that Courtney (the whyfe in question) wrote out this morning, starting with the above “Can you start early…”, I’ll be writing and posting a new short piece every day through the month.

The rules:

1. Must have something new every day
2. Pieces must be at least 30 words (but not necessarily 30 lines)
3. I can deviate from the original line itself, as long as it serves as a prompt for what becomes the final piece.

Feel free to play along, offer feedback, and submit your own work. After all – when a month dedicated to poetry begins with a day dedicated to fools, what could be better than a little foolish work?

Join Paulann Petersen in a poetry workshop dedicated to creation, reflection, and craft.

DOWNSTREAM: WRITING WITH THE CURRENT

Using notable poems as springboards, the workshop will help you turn loose in the river of word as language carries you along in its current. You’ll generate some new work in each session, while also exploring other poems you’ve written (new or ones you bring with you) for possible ways to strengthen them through revision.

This workshop is open to writers of all levels of experience.

Sundays, 12-3 pm, April 26th to May 31st

Visit Attic Writers to learn more and register today!

Everything is new to a child; each step is an act of courage where no notion of being courageous exists, only the notion of being.

Now go, write, and know your words are good.

My good friend Pattie and I got together for coffee last week to talk writing, and we accidentally wound up collaborating on a little something, which I’ve pasted below. Not sure if you’d call it a poem or fragment, but it’s the result of two people talking and writing down what the other was saying. (And I’d like to give a nod to Dana and Nathan, who introduced me to the idea that poets can collaborate.)

BLUE HERON

How do you write about the blue heron
flapping its wings, rising out of water
in so few flaps and slow.

My childhood was gone faster that it takes
the bird to lift and go.

Some things are too beautiful
for a box of words, though Basho
could make it work.

I’m delighted to have a small poem featured in the March issue of 4&20 Poetry, a wonderful online journal that Declaration Editing puts out each month to celebrate the smallest of verse. They’ll also be featuring another poem of mine as an upcoming “4&20 of the week” on their blog.

Have a good quick read.

In between family life, including the duties of raising a six-month old, Portland’s Gabe Barber is keeping one heck of a blog over at Reading Local.

If you’re not familiar yet, do yourself a favor and check out the man’s ongoing rundown of all things literary. The fact that he’s doing it in a place like Portland, a town teeming with writers, bookstores, author visits, workshops, readings and gatherings of the word, makes it that much more impressive. He has a great passion for reading, talking writing, and being part of the community, all of which comes through on his site.

Check readinglocal.com the next time you head out to soak up some good words.

It’s worth mentioning that we’re heading to the sixth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, not as a political statement, but mostly as a historical one. I don’t have much else to say about it (actually I do, but since all writing is political, whether it is or isn’t, I’ll let the idea of writing be my statement, and invite you to read between the lines) – and don’t have all that much to say about the fact that public interest, in the U.S. at least, seems to have tapered, what with so many minds turned to all things economic (which, when you think about it, is tied into the costliness of the Iraq intrusion anyway…).

This post is about art and story. After all, the war may end in 2010, but it will last in our consciousness for years afterwards, especially as it begins to inform the work of writers, poets and filmmakers, the way Vietnam informed and continues to inform the work of people like Tim O’Brien, Bruce Weigl and Oliver Stone, to name a well entrenched few.

With this notion I openly pose the questions, “Where are the stories of this war, and when will they find us?” Of course, one need only linger in the halls of VA offices, stand in line outside of job placement agencies, talk to a recent returnee on the streets, or saddle up next to a local guardsman or woman in the nearest watering hole or church to hear, see and learn. Our vets are everywhere, but if you’re anything like me, you’re wondering where you can find their stories, and when will they become readily accessible for public consumption, conversation and discourse.

Which leads me to the true nature of this post: Brian Turner. Poet. Graduate of the University of Oregon’s MFA program. Soldier. In 2005, Turner’s first full-length collection, Here, Bullet won critical acclaim from places like the New York Times, Publisher’s Weekly, the New Yorker, Salon Magazine and The Military Review. His work was featured all over the place, and the book continues to serve as a beautiful and gritty first-hand account of a soldier’s life in a war zone. (Turner also spent time in Bosnia during the U.S.’s intervention.)

This week, as we roll and blow into the war’s sixth year, we’ll be featuring a selection of poems from Here, Bullet (Tuesday on the Guest Writer page) as well as an interview with Brian (Friday, Interviews). Brian kindly gave his permission to feature the work and share some good words about a lot more than writing.

Keep an eye out.

Dave

The good folks at Meow Poetry are looking for poems about cats, involving cats, or that are cat-like in their nature, for a poetry anthology to be published in Fall 2009. Take the cat theme as far and wide as you want – they’ll consider poems about Catwoman and the Broadway musical Cats if that’s where the words go.

All genre of poetry will be considered from haiku to sonnets to limericks to free verse.

Here are some specs:

Poems should be 50 lines or less. Original, unpublished work is preferred. Previously-published exceptional work will be considered. Include full citation. No reader or submission fees. No remuneration for accepted work. A portion of any profits will be donated to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), the first humane society to be established in North America — an excellent organization dedicated to the care of cats, dogs and all non-human friends.

How/where to submit:

Email poems and a brief three- to five-sentence bio to meow.poetry@yahoo.com . Submissions can be either in the body of the email or as an attached Word.doc. Email subject line should read: Meow Submission: Your Name.

Deadline: July 1, 2009

Poets will receive emails of acceptance / rejection and notification when the published book is available.

Get to it.

An hour into work I forget I got up from bed
at all, how the cold fir floor was a shock,
that the kettle took too long to warm.
I’m sure I touched the curve of my wife’s back
before I left, certain she rolled over, reached
in the dark for my face.

I remember the frost, how my car wouldn’t start
then coughed down Milwaukee Ave through lights
that blinked yellow this early.

Now, finished cleaning the piss stalls, set to mop
the bar where last night’s smoke still hangs,
all I can think about is Gilbert in the ice cream –
his weakness, he said when I caught him
sneaking it once, too hard for him to deny
the tall vanilla drum just beneath the sinks.

Smiling at me elbow deep, I know the morning
can only go three ways. The version where I rush him
to the ER, his fourth diabetic shock in a month.
The one where our boss walks in, fires him
on the spot because he warned him last time
about the ice cream. Or the one we actually get to,

where I call Gilbert over to the lunch I forgot
I brought, three cuts of pizza, a slice of apple pie,
tell him to scoop out two bowls but make it quick,
then we split to dry storage, sit with our food
and the needle he needs to take, laugh
about how sweet life is.

(special thanks to Read Write Poem prompt #69)

One of the Pacific Northwest’s leading voices, Paulann Petersen, will be sharing her love for poetry this Saturday, March 14th, from 2 to 4 p.m. at the Multnomah County Central Library, with a free workshop is entitled ANYONE’S DOMAIN: A BASIC POETRY WRITING WORKSHOP.

While it’s listed as a workshop for beginning writers, the two-hour gathering will be devoted to creating and generating poems, and is open to anyone who wants to write in a supportive, congenial group.

From Paulann: “Poetry is not the domain of just a few. It’s as natural and accessible as heartbeat and breath. Writing poetry requires nothing more than a love of words and a willingness to let your pen move across a page, following language wherever it takes you.”

Read more, and register here.