An Invitation: With Laura Purdie Salas’s blessing, I’ve started a weekly writing prompt for Thursdays in the spirit of 15 words or less. Pop over to read the poems this week about a pretty pink thistle: This Photo Wants to be a Poem.
This week my students and I read Joyce Sidman’s poem in the December issue of Scope magazine: Song of Bravery. There were a few things to notice in her poem, allusion and irony. When one normally thinks of a song, it’s something positive and praising. Joyce Sidman’s poem stated the opposite.
Joyce Sidman, Song of Bravery from What the Heart Knows
This one’s not a sure thing.
I’m not bound to win.
I don’t think I’ll ace it this time.
I won’t break a leg,
make my own luck,
or reach the stars.
read the whole poem here.
After Joyce, I wrote Song of the Sacred.
I am not a barefoot Buddha.
Margaret Simon, draft
I cannot think and become.
I’m not singing rhyming psalms
in the present moment.
When I fall on my knees, they hurt.
I have no burnt offerings
or holy incense to light.
Maybe I pray with open hands
or maybe someone prays for me.
I’ll never know.
But here I am
stretched in savasana
humming an Om
with my eyes closed tight
Breathing to clear my mind
from the shadows of a cloudy day
to see the holy sun.
Reflections on the Teche 