I’ve gotten woefully behind in reading a poetry book each day for #TheSealyChallenge, and that’s because school has started. My focus has shifted. So to create a post for today, I sat down with Late Father by Taylor Mali, a gift from Janet Fagel for the summer poem swap. I got lost in the poems that lead us through his life with candor, humor, and grief. Then I googled him and found his website and a link to his Facebook page where I watched a video…In other words, I took too long on this post.
I’ve heard from a few poets that giving the title some of the heavy lifting can be helpful in writing a poem. Irene Latham does this often in This Poem is A Nest. I noticed it in Elizabeth Acevedo’s verse novel The Poet X. (Title: “Another Thing You Think While You’re Kneeling on Rice That Has Nothing to Do with Repentance”) And here it is again in Taylor Mali’s book. Time to pay some attention to this craft move.
I’ve Already Worked too Long on this Post
Praise be the poet who,
having written a poem every
day this week, opens her docs
and plops one into a blog post
and calls it Poetry Friday.She must know that I will read it
again and again and call myself
a faker. Berate the time I spent
watching “Outer Banks” rather
than writing this poem.(I got this.)
She must know that poetry can be
LaMiPoFri* by Margaret Simon
a playground with a swingset anchored
for cloud viewing–even if now there’s rain–
the memory of a vision is enough
to build a poem on.
*Last minute poetry Friday form coined by Kat Apel.
Reflections on the Teche 