Nancy Posey Wins

The 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge results.

I had to post this before the month’s end. It’s been out since February 2nd, but I was too busy running between here and New Orleans and working.

The PAD Challenge from November 2009 was a lot of fun to participate in, even though I didn’t win it. The winner, Nancy Posey did win and above is the link where you can find out more about her poetry. Using the link above, you can read about the winner and sample her poetry. You can also connect to the list of the 21 finalists.

If you like to write poetry sporadically, you may want to consider a writing a poem a day. It’s a good practice. And, writing in groups can provide a great impetus to carry on when you want to just stop.

I’ll never forget the day—

After doctor visits
just me and him or with other family
in hospitals and waiting rooms,
examinations, procedures, and treatments
hours spent in fruitless and unavoidable worry,
we finally got the doctor’s
last words on the matter;

Whatever they decided to do
whatever dad accepted to be put through
he didn’t have much time to be here with us,
they were sure they couldn’t fix him.

My life moving on felt like
a betrayal to dad who’s life was coming to a close
and everything was heavier.
Still, I continued doing what I knew I had to
placing everything I could on my automatic list,
with breathing and swallowing
because everything I thought to do
became easier to just skip it.

And then one shimmering
breezy September afternoon,
I was driving alone when I laughed aloud
and had to admit it—
I can’t recall the song, joke
or thought that brought me to it,

but that was the day I knew
that even through my profound grief
over the impending loss of my father,
in my soul I would eventually know joy again.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a poem about a memorable person or event. Day 30 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides.

  Holidays joyful
we celebrate to excess
  then resuscitate.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Pick a number, make that number the title of your poem, and write a poem. Day 29 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge from Poetic Asides

Through this life I travel
growing, changing, being changed.
My only constant the Self
the core me I can always recognize.

We are here for an unknown finite duration
moving through this ethereal passage.

Present with no reason why I’m here
in my youth I happened upon this affinity
grown into a hope a chance dream
to leave my mark with even one verse
that time will hold on to.

Through this passage we’re each alone
even in the company of others.

Without understanding it,
breathing is to sit with paper
and scribble thoughts that come to me.
Equally as unrelenting and unfathomable
is the desire to share with even one person.

If I had to choose having
a companion through this nebulous ephemeral passage
until our time together is done,
or having a verse known through millennia
I might actually lay down my pen
to share my limited time with one who gets me.
I might…

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Take the phrase “Through this (blank),” replace the blank with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem. Day 28 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge from Poetic Asides

A lovely face does not a relationship make.
But, in the equation of weighing whether
to remain a couple or separate,
there are some shapes that matter.

For example, there are
the shapes his mouth makes
when he says my name.
The soft arch his hand makes
when it covers mine at a dinner table.
The twist of my arm with his
as we watch movies together.
The bend of his arm wrapped
warmly around my waist
drawing me affectionately to him
as we walk wherever.
The way his eyes almost close
when he laughs out loud with me.

The sturdiness of his squared shoulder
when I need one to lean on
is a great gift in deed. And then
there’s my favorite, the way his smile
forms a mesmerizing crescent when
he appreciates some little extra thing
I’ve done.

These are the shapes that matter to me
the ones that entreat me
to stay and work in a relationship
instead of walking away from it.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a poem involving shape (or multiple shapes). You can make the shape the title of your poem, or you can work the shapes into the actual poem in some way. For Day 27 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides

A luscious menu includes mouthwatering staples.
Family and friends enhance flavors and aromas.
Delectable conversation smooths digestion.
Delightful entertainment devours the hours.
The slightest hint of a taste missed
as I remember my dad and others no longer with me.
And I am thankful for each morsel and memory
that serves and fills me completely.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a thankful poem. Day 26 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides.

Herman delighted in
the kisses Missie planted.
Even sweetly on his cheek
they seared his skin
with a passion he never
sought as it was unfamiliar
to him. This gift of love
Missie ignited in Herman
was the flame he longed for
though he never knew the
name of it.

No chance to change
his mind; he wouldn’t
be able to keep it.

She touched his chest
in romantic caresses.
He held her closely
pressing her to him
in the small of her back.
To the passerby they looked
the part of any lovers in the park.

That is, until they fell down
on the ground.

Close acquaintances were surprised to learn
a coroner’s investigation revealed
Herman planted an oleander spike
in Missie’s spine and she reciprocated
with a similar prick in Herman’s ear.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a temperature poem. Poem for Day 25 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, at Poetic Asides

Holiday celebrations
pre-empt my writing time.
Antisocial by right of design
still my inclination.

But I dismiss mine
for the sake of family,
habits made traditions
made rituals, now sacrosanct.

And in my ordinary family
like so many others
everybody says
so it should be.

Absence gets me shunned
which works for me
but everybody says
I shouldn’t be that way.

So, for mom’s sake
I fit in as best I can
privately harangued
by my life calling me.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Take the phrase “Everybody says (blank),” replace the blank with a word or phrase, make that the title of the poem, and write the poem. For Day 24 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides.

Somewhere we lose sensitivity to loud music
or someone says it’s time to get over it.
At parties in high school the DJ blares music
as if the goal is to sabotage your game.

No way can you hear
the person your dancing with
so no point in trying to
talk inside the room.

Or maybe that’s the point,
to get you outside alone
together under the pretext
you’ve important things to say.

But then, stepping outside
finds you among other couples
with equally important things
to share with each other.

Oddly the silence is so loud
until your every breath shatters it,
carried out to others around
and your words thunder toward them.

The sonorous crossroads present
the choices between the decibels topping
well over one hundred forty
or the resounding silence
that resonates every word, every sound.

And as you stand outside
gazing in your date’s eyes
you’re serenaded by the sounds
of kissing so loudly in the bloody silence
until you blush with embarrassment.

Finally it’s nearing midnight.
The couples separate their lips and bodies,
trickle back inside, teasing and cavorting
in raucous self-congratulations.

Your parents will arrive soon
to collect you. And so you’re spared
the dramatic decision of where to be.
Dad says be waiting for me;
that has to mean outside.

If you’re going to say anything,
you better make it quick.

No. There will be time enough to say stuff,
better occasions with no noises sabotaging
when you can be assured only
the ears meant for your message can hear it.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a poem filled with noise. Day 23 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, at Poetry Asides with Robert Lee Brewer

I’m running for my life and I hear loud footsteps
thudding rapidly behind me.
They get louder so I think they’re
getting closer, and with what felt nothing left
I manage to pull out a little more speed.

My mind was racing, trying to think which direction to go in
when I saw the pole just ahead of me
as a place to hold onto and stay on my feet.
I reached out, stumbled forward and
recovered my balance, and held on for dear life,
slamming my eyes shut as if the act would protect me.

I’d momentarily forgotten the sound
of the footsteps thudding rapidly behind me
when suddenly they were all I could hear
through my own heavy breathing.
They had to be upon me now, but I wouldn’t
open my eyes to see them.
I was only standing
because of the pole I was holding;
I knew there was no way I could run any further.
Whimpering now, too tired to really cry
I slid down, hugging the pole until
I was seated on the ground like a puddle.

At last, I managed to open my eyes
to see the window of my bedroom and the
pole I was holding melted and swelled into what was
my other pillow, drenched with my perspiration.
The heavily thudding footsteps morphed into
my racing, panic-stricken heartbeat.
And I was overjoyed even through my exhaustion
to finally be awake.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write an emergency poem. Day 22 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides

I have to thank the man
who invented the ink pen.
You know, there’s some dispute as to
who really did that.
I’ll bet though, they all came to this
brilliant idea independently
inspired by its brilliantly simple usefulness.

For me, the scrape of my pen across paper,
not skin since I left high school,
is soothing like the washing machine
for some crying babies.
Makes me feel like I’m writing
something worth keeping.

When I need a break from the
hum and whir of electricity and flashing cursors
when time allows me to sacrifice expediency
to connect most viscerally with me,
it’s ink pen to paper to discover, uncover
and invent my next adventures and record them.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write an invention poem. Day 21 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Robert Lee Brewer of Poetic Asides

I had this great idea
for something that felt like
quite the profound verse
as it rolled around my thoughts.

Then things got in my way
to stop me from recording it.
First, my niece and I had to play together.
And then after lunch and games, my eyes
wouldn’t focus; I needed to close them.

Then when I woke, other responsibilities
were commanding my attentions
to rise above the fray of TV and chatter
to get a single sentence at a time written.

And then, a lone moment sneaked in
so I tried to recapture
that elusive, profound, and much desired verse.

I wrote where I thought it started
and then other random stuff
trying to exhort it to return
to my brain so I could record it on paper.

But
after the day’s excitement, adventures, work
and games, my entreating efforts availed nothing.
And then I gave up and just played.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write “And then (blank),” replace the blank with a word or phrase, make that the title of your poem, and then, write your poem.

This is my poem for Day 20 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides by Robert Lee Brewer.

Family, friends, favorite ink pens
wide ruled composition books
all sizes, bindings, page styles
and the new colors of Moleskines.

“The Mirror has Two Faces”
is my all-time favorite movie
of the many I adore from Barbara Streisand.
Thank God I’m a girl otherwise
according to “In & Out”
that affinity might betray
my natural attraction to men.

My computer in good working order.
External hard drive and DVD burner
at the ready to facilitate
me doing my things.
The internet and my own blogs
the fast tracks to sharing
my life with welcome visitors.

So much more I’m grateful for
‘til I probably could continue
for long pages.
Suffice it to say, some kind of way
these things have become part of me.

Even ex-boyfriends strange as
that may be by TV standards.
The reality is it’s harder to erase them
when our main component was friendship.

Can we talk?
Film cameras: My first and last Minoltas
SRT-201 and Maxxum STsi
and a low budget retro-looking
medium format Seagull to get my feet wet.
Favorite web tools WordPress and HTML-Kit.

No way would I part easily
with any of these and other things
tethered to my life.
If cherishing were an exercise or burden
I’d be totally, daily spent.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write an attachment poem. Day 19 of the 2009 November PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides by Robert Lee Brewer.

Notes: The two movies mentioned have great casts, but I only list a few. You can click on each title to visit their IMDB listing for more information.

• The Mirror has Two Faces, 1996, Stellar cast includes stars Barbara Streisand, Lauren Bacall, Jeff Bridges, Brenda Vaccaro
• In & Out, 1997, Stellar cast includes stars Kevin Kline, Joan Kusack, Tom Selleck, Wilford Brimley
• Moleskines are available online and in many stores. Check out this online site for fun stuff like Moleskine sightings on TV and in movies.

I saw the signs of
eminent loss headed my way.
And yet all I would do
was close my eyes
and pray for the best
because I was smitten fully.

Broken engagements
cross words unbidden
public displays of
expected affection absent.

Over not one day
but months of instances
climaxing with ill-treatment
for Christmas.

After all that
I still could return, deciding you
unlike other lesser men
would change things.

Even after past attempts
with years passing between
you and me being us
again I’d try, never getting it
but the pattern was set.

After all this
it still came
down to you finally
having to end things.

After weeks of pining
wondering what I did
how I might have changed things;
it occurred to me
to embrace my freedom
because
honest review revealed
without you in the picture
things only got better.

For one not so clever as
to be able to read
the bold print all caps
handwriting on the wall;
painfully it’s so
I must be slow.
Still—
better late than never.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write a slow poem. Day 18 November 2009 PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides

The Chamber

A cavernous hollow
one area of my heart
long shut
‘til you broke in,
is now emptied by
your vacating.

It echoes my loneliness
to any near enough
to hear it.

To my ears every wind
carries on it
your name.

Night time
in the hollow

The hardest
time for me—
practicing belief
that I
am alone
deliberately.

Pretending to ignore
the recurring
butterflies as
my resistant parts
insist on waiting for
the call I know
isn’t coming.

Hear now the
raging battle between
head and heart
as it threatens to
rend me apart
exploding me
at my naval.

Here now it
almost seems possible
enough love
can resuscitate
that considered dead
before it’s time.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

Prompt: Write an explosion poem or an implosion poem. This is my poem for Day 17 of November 2009 PAD Chapbook Challenge, from Poetic Asides.