November’s more than half over and so is my poetry writing for the month. I’m three days behind but that will change in the next day or so.

Reading and Writing Poetry

I feel the need to read, and chat about poetry. So, this afternoon, I’m on my mad dash to write to catch up some. My plan is to split the time with reading and writing until I’m back on track.

There are some really excellent poems being shared at various sites. If you’re not writing but want to read them, be sure to visit the prompt sites that are posted in my sidebar. They really do attract an amazing collection of talent!

Wishing Us Success

I won’t wish us luck. That’s not at all what get’s me through. It’s fun and otherwise extreme perseverance. I mean, there are times when I think about giving up. No—not that really. At times, I let things get in the way, which is very much not a good thing. Especially when you consider the fact that all we need is drafts and not competition for Lucille Clifton or Billy Collins.

I met a lady on twitter who’s writing non-fiction for this month. There’s a lot of writing frenzy this month, which means a lot of energy is generated in all the stress. So I wish us all success, including me for the catching up I’m inflicting on myself. I’ll come up for air, soon as I’m done. Quite likely I’ll tweet it from my highest perch. Get it?

Okay, that joke is either a good sign or a bad one. I can’t say just yet. So, cheers all around! I’ll be visiting blogs soon as I come up for air today and hopefully things are going well for you. Enjoy!

So long away until
hardly do I
know where
to re-enter in
to my
favored writing space.

Still, here it is
lame perhaps
as any attempt
I might make
to excuse my absence.

This small sharing
brings me back in
to move forward
on sharing ideas
that were the brush strokes
over the work that
consumed my days.

The words came and passed
in my time spent
studying other things.
Slowly, now, they make me aware
they still want their say.

Thankfully
I have this space
to give them room and permission
to move off the page
to the screen,
and on into cyberspace.

Today, I’m renewed as
I carve a new space
in my days
for releasing the verses
that breathe
in such synchronicity
with me until
they appear to
breathe for me.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

I shouldn’t try but here’s my excuse: I didn’t have to stop all the poem posting. The truth is, I really wanted the rest from the mad posting of April. I’ve been in a training program, studying and reading since May. My plan is to take the A+ certification exam soon and pass it the first try—it’s a goal.

As much as I wanted the break, I relish my return and the chance to push the Publish button once again. My apologies for it being so rough, but I’m a little rusty.

I made it writing a poem daily for National Poetry Month 2010! Whew! I wipe my brow in completing this undertaking. And I salute all the participants for their stick-to-it-iveness. (I did write that out.) You can check them out as many are in my poet blog links.

Writing a poem daily is fun. But, don’t think it’s not a strain. And, writing in public to prompts does not lessen the pressure at all. Still, I’m glad I went the distance.

Now, if you take the time to read my poetry and the prompts, you will see that I came pretty close most of the time. In fact, any deviance from the prompt would be due to misinterpreting the meaning of the prompt. What can I say? It happens. You may also notice that some of the titles leave much to be desired. These are the markings of drafts in the true sense of its meaning.

What’s Next

Now comes the time to review, to edit and revise what I tried to say through my poems this month. I’ll have to see if I can remember how to fit my titles to the poems, like some of the great poetry I read this month. My plan is to revise the poems while keeping them really close to the original poem. It’s the most authentic, and it’s the rules too.

Submitting: If you participated in writing a poem daily and are hoping to be included in the anthology, the submission instructions are up at Read Write Poem. The deadline is May 7, so don’t delay in selecting and preparing your poems according to the guidelines set forth.

And after That

As of today, Read Write Poem is no longer a live site. It’s shut down to new members, to comments, to group activities, to everything except the repository of poems posted there. And what a collection it is, for your reading pleasure! Now’s my chance to go back and read the poems I missed during the month.

I’ve visited several of the community sites that are springing up and being revitalized as a result of the closing of Read Write Poem. They are community sites that offer poem prompts. I find I enjoy using prompts and seeing where they take me. The ones that have my attention so far, are linked in my sidebar by way of their respective banners. They’re worth checking out.

They don’t offer poems daily. For example, Writer’s Island has Saturday prompts with the first one today, already posted.

Time for Review

Posting about poets I enjoy: For my next one, it’s down to two from my bookshelves. Either way, I’ll be reading and exploring someone that I enjoy a great deal. Getting to know the writing of others is big schooling for me.

Poetry books on tap: Frances Mayes’ The Discovery of Poetry and John Drury’s Creating Poetry. I do this because 30 day poem sprints always make me want to go back to school.

What’s on your poetry agenda? What poetry communities have captured your attention? Leave a comment about what’s next for you, or link to your blog post.

I was hoping someone would step up and say it isn’t so. But it didn’t happen. Read Write Poem soon will be nothing more than a fine repository of fine writing and writer links. You see it’s closing after April 30, 2010.

The forum was started on Read Write Poem’s site to discuss the closing, the sentiment, the next steps.

What comes after Read Write Poem closes was anyone’s guess. In this information post at his blog, Bearly Audible, Neil Reid has links that really need to be explored.

And he’s gone much further! Neil has done this awesome thing of opening a new community site, We Write Poems, as an option for Read Write Poem members to join. If you’re familiar with the writers at Read Write Poem, or become familiar by reading the postings there, you’ll be happy to know that several of the talents from RWP are participating in Neil’s new site. That is pretty cool!

So are many others stepping up with ways to continue doing what brings them joy. Among them, Rob Kistner returning to his Writer’s Island for regular weekly prompts. And, he presents links to other prompt sites for our participation.

No Longer Active, Still Vital

This is all quite new to me. Once I decided to post more of my writing and engage poetry more fully, it quickly became clear that it wasn’t something I wanted to do alone. I may have mentioned how thrilled I was to have finally gotten up the nerve to tap into some great poetry communities.

When I went for it, Read Write Poem was one of the first ones I found that I braved. I will always be glad I started there. Having the opportunity to continue with this community of poem writers is just a big ol’ gift I eagerly accept.

I’m keeping the Read Write Poem badge in my sidebar as long as it remains online for exploration. And I’ll add other badges for sites I participate in, first up We Write Poems, coming soon.

Everything related to RWP’s NaPoWriMo event is in place. You can visit this link to read about the plans for the online anthology of some poems from this month’s submissions.

The professional musicians, singers, lyricists, music writers, they all make it look so easy!

Half way, WOOHOO!! I am up to date, not up too late after posting #15 for RWP’s whimsical musical prompt for today. It hurt. But I wrote through the pain.

The pain came from all the preamble that was necessary to get to the writing. I had to choose from all my incomplete, semi- or fully-sucking poems to find one that lent itself to a rhythm.

I had to own my musical challenges when it came to making up a rhythm and sticking with it and writing words to it. It was easy to trash the rest of the poem that I drew from.

Fortunately, I know I need for poetry to drip from my fingers. That’s been since from time and when, and will continue until the last part of me ends. So I have no choice but to embrace it…I checked…my poetry and me are better together.

At any rate, it is done. I’ve made it this far, writing a poem a day. And, I’ve managed to write to the prompt, (or better, to my interpretations of the prompts), each day. But, who knows what tomorrow brings? I can say for certain, it’s a labor of love—and I’m loving it!

I couldn’t bring myself to put a third video in here, no matter how much I loved it. The point is, it’s a love/hate relationship and the love wins out. If it sounds familiar, “who knows what tomorrow brings” is the first line in Joe Cocker’s “Love Lift Us Up Where We Belong.”

The way I’m making it through these days, is skittish at best when I read the prompts. Then when I sit to write, something comes over me and I feel like I’m going to do this. And I just go with that flow. I think I’m catching my rhythm, especially since writing poems earlier.

Continuing my Goals to the End

Hopefully I’ll continue to stay on prompt, and read more and more poetry at RWP and other places in cyberspace. I’d also like to remember my idea for a theme I had for this month’s writing. Really, though, I’ll settle for the first too.

Nearing the halfway mark for the month and writing a poems a day, I had to make one big change to my routine. For whatever reason, I was dragging my feet to finish and post poems until the very last minute of the day. That was weighing me down as I tried to wade through the writing and reading that is supposed to be a pleasure.

Posting late mattered because I took it to heart and made it a responsibility to write a poem a day, right. So I had it to do and it was on my mind all day, each day. It popped up throughout the day, whatever I was working on, that I had this obligation yet unfulfilled. It created a measure of pressure and distraction that I decided to eliminate. Today was my first day being really early to post a poem, and it felt really good.

I’m so early today until I hardly know what to do with myself. I’m home early and trying to catch up on reading and other writing. For sure, I’m going to try to go to bed early to see if I can get up even earlier than my usual 7:30, hopefully to read more poems. The poems are really fantastic!

And there’s lots to read. Where I’m posting my notifications, at Read Write Poem, there are more than 200 writers posting their works and comments–daily!

I’m also visiting the places listed in my National Poetry Month section in my sidebar. If you want to read more, and possibly better poems, by all means visit these places and get reading.

One place I have to mention I came across a few days ago, is Poetic Mindset. This blogger introduces a poet a day. It’s an ambitions effort that I am enjoying immensely. You should check it out.

So, how’s it going? Have you changed anything big in your poem a day practices? Have you come across any interesting sites? Or are you doing anything unusual for NaPoWriMo? I’d love to hear about it.

Feeling wordy I sat to blurt it,
just anything that came
singing to me.

I made to type
and it hit hard in my face
there were no sensible words
left in the Guff.

© 2010 Shari Lynne Smothers

Really, it’s not that bad. Rather unexpectedly, I’m in New Orleans until Thursday. My mom decided she wanted to be here for the playoff game against the Vikings. So we’re in our hometown for a few days, before returning home to Houston.

While I’m here, I don’t have regular access to the internet, and I hadn’t really planned to work the whole time anyway. However, while it’s good to spend time offline, I miss it. So I got on for a minute to post a brief note to explain my absence and maybe later I’ll be visiting blogs I regularly enjoy.

Monday morning I’m
three poems in arrears and some
thousands words behind.

©2009 Shari Lynne Smothers

This is a short Haiku to convey my rising anxiety about the projects I’ve taken on.

I can deal with being three poems behind–on  a regular day. But, because I’ve taken on NaNoWriMo and I’m very far behind, my anxiety is reaching  a feverish pitch.

My writing could well be over for NaNoWriMo, except the characters are still alive in my head. I’ve got all these ideas and twists and I let time get away from me. Well, I let family and events get in the way, cardinal November sin.

Ultimately, I’m not out of the game until November 30th. So, with ideas still to record, creativity still flowing, I need to open their creative outlet. I’ll take these last eight days and make the best of it.

NaNoWriMo 2009 Update

Some people say that they don’t write with an outline. I get that. It was great fun letting my characters meet new characters, and watching them evolve. However, I’m learning what I can and cannot do regarding leaving them their own devices.

In short order I’ve managed to get a good bit behind in my writing. However, I have good reason. I needed to go back and do some mapping. It turns out that these characters with lives and personalities still need some guidance. Especially if I’m going to get them to the point of fulfilling my ideas.

Even if it turns out that the story ends up someplace different from my idea, I still need the frame to work in. If a story line more plausible than mine presents itself, then I’ll just be grateful.

Brainstorming

To further my novel before getting hopeless behind, a few days ago, I worked up a frame to give me the structure I needed. It includes things that I’d never thought of before, and possibly over-thought for this. We’ll see.

My brainstorming yielded:

• a time line
• calendar of events
• useful characters to make sense of the plot
• details to flesh out the story

Benefits of brainstorming at this point:

• I see events to develop and characters to make it happen
• Knowing what events and activities may be left out
• Confidence to go forward because I know what forward is

Everything is fluid and therefore negotiable. This novel writing is an interesting experience. At just over 10,000 words now, this is the farthest I’ve ever gone in writing a novel. And even unedited, this is exciting and satisfying.

Still, I thought of things that I want to change and am really fighting not to go back and change them. I’ve made notes of what to change and if I finish early, then I’ll go back to revise. Otherwise, I’ll leave the notes for revision time, starting December 2009.

So, this is my update for now. I still have a few thousand words to write this afternoon. And I’ll likely be writing into the night because family is coming over soon. But, since I’m still having a blast, it’s my pleasure to keep going—to learn what comes next.

Are you having as much fun as me? Learning new things about how novel writing works for you? I invite you to share, leave a comment.