Day Five

Happy Wednesday, everyone, and happy fifth day of NaPoWriMo/GloPoWriMo!

Our featured participant for the day is Closed Captioned for the Thinking Impaired, where the enigma poem for Day Four is steeped in Greek myth and sassy questions.

Our interviewee today is Mary Oliver, as rather incongruously, to my mind, interviewed by Maria Shriver. I won’t bother to conceal from you the fact that I chose this interview in part for the picture, in which Ms. Oliver appears to be a tiny, birdlike gnome in contrast to the Amazonian Shriver. Be that as it may, Oliver is one of America’s most popular contemporary poets, known for plainspeaking poems that focus on the natural world. You can read more about Oliver here, and read some of her poems here.

Last but not least, here is our prompt for Day Five (as always, the prompt is optional). In honor of Mary Oliver’s work, I’d like to challenge you to write a poem that is based in the natural world: it could be about a particular plant, animal, or a particular landscape. But it should be about a slice of the natural world that you have personally experienced and optimally, one that you have experienced often. Try to incorporate specific details while also stating why you find the chosen place or plant/animal meaningful.

Happy writing!