Day Fifteen

Today marks the halfway point of NaPoWriMo/GloPoWriMo 2020. I hope you’ve been enjoying the challenge so far.

Our featured participant today is Bag of Anything, where you will find a bouquet of humorous clerihews in response to Day Fourteen’s inspirational prompt.

Today’s poetry resource is this PDF of Fred Moten’s first chapbook, Arkansas. Since publishing it in 2000, he has published numerous full-length poetry collections, including The Feel Trio, which was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2014. The poems in Arkansas mix spoken language, musical rhythms, and a very precise eye for colors.

Our prompt for the day (optional, as always) takes its cue from Arkansas. Today, I’d like  to challenge you to write a poem inspired by your favorite kind of music. Try to recreate the sounds and timing of a pop ballad, a jazz improvisation, or a Bach fugue. That could mean incorporating refrains, neologisms and flights of whimsy, or repeating/inverting lines or ideas – whatever your chosen musical form would seem to require! Perhaps a good way to start is to listen to your favorite piece of music and “free-write” for the duration  of the piece, and then use what you’ve written as the building blocks for your poem.

Happy writing!