Day Twenty

As of today, we’re two-thirds of the way through Na/GloPoWriMo 2021. Like all good things, Na/GloPoWriMo must also come to an end – but we’re not there yet!

Our featured participant today is another two-fer, because, once again, I could not choose. First up is Lucky Cat Comics, which not only brings us a rhymed rant in the voice of a raccoon, but managed to teach me something I didn’t know about raccoons at the same time. Our second featured participant is Experience Writing, where you’ll find a rant not in the voice of an animal, but about an animal — namely, the perch.

Today, our featured reading is a pre-recorded one, so you can enjoy it whenever you have time. It’s a very recent reading given by American poet laureate Joy Harjo for Emory University (and don’t be surprised that the video begins with a song — it was written by the poet!). Before the reading, there are discussions of Harjo’s work by Craig Womack and Jennifer Foerster. If you’d like to skip these, go to minute 22 of the video.

Our (optional) prompt for the day is to write a sijo. This is a traditional Korean poetic form. Like the haiku, it has three lines, but the lines are much longer. Typically, they are 14-16 syllables, and optimally each line will consist of two parts – like two sentences, or a sentence of two clauses divided by a comma. In terms of overall structure, a sijo functions like an abbreviated sonnet, in that the first line sets up an inquiry or discussion, the second line continues the discussion, and the third line resolves it with a “twist” or surprise. For more on the sijo, check out the primer here and a long list of examples in English, here.

Happy writing!