Imagine the Possibilities

This is my third year participating in The Progressive Poem. Irene got us started off with a line she lifted from The Imaginaries by Emily Winfield Martin. So far the poem has taken an interesting path – a conversation, a feeling of reluctance, but then clearly some encouragement. I have the feeling that a journey is just beginning. It’s been a week now and everyone has followed that lead of using words from another source. Since I spent the week revisiting some of the work of Patricia MacLachlan as a tribute to her memory, I knew I wanted to use her words.

Here is the poem so far:

Where they were going, there were no maps.

“Sorry! I don’t want any adventures, thank you. Not today.”

“Take the adventure, heed the call, now ere the irrevocable moment passes!”

“We have to go back. I forgot something!”

But it’s spring, and the world is puddle-wonderful, so we’ll whistle and dance and set off on our way.

“Come with me, and you’ll be in a land of pure imagination” 

Wherever you go, take your hopes, pack your dreams, and never forget – it is on our journeys that discoveries are made.

Here’s my contribution that comes from Sarah, Plain and Tall:

And then it was time for singing.

But wait, there’s more. My Poetry Friday project has been going well. Here’s a tanka I wrote about the blue poppies on display at Longwood Gardens for a few short weeks each spring. They grow in the Himalayas and are thought to be a symbol of possibility and potential.

Blue Poppy

rising like mountains
to borrow blue from the sky
rare poppies stand tall,
shout of possibility
and vast potential
Draft, 2022 Rose Cappelli

Janice has the poetry round up this week at Salt City Verse.

If you want to follow the Progressive Poem, here’s the list of contributors:

1 Irene at Live Your Poem
2 Donna Smith at Mainly Write
3 Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core
4 Mary Lee at A(nother) Year of Reading
5 Buffy at Buffy Silverman
6 Molly at Nix the Comfort Zone
7 Kim Johnson at Common Threads
8 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities
9 Carol Varsalona at Beyond Literacy Link
10 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance
11 Janet Fagel at Reflections on the Teche
12 Jone at Jone Rush MacCulloch
13 Karin Fisher-Golton at Still in Awe
14 Denise Krebs at Dare to Care
15 Carol Labuzzetta @ The Apples in my Orchard
16 Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe
17 Ruth at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken Town
18 Patricia at Reverie
19 Christie at Wondering and Wandering
20 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge
21 Kevin at Dog Trax
22 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche
23 Leigh Anne at A Day in the Life
24 Marcie Atkins
25 Marilyn Garcia
26 JoAnn Early Macken
27 Janice at Salt City Verse
28 Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference
29 Karen Eastlund at Karen’s Got a Blog
30 Michelle Kogan Painting, Illustration, & Writing

Happy Poetry Month! As I’ve done for a few years now (sometimes successfully, sometimes not so), I intend to write a daily poem in April. This year I added a theme to the project: Flowers from A-Z. I’ll write a poem about a type of flower for each letter of the alphabet (plus a few extra). I’ll continue to post on Fridays, rounding up one or two of my favorites from the week.

To get started, I wrote about the African Violets I planted as a tribute to my mother.

African Violets: A Tribute

My mother grew African Violets,
purple and pink,
on a sunny sill.

I remember the velvety leaves,
as soft as the ears of the cat who
not-so-politely
curled around and through the path of the pots.

I remember the bright blossoms,
the warmth…
and much more.

I remember now with my own blooms—
minus the cat.
Draft 2022, Rose Cappelli

Heidi has the round up today at my juicy little universe along with lots of other poetry goodness.

The prompt this week for the Nevermores (a poetry writing group at Inked Voices) was to write a color poem. I love writing color poems! I wrote them in classes with kids of all ages when I was teaching, so this exercise brought back many sweet memories.

I began by rereading a few of my favorite mentor texts – COLOR ME A RHYME by Jane Yolen and Jason Stemple, HAILSTONES AND HALIBUT BONES by Mary O’Neill and John Wallner, and RED SINGS FROM TREETOPS: A YEAR IN COLORS by Joyce Sidman and Pamela Zagarenski. I also reread “That was Summer,” a poem by Marci Ridlon. All of these texts have different structures and strategies to offer – strong verbs, repetition, use of senses, and more. After picking yellow as my color and jotting down a few ideas, I challenged myself to spend the next few days searching for, and thinking about, yellow. I had fun jotting ideas on scraps of paper, the Notes app on my phone, and of course, a notebook. The best thing about this process was that I had fun playing with ideas and words and lived up to the mantra I chose for 2022 – Enjoy the Process.

That’s Yellow

Do you know yellow?
Sure you do.

Yellow winks from the wing of a blackbird
and the ring of a grackle’s eye.
It sings with the wind chimes
and shouts a warning when it’s not safe to cross.

Yellow is the smell of sunshine in the sheets on the line.
It’s the promise hidden deep inside daffodils,
and under the feathers of the finches at the feeder.
It’s life inside an egg.

Yellow is that feeling you get
when a laugh starts bubbling up inside
and you can’t wait,
you just can’t wait
to let it out—
and neither can your best friend.

That’s yellow.
Draft, 2022 Rose Cappelli

Please join the Poetry Friday group here where Ruth has a beautiful haibun, a new-to-me form that combines prose and haiku, about an early morning birding walk in her new home in Paraguay.

Thanks for reading!

The weather in March is unpredictable, at least here in the northeast. This week we had record warmth, followed by wet snow. And wind, blustery wind. The lawn wore a silvery blanket of frost this morning. I watched it evaporating inch by inch as the sun rose higher and higher. But there are signs that spring is on the way.

The First Signs of Spring

The gardens are strewn
with autumn’s leftover leaves
and windblown bits of trash—
a strip of window screen,
a scrap of Christmas wrap.
But the hellebores are waking,
roused by a few days of warmth.
Daffodils are pushing up, up, up.
They’ll soon join the crocuses
to bring spring,
all yellow and purple and green,
to the garden.
Draft, 2022 Rose Cappelli

Syvia and Janet have this week’s poetry roundup at Poetry for Children. There you’ll find a sneek peek of their new anthology that just came out, Things We Eat. Congratulations Syvia, Janet and all the poets!