photo prompt – Susan Joy Clark

Creative Life, Poetry

Poetry in Motion

Like a ship’s maidenhead

reimagined

for a machine on wheels,

she is poised

for action,

knees bent like those

of a diver,

gracefully streamlined

in art nouveau design.

She is, seemingly,

a type of female Mercury,

a goddess of speed,

wings tilted upwards

as well as her chin,

holding forth a

wheel

as though the wind

will turn it.

Though frozen

and still

in sculpted metal,

she is full

of motion.

This poem was written for a dVerse Poetics challenge, where we were challenged to choose one of 12 minimalistic photos by Glenn A. Buttkus for poetic inspiration. Glenn is a poet who contributes to dVerse challenge and also has a site for his minimalistic photography.

Creative Life, Poetry

A Map of Stars #Tanka Tuesday, #Tanka, #Ekphrastic Poem

paddling my canoe

under the light of the full moon,

while guided by stars

and wisdom of forefathers,

while kingfishers fly above.

This was written for Colleen M. Chesebro’s Tanka Tuesday challenge. We were challenged to write a syllabic poem inspired by the artistic photo shown. I was inspired both by the photo and this bit of information I found on http://www.ancient-wisdom.com, “The ancient Polynesians navigated their canoes by the stars and other signs that came from the ocean and sky. Navigation was a precise science, a learned art that was passed on verbally from one navigator to another for countless generations.” I decided then to make reference to a Polynesian bird.

Creative Life, Poetry

The Waterfall, #Tanka Tuesday

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA: Trent McDonald, Photographer

rush of

water sprays

over jagged

places, and gushes

down into the chasm,

skipping over shards of rock.

Falling from an impressive height.

it slides past every obstacle.

Continually, it falls but never breaks.

II Corinthians 7:8-9

⁸We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; ⁹persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed—

This poem is in response to Colleen M. Chesebro’s Tanka Tuesday prompt. The idea was to write an ekphrastic poem with metaphor based on the above photograph. I chose to write an etheree, one of the acceptable forms, because it would create a waterfall effect visually.