The Versesmith

  Tanka Tuesday Poetry Challenge: Word Garden Lisa Fox (aka JadeLi) is host of this week's #TankaTuesdayChallenge.  She has given us this prompt. "Today I would like you to choose three (or more) words from the given list and write a syllabic poem using them. Please feel free to add plural, past tense, etc. to the words as needed." My chosen words are in red.  I have written an etheree, and a reverse etheree, separated by an American sentence.  "There's a sea bird above you Gliding on one place like Jesus in the sky"  from Rock Me on the Water by Jackson Browne close-up of a vintage postcard in the author's collection   I walk the dunes alone d own by the shore I smell the seaweed washed up with the high tide salty slippery I step into the cold surf and listen gulls cry out their sorrow one by one d o they mock me? or imitate my grief? As they suspend in mid-heaven, what do gulls care of man's  misfortunes? t he waves will ca...

        24 Seasons Syllabic Poetry Challenge, No. 43      Growing Heat 小暑（Shousho） "Your writing invitation is to choose one of the 24 Forms for your poem. You can use the kigo words and phrases from the Part I challenge post… or you can use the phrases I’ve created… Below…  Use one kigo phrase in each of your three poems in whatever order you’d like. If you can’t write three poems, please write at least one." Northern Hemisphere:     • #1: “smoldering heat”     • #2: “midsummer darkness”     • #3: “cutting the grass” Midnight Dip  (Shadorma: " smoldering heat ") smold’ring heat sleep flees the damp sheets once again up at two I step out into the yard dip feet in dog’s pool credit A Thunder Moon  (American Cinquain: " midsummer darkness ")  no sleep again tonight in midsummer darkness the Thunder Moon's bright light a lie no rain I Will Cut No Grass Today (Double Etheree...

  Tanka Tuesday Weekly Poetry Challenge No. 330 Ekphrastic Poetry "This week, using the painting below as your inspiration, please write either a syllabic poetry form or a freestyle poem, including a syllabic form (both on the same post) ." Wivenhoe Park , by John Constable  My ten line poem would ordinarily be called an etheree, however the last line repeats the first four lines, making it a dectina refrain.  Both the etheree and the dectrina refrain are invented forms.  You paid how much for this pastoral scene? Constable, you say? It should be Picasso at that price. Or a Warhol would be far cheaper.  Send it back. You wasted my money once again. You paid how much for this pastoral scene?   ©2023 Lisa Smith Nelson. All Rights Reserved As you can see, I am not a fan of Constable!  My son summed him up well this morning with, "It looks like a jigsaw puzzle."  Well, to each his own, I know he sells for incredible amounts of mi...

Tanka Tuesday No. 290 Ekphrasis Poetry: photo prompt from Britta Benson  My choice of syllabic form:  etheree ©Britta Benson Come. Come close. Closer still. Be not afraid. I will not bite you, not as you see me now, bleached white by the centuries. Before, when I was young and flesh, I was fearsome then and radiant. But now, adoration without the blood.   ©2022 Lisa Smith Nelson. All Rights Reserved  #tankatuesday #syllabicpoem #syllabicpoetry #etheree #vampirepoetry #ekphrasis #ekphrasticpoem #photoprompt #ekphrasticpoetry #vampirepoem