Praying Mantis #NaPoWriMo

time is suspended, up-ended
descending as it reaches ascendance

whomever discovered the beauty of a pardon 
would themselves bask 
in the sunshine of forgiveness
though of course it’s no easy task

do unto others as you wish you could
do it till you’ve done it good

play-acting is a form of trickery
but also a way toward higher self alchemy

I would interface with you, outlandishly
if you’d let me

just call me, Asian Provocateur
Sir

the full-bodiedness of a good red 
catches me unaware sometimes
so let’s ditch the guise of politeness
and pour another instead

there are auspices too in the sad shade of things

maybe we will, maybe we won’t, dot dot dot

togethernesses can also be an aloneness of

if words aren’t enough to pierce the heart 
one must use music,
one must use art

anosmic, I plod through the day and hope 
all my other senses compensate
until by dusk, all becomes cosmic

there will always be reasons for photography
always, like portals of water, like fabric 
animated by a soft wind, like 
beautiful hands and how they do things

^{_{© N Nazir 2024}}

NaPoWriMo Prompt 26: to write a poem that involves alliteration, consonance, and assonance. Alliteration is the repetition of a particular consonant sound at the beginning of multiple words. Consonance is the repetition of consonant sounds elsewhere in multiple words, and assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds. Traci Brimhall’s poem “A Group of Moths” provides a great example of these poetic devices at work, with each line playing with different sounds that seem to move the poem along on a sonorous wave. Your poem doesn’t have to be as complex as all that, though. Just pick a consonant or two and a vowel and dive right into the wonderful world (hey, there’s some alliteration/consonance/assonance right there) of sound.

We Rose from Ashes #NaPoWriMo (off-prompt)

_{^{The Reverie of Mr. James, by Rene Magritte (Belgium) 1943}}

I would never wilfully pluck the flower.
I’d be happy if it turned its face toward me 
so I could entertain the possibility 
I am its sun.

The sprouting of a love is so often
an echo of the one before.
Shared whispers in the sprawled night.
An adventure that requires more daring than before.

Rose and thorn co-exist. 
The curl of viridian leaf hides a sting.  
You would be stung trying not to be.  
Isn’t it just truth-blinding-symmetry?  
That heaven is made lovely by the presence of a hell.

I, thorn, cannot help my nature.  
I am born to draw blood. 
As your test, I prick your conscience
to see if you really mean your love.  

They say the pink rose divines the one who would befriend you first.  And the heart would shyly blossom after that.  Take my hand, it would say.  Okay, you would say.  Then not know how to go any further than that.  Oh, the blushes.  The to-and-fro thoughts.  A slow waltz of back and forth.  It could go on for years like this.  Then one day, it warms up and…no more words are needed. 

White is only meant to be friend.  Entertain nothing more.  It would only dissipate like petals in a gale.

Yellow is a dark one.  For they secretly desire another while reading you their latest love poem.  Naughty, roguish yellow.  You are only stepping-stone for the one they’ve set their sights on.  A beguiling downfall for many a fellow.  You bask in their sun then wonder how the shadow of cloud had chilled you so quickly.

Red is intensity brooding.  Like a late summer storm brewing purpled clouds and damn, you’ll know it when they split.  Eyes are involved.  Air, electric with current.  Suddenly, you want to taste everything.  Passion like this must be tempered.  It cannot burn for longer than a summer else it would make ashes of you.  And still you walk willingly into its fire.  Its velvet hug, a promise unfolding.  To leave its centre marked forever.  

_{^{© N Nazir 2024}}

NaPoWriMo Prompt 25: some crazy Proust questionnaire thing that I took one look at and was like nuh-uh.

*My thanks always to the Ekphrastic Review for publishing my poem. I include the whole thing to save you scrolling. I have actually broken my own streak now cos I didn’t submit to the last ekphrastic challenge (the image didn’t inspire). The current one’s pretty intriguing. If you wanted to take part, you can do so here (deadline: 26th April i.e. tomorrow).

*Shared also for dVerse Open Link Night, where the optional prompt serendipitously includes another painting by Magritte as inspiration.

Morph (ii) #NaPoWriMo

At last the word for scream bursts into my notebook,
while all the motionless things are set in motion 
after the freeze.  I pause in the undertaking 
of surrender.  I am born again in the wooded spring.
It’s metaphysical, it’s a seventh body realisation,
it’s a cat-familiar creature consciousness.

Don’t hunt me and I won’t hunt you back.
Sometimes, a pause is the gathering of force
to be cunning in the face of extinction.
I become only moment, only instinct,
the immediate future in my footsteps.
And then if I want, I’ll live my life 
in the branch of a tree, just watching.

^{_{© N Nazir 2024}}

NaPoWriMo Prompt 24: to write a poem that begins with a line from another poem (not necessarily the first one), but then goes elsewhere with it. This will work best if you just start with a line of poetry you remember, but without looking up the whole original poem. Or you could find a poem that you haven’t read before and then use a line that interests you.

*The first line of the poem is taken from the poem Must Escape by Farzaneh Khojandi (translated from Persian to English, from one of her chapbooks entitled simply Poems).

*I wrote a few stream of consciousness ones like this today but chose this one, which also happens to be the first attempt.

Unsung Heroes #NaPoWriMo

So many of them
walk among us.

Death too lurks everywhere
as if with a daily quota to tick
but sometimes someone’s soul will say
not today, Death.  Not today.  

The paramedic who does CPR just in time.
The woman who pulls you out of the way of a bus.
The lifeguard who drags you out of the current.
The allies, the valiant, acting on instinct.

Those who can talk you back from the brink
as you stand on a precipice 
not knowing how you got there.

The deep-sea divers in Thailand some years ago
who saved that group of thirteen
and braved the flooded cave,
the valour, the strength, the resolve it took.
I cannot fathom such heroism.

Someone says the odds are slim
but courage says let us try, let us try
we have to, because we must.  
And it’s true
that fortune favours the brave
for something on high steps in and says 
I’ll help you.

The firefighters, the soldiers, the freedom fighters
performing feats of grit and mettle
looking death square in the eye.
They signed up for it 
but how hard it must be
to keep your cool in the face of jeopardy
and know that one false move
means you would perish too.

That is some steel will, right there –
Timing, it’s all about timing, isn’t it?
One second too late and then –

And of course
the good, good parents doing their best
every day, all their days
the single mothers, the lone fathers
guardians, keepers, teachers, carers
cos that’s where it all begins
with those who keep a watchful eye
and do their part
to plant the good, good seeds.

That is all I have to say.

^{_{© N Nazir 2024}}

NaPoWriMo Prompt 23: to write a poem about, or involving, a superhero, taking your inspiration from these four poems in which Lucille Clifton addresses Clark Kent/Superman.

*I felt really emotional writing this. Sometimes, Napowrimo feels like a mental excavation and it gets overwhelming when you try and write as authentically as you can. Is it just me? Anyway, it’s a really rough write that needs editing but like a lot of my writes this month, I’ve posted it as is.

Conversation with a Seedling #NaPoWriMo (off-prompt)

^{_{© Russell-Howland Photography 2015}}

Me, grown:
Life is the sky in a puddle
I am thought in form.
I hear you but you must be
a vision I’m having.
These are only dreams.

It’s warm where I am
in the bask of sun.
Is it cosy where you are
in the cool dark?
This is where I come from.
This is where I shall return.
I’ll become a ray of sun.
I feel you
but only as if you’re me
reflection musing back.

But I’m not a trick.
I’m as real as rock.
You believe in dreams.
How are they not an illusion?
I am you, grown, Embryo.
Listen to me
I shall tell you of the future.

Embryo, forming:
But you are not my eyes.
My eyes are my heart
and my heart says
the truth is not out there.
It’s in here
in my tiny beating life
in my breathing of the elements.

I don’t even know you
or what you speak of.
Please leave now
and let me slumber in peace.

_{^{© N Nazir 2024}}

NaPoWriMo Prompt 22: to write a poem in which two things have a fight. Two very unlikely things, if you can manage it. Like, maybe a comb and a spatula. Or a daffodil and a bag of potato chips. Or perhaps your two things could be linked somehow – like a rock and a hard place – and be utterly sick of being so joined. The possibilities are endless!

*Previously published in Volume 3: The Poems that Flow Through Us, Poetic Medicine Sessions, The MERI Center for Education in Palliative Care, 2021.

*I just couldn’t muster anything for this prompt. I tried a half-hearted attempt at a spat between salt and pepper shakers but nothing came of it and I was all out of punchlines. So, as it’s Earth Day, I thought I’d post a poem to honour that. Fingers crossed I manage to write a poem tomorrow 🤞🏼