#NaPoWriMo 2022 Day Six

Hold Your Horses

Hold memories close
Your mom will be gone one day
Horses hard to rein in

Mom

Mom would exclaim when
Ornery child chafed at bit
Must hold your horses

(September 2014)

NaPoWriMo Prompt – Today, I’d like to challenge you to write a variation of an acrostic poem. But rather than spelling out a word with the first letters of each line, I’d like you to write a poem that reproduces a phrase with the first words of each line. Perhaps you could write a poem in which the first words of each line, read together, reproduce a treasured line of poetry? You could even try using a newspaper headline or something from a magazine article. Whatever you choose, I hope you enjoy this prompt.

Good morning and welcome to day six of NaPoWriMo and the first phrase to pop into my head was – hold your horses. My mom would tell us that often. I knew I wrote a senryu with it not long after my mom passed away. I did not recall it was also an acrostic that was a little eerie.

Advertisement

#NaPoWriMo Eeyore Acrostic

   

NaPoWriMo Prompt – Today’s prompt (optional, as always) asks you to write a poem about a particular letter of the alphabet, or perhaps, the letters that form a short word. Doesn’t “S” look sneaky and snakelike? And “W” clearly doesn’t know where it’s going! Think about the shape of the letter(s), and use that as the take-off point for your poem.

Good afternoon and welcome to day twenty-three of napowrimo and I decided to go off prompt. It just didn’t seem to speak to me not as much as Eeyore does anyway. And now I’m trying to mess with the formatting to get the letters to line up how I want. We’ll see if this works.

Sweet Sixteen

 

Sixteen

Shy
Introverted
Xenophobic
Timid
Evasive
Erudite
Nerd

NaPoWriMo Prompt Day 4 – Today I’d like you to take some inspiration from Elgar and write a poem with a secret – in other words, a poem with a word or idea or line that it isn’t expressing directly. The poem should function as a sort of riddle, but not necessarily a riddle of the “Why is a raven like a writing desk?” variety. You could choose a word, for example, “yellow,” and make everything in the poem something yellow, but never actually allude to their color. Or perhaps you could closely describe a famous physical location or person without ever mentioning what or who it actually is.

Welcome back to NaPoWriMo. It’s day four and as always someone’s birthday. The birthday girl is pictured above. Is it the girl wearing the crown or the girl blowing the noise maker? She just texted me she has a birthday buddy. Every year she laments no one remembers her birthday or attends her parties. Well the description of my little girl above is pretty accurate and may be a big reason why. Here is a clue to who the birthday girl is.

Happy Graduate!

Graduate with mom and dad photo taken by Poppo

Rachael

Remarkable
Achievement
Commencement
Hails
Academic
Excellence
Laureate

Rachael graduated from EMCC last night with an associate’s in arts. After high school graduation on May 18th, she’ll be off to ASU.

NaPoWriMo 2016 Day 12

My All Time FAVORITE Book

D.E.A.R

Dear Mr. Henshaw
Emily’s Runaway Imagination
A Girl from Yamhill
Ramona the Pest

It’s DEAR day (drop everything and read) Happy Birthday! Beverly Cleary 100 years spry today!

NaPoWriMo Prompt – Today, I challenge you to write your own index poem. You could start with found language from an actual index, or you could invent an index, somewhat in the style of this poem by Thomas Brendler. Happy writing!

OK maybe not exactly an index poem, but I took out my copy of Dear Mr. Henshaw turned to the back and saw this:

Beverly Cleary Books

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

a listing of all her books. As luck would have it, I could arrange some of the titles into an acrostic for dear. So there is my faux index poem.

NaPoWriMo 2016 Day 8

Feeling Blue

Forlorn
Longing
Overcome
Weeping
Exorcises
Ruefulness

NaPoWriMo Prompt – It’s Friday, and writing poems isn’t easy! So let’s give ourselves a break with a simple prompt today. Poets have been writing about flowers since, oh, the dawn of time. So today, I challenge you to add your own poem to this long tradition, by finding a flower, and versifying in its honor. Happy writing!

We have made it past the one week mark in April. Yesterday the drywall guy came and repaired the drywall. My writing nook is slowly returning to normal, but it’s not there yet. I am still sitting at my kitchen table. Shawn bought the bouquet in the picture in August 2014 when my mom passed away. Right now my table has no flowers. A couple years ago, Shawn brought home orange roses. Wow! It’s hard to believe it will be 20 years this October. As I asked yesterday, How did mom get old?

NaPoWriMo 2016 Day Two

Thanksgiving Dinner 2001

Thanksgiving

Twin sister
Hosts dinner
At her house
Nieces stood together
Katryn dressed in white
Scott turned his head
Gretchen held secure
In Dad’s embrace
Veronica smiles big
In front of Sean
Nonnie wrapped the
Girls with loving arms

NaPoWriMo Prompt – Today, I challenge you to write a poem that takes the form of a family portrait. You could write, for example, a stanza for each member of your family. You could also find an actual snapshot of your family and write a poem about it, spending a little bit of time on each person in the picture. You don’t need to observe any particular form or meter. Happy writing!

A family portrait you say. I immediately thought of this picture. When my mom passed away, she had set aside pictures for each of her daughters. The above picture was in my envelope. It is Thanksgiving Dinner at my sister Katryn’s house when they lived in Arizona. It is her girls, my girls, and my in-laws and niece. My brother-in-law committed suicide just before Thanksgiving 2013. This may have been the last time we were all together and I wanted to write about it.

Note – yes, I did not mention Tina (standing between Scott and Katryn) in the poem.

First Day of School

Gretchen smiling at Disneyland

 

Follow girls to bus stop
Inquire where it is
Remember first day of school
Standing with wide-eyed freshmen
Timid about making friends

The first day of school for freshmen was Monday August 3rd. Rachael didn’t start until Wednesday but she was up bright and early to walk her sister to the bus stop. Yes, I have a terrible time getting pictures of Gretchen. The Disney photographer actually caught the girl with a smile on her face when we met Elsa and Anna. I was impressed.

Since the first day is freshmen only, there were only three kids at the bus stop. I wrote my #haikuchallenge Monday about it.

Waiting at bus stop
Count how many freshmen show
My entertainment

Agua Fria starts super early 7:20am except Wednesdays which are late start. Monday only three kids showed up at the bus stop; Tuesday the first day for everyone only four kids were there. I figured high schoolers were “too cool” to ride the bus. But Wednesday when the bus picks them up at 8:15 about a dozen kids were there. Yesterday at 6:45 there was still a good number, but it went down slightly this morning. Well first week of school complete thirty-nine to go.

Open – Acrostic

Only a week away
Pencils will be sharpened
Exams will be taken
New school year opens

Well Rachael starts in one week, Wednesday August 5th. Gretchen will have to get up bright and early come Monday. Since I’m good at procrastinating with housework, I decided to check out Writer’s Digest Wednesday poetry prompt – write a poem about open. On twitter the #haikuchallenge word today is beg.

five a.m. alarm
summer break has reached its end
beg eyes to open

On the positive side to school starting – when I do get off my butt to clean the house, it will stay clean for a couple hours in a day.

Diamond Jubilee

Disneyland
Imaginative
Adventurous
Mickey Mouse
Overjoyed
Noteworthy
Dream vacation

We are back from our trip to California. We left Saturday July 11 and spent a couple nights at Newport Beach. I made the mistake of putting sunscreen on while I was wearing shoes. Sunday night, I had very crispy red feet. We had dinner at the Crab Cooker that night. Gretchen was brave enough to try some clam chowder. She is not a seafood lover. Her meal consisted of the tomato slices that came with my crab cakes.

Monday we drove over to Laguna Beach and then San Juan Capistrano Mission. In the evening we checked into the Grand Californian Hotel & Spa. Yes, my hubby spoils me. He knows I’m not good at walking long distances and the Californian has its own private entrance to California Adventure. They also have a viewing balcony for the light show in the park. Monday night we checked out the Lego store in downtown Disney; had dinner at the Storyteller Cafe and then went up to the balcony to check out the 10pm light show. Shawn rented a wheelchair. I let Gretchen sit in it on the balcony (it has no seats) and by the end of the show, my foot was throbbing. Back in the room we found out why as I took off my shoes and socks, my right foot had a huge bulbous pus blister where it was burned.

Needless to say, Mom was in the wheelchair come Tuesday morning and we hit the parks for the first day. Last time we went to Disneyland happened to be a week before Carsland opened. We headed over there first and lucked out with only a half hour wait for the racers ride. We spent the morning and early afternoon in California Adventure and then went back to the hotel to rest. Then in the evening we spent time in Magic Kingdom. The first night there we got some great seats for the Fantasmic Show. Since my blister popped, I let Gretchen use the wheelchair. It was nice to have a bench to sit and rest my feet during the show. Wednesday was a repeat – California Adventure, hotel, Magic Kingdom. We lucked out again. After we got off the river cruise, the girls wanted more Bengal barbecue and as we were eating Indiana Jones opened up again and we were able to walk right on.

Wednesday night we went over to the Matterhorn. It’s never been open the other two times we were in Disneyland. Gretchen did not want to go on. We set up to watch the Electric Parade instead before heading back to the hotel. Thursday morning Rachael and Dad woke up early to tame the Matterhorn, extra magic hour hotel guests have we haven’t used because Gretchen doesn’t wake up early. Then we all went to the Magic Kingdom and we finished off our three day park hopper in California Adventure. We made the last Grizzly run and got soaked. The private hotel entrance is right across from the ride. We went back to the hotel. Shawn wanted to sit by the fire and dry, but the girls were tired. We brought them up to the room and then Shawn and I went back down to the lobby to enjoy the fire, a glass of wine and some alone time for our last night.