Poetry Thursday - Here is the News
The prompt this week at Poetry Thursday is to respond to something from the news. When I see prompts, my instinct is to mentally trawl through my body of work, and if something clicks then to offer this. This week, there's a poem I can offer that is connected. It was written at a workshop offered by Matthew Sweeney, and the exercise is an interesting one.
Select a random item from a newspaper, an item within the room in which you are writing, and an item outside the window of the room. Combine them somehow into a poem. This is one such poem:
................This Day: 4 July, 2002. Bantry
....................Now they are tossing the papers,
....................trying to shake the best bits of news
....................onto the table, to rattle the rest of the story
....................out like the last embers from the range.
....................It doesn't work like that! I want to say.
....................It isn't like Hampton Court Flower Show either -
....................model gardens made in six days, dismantled in one,
....................at the end of the second glorious week.
....................You think a recipe is all you need - for
....................beans on toast, a garden, the perfect war
....................or air-strike. Show me the pictures now. Where
....................are the bodies? Where is the blood?
....................Outside, a saint whose name escapes me
....................stretches bronze arms to the sea -
....................a call for calm or a beckoning.
....................Here, tell me the news. Tell me.
There will be more newsy poems HERE
Labels: Bantry, Poetry Thursday
13 Comments:
Oh, I love the image of the angel stretching out her arms, saying "Tell me the news, tell me". This is wonderful! From receipes, beans and bread to the blood and bodies of war. Good job.
The exercise you shared behind your poem was very interesting to me...hmmm...the poem itself was a mix of images, feelings, and concepts--but you made it work...I loved it.
I especially like the first stanza. As a former newspaper reporter I have first-hand knowledge of what it's like to try to "shake the best bits of news onto the table."
oh, this is good. nice work. I love so much the last word picture of the saint with his arms out...
:)
I love poems that don't end up where I expect.
What a great prompt, combining such disparate things! Your language is so nice! The beginning has such great sound! Very nice. And the end is wonderful. Love that last image.
love it
I love how you put this all together..nice..m
Excellent poem from an interesting exercise.
Cool exercise! Well done! I agree with jen-rouse :)
This is such a well put together poem. I like where it took me - and the accomapnying pic was a bonus.
Such wonderful images, and all knitted together so lyrically. That's what I call news.
This evokes so many different images and emotions - rather like the daily newspaper does.
You do have a way with words!
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