Mother’s Day Special: Free download of “Loosely Collected”

This weekend only, download the Kindle version of Loosely Collected: A Book of Poems FOR FREE for your favorite mother (including yourself!) This offer is good May 7 – 11, 2015.

Get your free download May 7 – 11, 2015!

National Poetry Month Collaborative Twitter Poem

Poetry (Photo credit: V. H. Hammer)

Well, here we are. It’s April 1^st, and once again time to celebrate National Poetry Month. I haven’t really been writing much poetry lately, so I thought it might be fun to do a collaborative Twitter poem challenge.

For this challenge, I am going to give you a one-word prompt/Twitter handle. Next, you come up with a poem – either one short poem that will fit into one 140-character Tweet, or a longer poem that you can split up, posting one verse per Tweet – and share it on Twitter using the provided hashtag. I am starting the challenge here today, and then I would love it if some of you would volunteer to host one or a few additional prompts on your blogs throughout the month of April.

Another “damn rape poem”

I came across this on tumblr this morning and had to share.

“The Rape Poem to End all Rape Poems” by the Rutgers University slam team:

How much space does your body occupy?

I saw this video of Lily Myers reading her poem, “Shrinking Women” on UpWorthy and had to share. I have watched it like eight times and cried every time. She totally exposes the truth about what it is to be a woman in our society.

 

It seems to me that, while some women shrink to make room for the men in their lives, others unknowing expand in order to be seen, to prove their existence.

I need some advice on self-publishing

It’s probably pretty pathetic that something as simple as designing a book cover is what is keeping me from self-publishing my poems, huh?

A few semesters ago, I took a poetry writing course. I don’t really consider myself a poet, but I like to dabble from time to time. I wanted to take a course that would challenge me to think about my writing in a different way, and this poetry course definitely fit the bill.

At first, I had a hard time writing poems on demand. Then I started reading poetry on a regular basis, and the ideas began to flow. I started jotting stuff down as it came to me, and I ended up with a stock of poems to choose from whenever the time came to turn one in for a grade.

What makes a poem a poem?

Walt Whitman’s use of free verse became appreciated by composers seeking a more fluid approach to setting text. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What is a poem? Some may think a poem has to rhyme. (I disagree.) Others believe the syllables must be counted, or that a poem must be stuffed full of alliterative language. But what about free verse? What makes a block of words, a sentence chopped up onto several lines, a poem, rather than a mere chopped-up sentence or a paragraph scattered over several lines?

To me, writing a poem is about capturing a moment. It could be a feeling, a natural occurrence, or a quick glimpse into the life of one person. Most of my poetry describes just one, very small moment. These moments might last only a few seconds, or as long as several minutes. Rarely does the poem capture more than a very short block of time.

Another poem for National Poetry Month: Love Long Distance

I want magnetic words like this so I can carry poems on my car with me wherever I go. | Poetry (Photo credit: Kimli)

It’s funny how I write a lot of poetry when I’ve been reading a lot of poetry. I don’t really read much of it at all, unless I have to for school. But this month, several of the blogs I follow have been posting poems as part of the Poem-a-Day Challenge. So, here I am, popping out poems when I should be working on my novel. But I guess I could use the distraction. Who knows, maybe my prose will be the better for it.

Here’s my latest:

Love Long Distance

Have you
ever noticed

National Poetry Month: First Day Budding

Spring has sprung, and I wish I had a cherry tree. | Cherry blossoms at POSTECH (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

April is National Poetry Month. So, I thought I would attempt to scratch out at least one new poem this month as my contribution. With that said, today I am sharing an original poem inspired by spring:

First Day Budding

A blush of white on trees
on the way
to work.

Ice?

Not when it’s raining
like this.

Pink tinged,
as though every tree
on Earth
is about to burst forth
with cherry blossoms.

Tomorrow,
the whole world
will be green.

By Amanda L. Webster

When we were kids, we bounced

We weren’t afraid to fall.

We Bounced

When we were kids,
we were made of rubber.
We just bounced when we hit the floor.
The harder we hit,
the higher we bounced.

We fall down now,
and we just break.

By Mandy Webster

Poetry Friday: Miss Kitty

This is Zelda. Don’t worry, I don’t let her roam about outside unsupervised. She just likes to hang out on the patio with me while I sit in my comfy chair and read.

It’s been some time since I’ve posted for Poetry Friday, but inspiration struck a moment ago, so I decided to pounce. Is it too soon to hope I’ve finally recovered from my bout with writer’s block?

Today’s poem is inspired by my kitten, Zelda, who is turning out to have quite the personality:

Miss Kitty

My cat thinks I’m her prey.

She stalks me through the house,
Crouching on the stairs
Or behind a curtain,
Just waiting for me to pass
So she can pounce.

~By Amanda L. Webster