Category: GloPoWriMo

I’m expected today, to write about my relationship with another art form. I know few art things, so I shall attempt this.

It’s Complicated

Your black and white tinge summarizes my feelings for you perfectly,
So grey, I don’t know where to place you.
As a child you enamoured me,
My parents made sacrifices for me to enjoy your cacophony,
And my uncle first placed you in my hands.
I remember the weight of expectation placed upon me,
To make you light up with my fingers and my touch,
I remember the public performances gone awry,
Soon, I knew my talent wasn’t much.
Then we moved cities,
You reappeared in a new avatar,
I learned how to serenade you,
And with each new touch, you played to my tune,
You were my muse, and I, was in love.
Soon, however, I learned that society
Found curves and strings sexy,
You had neither, and I assuaged myself of your beauty.
I longed however, to hold another in my hand,
Whose tune was on the radio, daily.
I must admit to you today, I carried this ambition through,
Found an instrument that appreciated my left-handed dexterity,
He felt different and unique,
But then the strings cut me,
My finger, and my heart,
And I longed for your love once more.
So I sat at my stool,
Crying, like a fool,
Found old classics to win you back.
You relented,
Accepting me once more,
For that I’m eternally grateful.
But today, I long for another’s touch,
Smaller, more portable,
One I can perform with, without much.
And so,
Our relationship will continue to be complicated,
As I discover more on my journey.
Please know, however, you’ve got a special place in my heart,
For piano, you helped me write this story.

Today they’ve asked me to incorporate surrealism into my surroundings. Which is easy considering how surreal GNLU can get. The tough bit I think is the poetry part.

Grey, Green Gandhinagar

If a ghost was to visit,
I think she’d find herself at home.
Much like the afterlife,
There’s organization to the infrastructure,
And greenery to enjoy staring at.
If the ghost wanted education,
There’s enough institutions willing to give her a degree,
She can choose: Law, Design, Technology, Medicine, Disaster Management,
Options aplenty,
The real question is whether the cost is worth it,
Because even if she’s see through,
Some ghosts won’t see through her gender,
Other ghosts will ignore her,
And even if Gandhinagar’s roads are empty,
She’ll find blockades on her path to glory.

A “spoken” poem is something I’ve never heard of before. I really enjoy GloPoWriMo for this very reason – the fact that it introduces you to genres you’ve never heard of before. But when I read about today’s prompt, I realized it was fairly easy for me: since my “poetry” is largely just a string of words I put together as if I’m speaking. Just with a little more structure, I would think. Today’s poem probably takes away some of that.

Tejas Thinks

My brain’s honestly sometimes the whackiest place, because I imagine
conversations between inanimate objects and scenarios which are hypothetical and wonder whether any of them will ever happen, or whether it’s possible to confirm that they haven’t happened. The Science is crazy, you know? So many competing theories, and then there’s a layer of religion as well – which sometimes contradicts the Science. What do you believe in? Anyway, can we really tell whether or not the trees talk about how terribly we treat them, and how we uproot their friends and families? Do you think the dogs talk about how people beat them, and whom to avoid? These are things I think about when I sleep, and even when I’m awake, fully aware of the fact that,
I don’t control people’s behaviour, apart from my own,
And I make mistakes sometimes.

Did you know there was a word for the sequencing of the alphabet? I did not know this until today. That’s because today’s prompt asks me to write an Abecedarian poem, a poem with the 26 letters of the English alphabet sequentially arranged across the poem. This should be a good one, particularly considering how much I’ve enjoyed Daniel Radcliffe’s performance of Alphabet Aerobics.

An Odd Salad

Apples, bananas, cantaloupes,
Dates, entawak,
Figs, guava, hackberry,
Imbe, jackfruit, kumquat,
Loquat, mango, nectarine,
Oranges, peaches, quicefruits,
Rambutan, strawberries, tangerines,
Ugni, voavanga, wolfberries,
Xigua, yangmei,
Zucchini!

Today’s prompt asks me to describe loss or grief, as best as I can through poetry.

The Laundry

I give five pieces of clothing,
Reflective of my wardrobe, it’s an eclectic bunch,
That things are about to go wrong,
I have absolutely no hunch.
I’ve heard the horror stories,
The loss of recently purchased clothes,
I’m dismissive, and condescending,
This will never happen to my laundry, I suppose.
Except one week later, when I come back,
There’s five pieces of clothing, but
Two, I don’t recognize, I feel attacked.
There’s a blue one missing,
And a pink one too,
I question the launderer,
He doesn’t have a clue.
There’s no way for him to make good the loss,
Even if he compensates me,
There’s no way to measure the actual cost,
The cost of heartbreak,
And faded memories,
Never again to be worn,
More crucially,
Never to smell like my own cologne.

Today asks me to write a poem about a scene from an unusual perspective.

Food 

They throw me away,
Claiming that I was extra,
But others need me.

Today’s prompt challenges me to write a list to defamiliarize the mundane.

Writing Instrument

The complexity of what I hold for 5 hours, at minimum, amuses me.
At once, an accessory, and a utility tool,
With the ability to spark a battle, or end a war.
The ability to put people to sleep, and wake people up, unkindly, when used with a bit of saliva in someone’s ear.
With the choice of writing in multiple colours, and multiple tongues.
How does one choose a writing instrument?
How, and who decides when one moves from a younger version of a writing instrument – relying on the natural elements, to a more, artificial, sophisticated, writing instrument?
Why is this decision made?
At once, so expensive and inaffordable
But so necessary.

 

Oho! Halfway. Today’s prompt asks me to write a play, or something that could be performed dramatically. I’ve decided to take a shot at a monologue. The setting for this is voting day.

Choose

Friends, acquaintances, and uncles & aunties,
Hello,
And Good Evening,
You may wonder why I have interrupted your tea,
And why I am speaking,
You may also wonder why my voice is screechy,
And why I am so short,
I am fifteen years old,
An adult I am yet, not.
Your other questions will be answered soon,
Or maybe I’ll leave them unanswered,
Because that seems to be something adults enjoy doing,
So maybe that’s how I’ll get your attention.

Soon you will be given a chance to vote,
On who gets to govern this area, but also, in the grand scheme of things,
The country,
I will not be given this chance,
Because the elders decided that I would not mature till I was 18,
Or 21,
But you,
You have this chance,
So please take it.
Aunty, this isn’t like when nobody at home tells you what they want to eat,
So you choose for them all,
Uncle, here, has to make a decision,
And the decision may not affect you in the long-run,
Because your future is something in your control – in your present,
My future,
Apart from my board exam marks,
Also depends on what the people governing my country choose to do,
So please think of me,
And what’s best for me,
When you choose,
Because tomorrow,
I will have to make a similar choice,
And my experiences now will make my choice in the future.

Today is homophone day! I was pretty pleased with keeping my poems short so I think you might get a few more of those.

Same-Same

See sea,
See-saw,
Saw the sea?
See the saw.

Today’s prompt asks me to write about something spooky and mysterious. I have chosen to write a haiku about an experience I had today.

Floating Faeces

Cannot understand
how people use the washroom,
and fail in flushing.

Today’s prompt asks me to talk about a dull thing that I own and why I love it.

Silver Pens 

I write with a silver fountain pen,
I’m not quite sure how I got it,
I think it was from my grandmother,
Who claims that she had “found” it,
It no longer has the sheen a new
Hero pen does,
But it writes just as smoothly,
The shaft is long,
And easy to grip,
And blue ink flows fluidly.
If I ever have to pick one piece of stationery,
I’d pick this pen, no doubt,
When I hold it, I feel like a royal man,
Born with a silver pen, and a silver spoon in his mouth.

Today’s prompt challenges me to write a poem that starts from a regional phrase, particularly one to describe a weather phenomenon.

Extreme Temperatures

Agadheilla,
I cried to mum,
Not specifying what I couldn’t do,
Or why I couldn’t do it,
Just stating that it couldn’t be done,
And so, depending on circumstance,
My mother whipped up Rooh Afza,
We turned on the AC in my room and closed the door,
Or, ended up with a razai over our entire bodies,
Watching TV,
It befuddled me, because,
I had said nothing could be done,
But things had happened,
The weather hadn’t won.