Slightly sideways

 

In my slightly sideways imagination my ‘bucket’ of creative ideas is a large stone jar, the kind my grandmother used for preserving fruit, or more often vegetables.

When I think of a new idea for a poem or story I mentally drop it in the jar, so it doesn’t get lost or forgotten and it is always there when I go back to it.

I have been ensuring that I chuck many new ideas into that jar for the last couple of weeks – ever since I signed up to write a poem a day through April, which is National Poetry Writing Month.

There is so much to write! Running out of ideas will not be a problem. Keeping up with the new ones could be. I may start a poem each day, but almost none of them will be finished this month.

The ones that do get somewhere close to the end of the process, and may get posted here, will be those I pull from the drawer – that’s the place where the first, second, third and, oh, numberless drafts live until they move into the rewriting, cleaning up, cut, cut, cutting phase and maybe finally I will let them go out into the world.

Ideas on the go include some new work on ‘place’. I am not that interested in things to do with time, the present moment is the thing; it is always now, after all. But my work is often rooted in a place. The coast and country of west Wales and Somerset are big ones for me. I have it in mind to add something from Cwm Du during this month, and from Mwnt. They will join Llangrannog, Poppit, Patch, Penbryn (many), Wells, Glastonbury, the Somerset Levels and others in the folder called ‘Places’. They are not directly about those places, of course, rather about the feelings brought to mind while there.

There is some more politics to come too – no shortage of stuff to get angry about is there.

And more ‘painting poetry’ is on the way  -- some responses to art on show in some of our local galleries. If I get stuck in this one, I shall write poetry inspired by some of the paintings in my home.

If I am still stuck I shall look out of the window and write from what I see.

Good luck to all my fellow poets who are taking on this challenge. May this be a wonderful creative time. Let the journey begin.

To see and follow others who have joined, go here:

http://www.napowrimo.net/