NaPM April 16, 2017

[Todd]

Rules: Write a poem for national poetry month on the topic or form described. Each poem should appear as a separate reply to this thread. The goal is to, at the end of the month have written 30 poems for National Poetry Month. 


Topic 16: Write a poem inspired by a near death experience or the afterlife.
Form : any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more

Questions?

[just mercedes]

Georgia O’Keeffe 1918


From first solo exhibition in New York to
Spanish influenza, near death, in weeks.
A vortex. I felt my body drain away like 
water down a sink behind me. Ahead 
a curving corridor, a light, brighter 
and warmer as I neared. 
Music. A choir?
Is that my brother welcoming me?
Tugged back, grey, aching,
I sank, the light faded.

New York is built of light and shade,
ephemeral, two dimensional, without
empty spaces. No quiet. No peace.
Today I began an affair with Stieglitz.
Now bells ring out, sirens blare.
Not for us. The war has ended
over there.


 
 

[Tracy Mitchell]

A Recurring Thought of the Spirit Mother

Silent sound equivalent of neon
outlined and seized my ontological
self in multiples, elongated like
accordion bellows toward rhapsodies
of raspberry and honey.  I am turned
to liquid, a liquid music surging
like mountain creeks in spring, rushing onward
through zigzags one to the next or sideways
or downward through quick twisting passages,
getting smaller, brighter and the music
becomes pure as I open into vast
illuminated fields of clear and green,
I become green - a tremolo I am -
I am back- I am a leaf a piacere.

[CRNDLSM]

I had a math teacher once
who was struck by lightning twice.
He played the lotto even
though he understood the odds
were slim against him.  His mor-
al compass fixed relentless-
ly to teach kids how to live,
then he was struck a third time and died.

[Tracy Mitchell]

I had a math teacher once
who was struck by lightning twice.
He played the lotto even
though he understood the odds
were slim against him.  His mor-
al compass fixed relentless-
ly to teach kids how to live,
then he was struck a third time and died.

I love the layers and the easy irony of this.

[dukealien]

Rebirth


Churchill, who should know, declared
there’s nothing more exhilarating
than to be shot at without result.

Perhaps; that may explain mad duelists.

But what of times when knighthood flowered
and men had opportunities to face
a visible, ground-drumming charge
of knights in armor?

Death expands to fill the world
(and so the Tarot shows him as a knight)
monstrous centaurs, armored beasts
bodkin-pointed lances lowered
irresistible.

And yet to stand, draw bow and loose
while facing that, or crouch unmoving with
foot on a pike’s butt, trusting those
around to stand as Death’s wave crests above.

But it dissolves, destroyed by arrows
tripped by caltrops, stakes and trenches
or impaled on fellow footmen’s pikes.

See knights, invincible, pile high and die
before mere yeoman fellowship
felt as a common death accepted
reborn, breathing like a kind of king.

[Donald Q.]

I wouldn't have had it any other way

and it would seem the world is over,
entropy has ground everything to fine powder.
The dust moves as if snorted by stellar
nostrils. Matter shakes free from the vacuum,
unemptied for so long, a rattling rain stick as
every particle in the universe flushes away.
But then, like a punch line dropping in
from nowhere, a final turn, as if time
had been counting down, and had saved
the best second for last,

[Lizzie]

I wouldn't have had it any other way

and it would seem the world is over,
entropy has ground everything to fine powder.
The dust moves as if snorted by stellar
nostrils. Matter shakes free from the vacuum,
unemptied for so long, a rattling rain stick as
every particle in the universe flushes away.
Bu then, like a punch line dropping in
from nowhere, a final turn, as if time
had been counting down, and had saved
the best second for last,

><

[rayheinrich]

       


                                                        < white sailplane >
                                               
                                                the brush of air
                                                long wings held out
                                                their tips invisible in cloud
                                                and up
                                                and up
                                                and then the sun
                                                falls through my canopy of glass
                                                falls warm against my face
                                                my path dissolves into the dream it always was
                                                inside the point
                                                where all else falls away
                                               
                                                                - - -

[Franklin'sMan]

To Wander On
(revised)

Many are the places that I sought the wise.
In worm tombs, in wombs, in an angel’s glade.
I’ve roved dark hearts, gained passage in dark guise.

Swaddled up in silk, I saw with many eyes.
The taste of tiny flies will never fade.
Many are the places that I sought the wise.

I split my skin with wings. Among the flies
I buzzed my praise, and danced on beings un-made.
I’ve roved dark hearts, gained passage in dark guise.

My wings then tickled nymphs, had polished thighs;
our laughter were but instruments -- which fade.
Many are the places that I sought the wise.

Swaddled next, Mother coos to ease my cries.
Father pulls out hers. A boy can give no aid.
I’ve roved dark hearts, gained passage in dark guise.

Roll on. I’ve only ever learned of lies.
The lives I’ve lived are waste. Ah! my hopes fade.
Many are the places that I sought the wise.
I’ve roved dark hearts, gained passage in their guise.

[Lizzie]

whether god or nothing
limitlessness
is not something you choose

whether before or after life
they say don't worry
the dark didn't hurt
before birth

forever overwhelms
like a building too tall
a rockface too steep
unbounded miles of barren fields
only flat expanse

[RiverNotch]

l'arcane sans nom


death should not be
(nor was)
ghostly knight on fog plain

better
skeletal farmer on sunset estate
reaping

stereotypical souls
best
naked sex with teeth pulled out

on sheep on line of sheep
counting, ticking
seconds to dawn

[Keith]

Afterlife

There isn't any dark underbelly
or shadow clad evil waiting to drag us
kicking into the opening roots of a bloody tree.

You won't find that the room temperature
drops and a pale figure appears dripping wet
because the previous owner of the house
wants you to find her bones at the bottom of a well.

But you will see that shock of grey hair
walking up the hill with her shopping bags
as you drive past and think for a moment
it was her.

You will kneel in the garden
to tie off the daffodils and remember that
she showed you how to do it.

You will hear your name being called
when you play loud music and turn it down
to listen for that voice again.

You will be asked to spare some change
by a man in the supermarket
who smells of sweet sherry and Sunday roast.

So you see, this is how they come to haunt us,
to make us remember, this is how they keep a foot
in our world, this is how we hold on.

[kolemath]

Message from Somewhere Else

Afterlife?  It doesn't exist
how you think.
Before dying, I might have laughed at it,
how you think
the afterlife is any kind of life after.
How you think
there's some white room
and human bodies sprouting swan wings
to fly down and care about
how you think.

No.  How you think 
is not what I am.
Can you feel the charge of atoms 
spiraling into chemicals bonding into cells dividing 
in your fingernail?

You can't.

I'm more like that than how you think,
more like that than anything you've ever thought of.

[ellajam]

Afterlife

There isn't any dark underbelly
or shadow clad evil waiting to drag us
kicking into the opening roots of a bloody tree.
You won't find that the room temperature
drops and a pale figure appears
dripping wet because the previous owner
of the house wants you to find her
bones at the bottom of a well.

But you will see that shock of grey hair
walking up the hill with her shopping bags
as you drive past and think for a moment
it was her.

You will kneel in the garden
to tie off the daffodils and remember that
she showed you how to do it.

You will hear your name being called
by a voice within loud music and turn it down
to listen again.

You will be asked to spare some change
by a man in the supermarket
who smells of sweet sherry and Sunday roast.

So you see, this is how they come to haunt us,
to make us remember, this is how they keep a foot
in our world, this is how we hold on.

[Keith]

Afterlife

There isn't any dark.....

[Todd]

So you came
back

Having a near death experience
is like getting a hand job,
and mistaking it for sex.
Even if it's an exploding
fireworks sort of hand job.
Angels may throw their harps
down and howl like cats
wanting to be let in after
you’ve gone to sleep—
still not the same.
Now death,
death is only like sex
with some people.

[Todd]

This topic seemed to prompt a lot of powerful pieces. I love too many of these to call any one of them out--it would be redundant. There are a lot of them I'd love to see workshopped.

[nibbed]

And So is Life Here

Days I cry
wondering if anybody but God
knows of these bonds.
Moments I smile
pondering the thought
it really won't matter anymore
when I get to The Place
where I am heading.
I watched a tea kettle once,
its noisy billows
faded powerless.