2026 NaPM 16 April

[RiverNotch]

Write a poem for National Poetry Month based on the topic described....rather, write a poem set in, pertaining to, or inspired by the given region, whether its entirety or just some part of it, as this year's prompts are going to be unified by the theme "Around the World" like last year's prompts were unified by the theme "Esoterica". Each poem should appear as a separate reply to this thread. There are three levels of participation:

Bronze. Participated at least once.

Silver. Participated every day.

Gold. Participated every day, with all entries either being the same form (e.g., every one a sonnet) or being distinct forms (e.g., no two haiku).


Today's region is North East Asia, or Chukotka, Kamchatka, Mongolia, Manchuria, Korea, and Japan.

[dukealien]

Serial Barbarians 


Middle Kingdom rounded by other nations
which partake in various ways and portions
of its high imperial culture and when
weak, of its spoils:

Manchus and Mongolians ruled when China
failed and splintered; Japanese also took their
turn at conquest, but without leaving any
trace except hatred.

Each one formed a natural border, desert,
ocean, neighbors shielded by China’s nature:
either land-fast harmony or, in fractured
unity, prey.

[RiverNotch]

Japan



Sometimes they stomp and as a vessel of water
splashes whenever it sits beside a ruckus
so the earth's movements are followed by a wave

that sweeps away all by the sea: houses, trees,
even the rocky sides of hills and mountains.
Sometimes they poke their lips out some old cave

then blow, provoking another set of waves
while scouring the tops of mountains both through the wind
and through the heavy rainclouds that it nets.

Sometimes the rows that invariably brew between
these buried giants lead to the spilling of blood
which bursts on the surface as an oozing flame.

For what did they move beneath the earth, ensuring
eternal life in the face of the deeper changes
that we their diminutive cousins deliver? Not even
the wisest among them can solve this direst of problems.