Young Writers Society

Poetry will go here. Hopefully. Maybe it's a stretch to call it poetry. We'll see.

If you wanna drop a comment here, feel free. That or my wall is fine ^^

Previous years:

2016 Earthquake Weather
2015 once more unto the breach
2014 Poe-Tree
2013 *gasp* Mesh Masticates Madness!
2012 Look! Mesh actually *does* write!
2011 Stardust - Bek's NaPo thread 2011
2010 ?
2009 I love like a phantom: Bek's NaPo thread 2009
2008 Bek's NaPoWriMo thread

1
drought, n.

1. abnormally low rainfall
2. a prolonged absence
3. thirst
4. california in the summertime

we wish for lack of certain things - bugs, sunshine, and the sense that cold is a construct we collectively hallucinate to justify why we live where you can fry an egg on the sidewalk at three and still burn your feet on cement at midnight.

I always love these types of poems that use a noun or a word and then elaborate on that word, and it definitely fits your title for this year! The end makes it more unique and makes it work. Nice first poem! <3

#2
it smells like midwest minus the cigarette smoke
and crushed dreams of flyover country
as imagined only by coastal peons
convinced they are the base by which all is measured -

air hangs heavy for warm spring nights
highlighted by enough bugs to make up
for five years’ rain.

#3
it's my favorite time of year:
beat-up leather and sun-parched dirt
kick up dust and tear out grass
the thunk of wood and leather-wrapped cork
meeting and missing in a dance of dominance.

#4
rain lingers in the nebulous space
of later, hints of moisture
floating on the breeze
that barely cuts through sunlight
much too strong (much too early)
that stains the cold cement of dawn
rusty with a breaking summer sun.

the rain lingers in the later
that remains three days imminent

#5
I landed, once, where the plains meet despair
(and the smallest airport i’ve ever seen)
to drive an hour north to fete the uncle i meet twice,
cousins once, their children for the first time
gathered softly in a sea of blonde

i landed, once, where the plains were despair
and in desperate need of rain.

These are all so good! They're drenched in awesome imagery. *laughs at own joke and then puts self in time out*

#2 makes me think of an article I read last week about what the founder of the Occupy Wall Street movement is up to these days. He thinks that getting into smaller towns and getting involved in the local politics is more effective than protests. Probably true, but the article also had the opinions of several locals who basically think he's an idiot and going too far too fast (like basically he moved to this random town in Oregon and ran for mayor with like zero support? Yeah, maybe not the most effective tactic...).

Gotta love how my tangents are longer than these poems.

#6
in ‘13 i learned that bugs could be bigger than my hand
and sunset does not always mean relief
and hills could be green in august.

the lights shone through bugs and mist and humidity
and i hid in the shadows, praying for salvation
in a land that would call mine an inferno.

#7
late summer fog has no place in april
[nor does flooding or warmth or foot tall grass
that grows faster than weeds can spread]

early spring sun filters through,
breaking rank to give way to brightness blinding
in unexpected brilliance
that burns skin and leaf and soul -
late summer fog has no place in april

It's cold where I am, but your poems make me forget.

#8
the breeze through the window
is everything outside isn’t:
cool, dry, and bug free.

it doesn’t block the sirens
that race outside
following the destruction-wrought screams
of people that create obstacle courses
out of joggers and soccer players
and bikers and dogs
native to the streets they try to claim.



[posting today, since i'm not positive when power/internet is going down tomorrow. who knows, maybe i'll be back with more regardless]

#9
smoke and humidity hang heavy
between crickets under windows
and cars screaming
down the old two-lane highway
turned raceway

#10 - pockets of storm clouds

brittle sun-baked ground doesn’t show
the floods that it left behind

evidence of morning showers erased by noon
under a sun that dissipated the storm

the steady dripping dissonant to rain
from three days past

wind whistles through the window
never properly sealed

#11
the sudden pounding of rain isn’t as unexpected as the radar loop shows it to be, more soothing that the sound of a sawzall ripping through metal sheeting and smothering the smell of fresh mud splattered on the walls and fresh drywall and it echos in the space between the new window and framing yet to be sealed (it faces east, and the rain comes from the south-west - mostly sheltered and hammered into place in between the gusts of wind that heralded the pounding late-season storm in a storm season that no one thinks will end).

the mountains have enough snow for two winters, we have enough rain before it melts to flood out entire cities as it rushes out to sea.

it will be fire season, soon, with more fodder than our usual tinderbox, and never enough water to fight it: the bugs the only sign left by august of the downpours we fled in February.