32 Women

NaPoWriMo will be upon us in just about a week. I probably won’t post much on Big Bang Poetry during that month as I’ll be furiously writing disposable poems. I did the prompts last year and it was a bit unsatisfying due to the fact that everyone is now creating their own prompts. So this year I decided to return to a project, one based on a poem I did many years ago for my friend Michelle Sawdey after hearing she passed away and while I was on a writing retreat and found a notebook she had given me and being moved by her inscription.

My NaPoWriMo project is called “32 women” and I’ll be writing each day about a woman who has been a part of my life, plus 2: one intro poem I’ve already finished for March 31 and the original Michelle poem for May 1. As we progress, you can find them here: https://hellopoetry.com/mary-mccray/

Zbb52 Haiku

Then I have another project lined up to start maybe in June called "52 Haiku." I’ll be posting a prompt each week for a year. Each prompt will initiate a meditation, a haiku, and a small sumi-e ink drawing. I so suck at drawing, this should be interesting. As a guide I’m starting with some of the prompts in Zen by the Brush and I'll be using an ink kit I found online.

What I love about haiku is that if feels like the opposite of eLit: offline, quiet, single minded.

And yesterday I came across this interesting page surveying Shambhala Publications haiku catalog. Food for thought while we prepare for 52 Haiku in June.