Wednesday, April 11, 2012

NaPoWriMo Day 11: No Spring Without Winter

The prompt for today comes from a quote usually attributed to T.S. Eliot: "Good poets borrow; great poets steal." But let’s stick to plain old stealing today by writing poems with their first lines lifted from other poems. You can pick a favorite poem of yours to take a line from.

I took the line,"Spring, I remembered you all these months," from the poem, Ingratitude, by Carl Dennis, featured yesterday on The Writer's Almanac (http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/).



No Spring Without Winter

Spring, I remembered you all these months,
my face pressed against cold window glass
watching snowflakes drift past the stars.

I remembered you, Spring,
when I saw rabbit tracks on fresh snow,
skies thick and gray as woolen mittens.

I remembered you
when I breathed air so cold
I could almost hear it crack.

Now the snow melts, robins return,
honeybees and blue butterflies
feast on Black-eyed Susan's.

Fields explode with lusty life,
sugar maple sap runs
and I am filled with joy.

Spring, I remembered and you came back.




"Spring, I remembered you all these months." From the poem, Ingratitude, by Carl Dennis.

4 comments:

brenda w said...

This is a strong write, Marianne. I love how remembrance drove the poem...especially remembering "when I breathed air so cold / I could almost hear it crack."

The last line completes it perfectly.

flaubert said...

Love how speak directly to Spring in this poem, Marianne. Beautiful.

Pamela

Laurie Kolp said...

I love spring and this piece is filled with the kind of longing I feel during winter. So lovely.

Mary said...

Beautiful, spring always trumps winter, returns gloriously to push all the cold and ice away! I love this poem as I love spring itself.