History of National Poetry Writing Month
National Poetry Writing Month (also known as NaPoWriMo) is a creative writing project held annually in April in which participants attempt to write a poem each day for one month. NaPoWriMo coincides with National Poetry Month in the United States of America and Canada.
This website is owned and operated by Maureen Thorson, a poet living in Washington, DC. Inspired by NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month), she started writing a poem a day for the month of April back in 2003, posting the poems on her blog. When other people started writing poems for April and posting them on their own blogs, Maureen linked to them. After a few years, so many people were doing NaPoWriMo that Maureen decided to launch an independent website for the project.
My History with National Poetry Writing Month
I started writing poetry in 1988 after I had been exposed to T.S. Elliot in my honors English class in high school. In 1992 I started reading my poetry publicly at Espresso Europia Coffee Shop in Abilene Tx while I was in the United States Air Force. While living in Rockford Illinois I published my first book of poetry Throwing Yourself at the Ground and Missing in 2007 followed by Postcards From Someone You Don’t Know in 2008 Wisdom From the Sack in 2010 and Shaving Crop Circles In My Chest Hair in 2017. You can get copies of all of these books in my merch section. In 2020 I started publishing my podcast version of the challenge and those can be viewed here for 2020 and here for 2021.
What I am doing differently for Poetry Month
For 2023 I am not going to be just writing poems in April, I will be writing poems all year round. Also, since I will be writing all year round, I am using a different source for my prompts. There is a blog called Think Written and you can find it here. I will also be performing these works at Katora Coffee House here in Fredericksburg Virginia on their Friday Night Snaps Open Mic Poetry reading. Some of the podcast episodes you will hear will be a live recording of me reading the poem to a live audience, other times I will be reading it in the comfort of my home studio. I do plan on posting my work to the NaPoWriMo site and interacting with the poets there and see if they want to read their work on this podcast.
Todays Poetry Prompt
Life Didn’t Go As Planned: Write about a recent or memorable experience when nothing went according to plan.
Todays Poem
The Last Time I Cried
14 March 2023
It wasn’t too cold that day
My car was starting, sporadically
It was a Friday, and I was forgotten in the waiting room
The nurse had me type in my information
She was unable to hold a thought for more than five minutes
Then back to the waiting room of forgetting
The resident came in
Way younger than me
Way more handsome,
Probably was having a threesome that night
He wanted to get out of there
I wanted to get out of there
Friday at 4 PM, both of our minds were elsewhere
He brought in his teacher, the real doctor
His accent was probably not as thick as I perceived
Between the nurse, the resident and this doc
I am surprised any of them hadn’t been sued or assaulted
And that’s when they told me
Welcome to the world of MS
And they ushered me out
The receptionist had left an hour ago
So, the head nurse practitioner had to check me out
He was the only one with an ounce of kindness
I made it through the hospital in downtown Richmond
I had been here before
Had the ticking timebomb removed from my brain
And I remembered how shitty I was treated back then
And I wondered why I came back
Oh yeah, I’m a De Sade fan
The car didn’t start.
I lit a cigarette
The car didn’t start
I am not sure why I thought it would
I walked around the car
Smoking another cigarette
Underneath the sign that says don’t
Just as I was about to call home
The car started
Driving up I95 on a Friday before Spring Break
There was a lot to time to contemplate
Making my way home
I said no, No, NO
5 years of frustration
5 years of MRI’s MRA’s, CT Scans
Spikes pressed 5 times in my back
Blood tests galore for every known disease
Finally understanding why so many things happened
Finally realizing that I was never lazy
Finally realizing that what was wrong had a name
It wasn’t me all along
Making it through the front door
The children were asleep
The wife was on the couch
I knew we would be there for awhile
Talked till her yawns couldn’t keep her eyes opened
And then we slept
Saturday with the children didn’t cause the waterworks
It was when my wife got back from errands
That it all hit me
And my kids wonder why Papa doesn’t cry
They’ve never seen it
And I know it’s bad to think, but they may never
Even then I couldn’t weep for myself in front of them
Retiring to our room
As she followed close by
I made it in, shut the door
And heard my dead mothers voice calling me selfish
And selfishly I cried
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