NaPoWriMo 2026 [April 26]
Day Twenty-Six
Hello, everyone, and welcome back for Day Twenty-Six of National/Global Poetry Writing Month.
Today, our featured participant is Jay Siegmann, whose response to Day 25’s rather complex prompt bring us metaphors for metaphor itself.
Our resource for the day is the Commonplace podcast, which provides you with oodles of interviews with contemporary poets, as well as explorations of specific themes and books.
And now for our prompt (optional, as always). The Latin phrase ars poetica means “the art of poetry.” It’s been a tradition going all the way back to Horace for poets to write poems that lay out – whether explicitly or obliquely – some statement about why the poet writes, or what they think poetry is. Here’s a very recent example, another that I had to study in school, and a very long, witty ars poetica by Alexander Pope. Today, we challenge you to write your own ars poetica, giving the reader some insight into what keeps you writing poetry, or what you think poetry should do.
Happy writing!
-
Note: Day Twenty-Six asked for an ars poetica: a poem about poetry, why one writes, or what one thinks poetry should do. So, naturally, the prompt went straight for the poet’s existential throat: why are we here, what is language doing, and must the notebook be this dramatic about it? Very casual. Just the poet’s version of “what is the meaning of life?” before breakfast. Anyway. I do not think poetry saves the world. I distrust that kind of sentence. But I do think poetry can reduce the amount of falsehood passing through a life. It can keep a record. It can point toward material action. It can refuse deadness. So here is my offering for Day Twenty-Six.
-
Ars Poetica for a Room That Keeps Interrupting
I do not write
because language is holy.
Please.
Language has been used
to make rent agreements,
family WhatsApp messages,
performance reviews,
marriage biodatas,
eviction notices,
border maps,
police reports,
citizenship registers,
medical certificates,
school punishments,
court orders,
to level dialects until every village sounds employable,
rename rivers,
discipline accents,
flatten tongues,
lynch minorities,
degrade women,
misgender the living,
sanitize massacres,
translate occupation into security,
translate hunger into policy failure,
translate cruelty into procedure,
and write apology emails
that apologise for nothing.
I know better than to trust a sentence
just because it stands upright.
I write because the room keeps
editing me without permission.
Because the bed remembers every woman
who mistook endurance for character.
Because the window keeps pretending
it is only a window,
when all day it has been smuggling in
heat, dust, neighbours, sirens, birds,
the country’s latest cruelty, and
one thin strip of sky that refuses to explain itself.
I write because my body files complaints
in languages my mouth cannot yet afford.
The stomach burns.
The jaw locks.
The ribs rearrange
their small furniture.
The skin says:
something happened here.
And the mind, that overstaffed ministry,
opens ten departments to investigate one feeling
and still misplaces the file.
My poetry is not therapy.
Therapy has invoices.
My poetry is not revolution.
Revolution would require better logistics,
more courage, and probably a group chat
I have not been added to.
My poetry is not prayer either,
though sometimes, it kneels by accident.
Mostly,
poetry is the act
of refusing
to let the wrong thing
become normal
inside me.
A small refusal. Embarrassingly small.
A cup moved from one table to another.
A sentence cleaned until it shows where the blood was.
A joke placed carefully beside the wound
so the wound does not start thinking it is royalty.
I write because I am frightened of becoming fluent
in the language of those who taught me silence with such domestic patience.
I write because love does not prevent estrangement.
I write because the family is the first state,
and I am still learning how to defect without starving.
I write because somewhere a country is being translated into rubble,
and here, in this room, light lies down on the floor as if it has no politics.
I write because that is obscene.
I write because beauty arrives without a plan
and I do not forgive it, but I do record the visit.
I write because poems do not feed people.
This is important.
Poems do not stop bombs,
pay salaries,
reverse laws,
return friends,
open locked clinics,
protect people,
dismantle systems,
return motherlands,
or teach mothers
how to rest.
But a poem can point to the bread.
A poem can say: there, that hunger, do not decorate it.
A poem can say: send money if you can.
A poem can say: do not call this elsewhere.
A poem can say: this wound has an address.
Maybe that is all.
Maybe my poetry is not a door, not a key, not even a window.
Maybe it is only the scratch on the glass
where someone, trapped here before me,
tested the surface and left proof
that the room was not always obeyed.
I write to add one more scratch. Not escape. Not yet.
Just evidence
that I touched the pane
and found it breakable.
~ Oizys.
After-note: Since today’s poem is about what poetry can and cannot do, I wanted to leave this here: Coastal Lines Press / Zines from Gaza, a collective of writers in Gaza publishing independent booklets of poetry, essays, and testimonies. Their zines carry stories of survival, resistance, and hope, and proceeds from every zine directly fund essential supplies for families under siege. I still do not think poems stop bombs. Poems do not feed people by themselves. I distrust that romance. But poems can refuse erasure. They can (help!) travel where bodies are trapped. They can point toward bread, witness, and survival. So go! Buy a copy. Or, volunteer with your amazing creative skills!
Sunday, April 26, 2026
Saturday, April 25, 2026
NaPoWriMo 2026 [April 25] - The Window Keeps Its Own Counsel
NaPoWriMo 2026 [April 25]
Day Twenty-Five
Hello, all! Happy Saturday, and happy 25th day of Na/GloPoWriMo!
Our featured daily participant is Behind Door Number 3, where the response to Day 24’s “strange things at night” prompt involve socks going on walk-about.
Today’s resource is Boston University’s video archive of lectures and conversations stemming from former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinksy‘s course on The Art of Poetry.
And now for our (optional) daily prompt! In her poem, “The Apple Tree in Blossom,” Melissa Kwasny strings together several fantastical metaphors for the apple tree, before shifting into exclamations, definitions, and a series of nimble, tonal shifts – and seeming changes in topic – before circling around back to the apple tree. Today’s challenge asks you to write your own poem in which you use at least three metaphors for a single thing, include an exclamation, ruminate on the definition of a word, and come back in the closing line to the image or idea with which you opened the poem.
Happy writing!
-
Note: Day Twenty-Five asked for three metaphors for a single thing, an exclamation, a rumination on definition, and a return to the opening image. So, naturally, I chose the window, because apparently I cannot leave rooms alone. So, here is my offering for Day Twenty-Five.
-
The Window Keeps Its Own Counsel
The window is a thin aquarium
where weather swims past
pretending not to look in.
It is also a border
that learned transparency
as a public relations strategy.
It is the house’s most polite eye,
open all day,
reporting nothing.
Outside, April goes on
with its usual administrative cruelty:
heat entering early,
birds filing complaints in the wires,
a neighbour’s pressure cooker
hissing like an old accusation.
Inside, my mother folds a towel
with the patience of someone
who has been taught
that order is a kind of prayer
even when god is not listening.
The window brightens.
Traitor!
I say this softly, of course.
Even my outrage has indoor manners.
What is a window, anyway?
The dictionary says:
an opening in a wall
for the admission of light and air.
Admission.
As if light has filled out a form.
As if air has stood in line
with two passport photos
and proof of address.
As if anything that enters a room
does so legally.
There is another meaning too:
a period of opportunity.
Small laugh.
A window, then,
is either a hole in the wall
or a scheduled chance
to escape through one.
Both seem optimistic.
At work, they say
we should circle back
when there is bandwidth.
At home, the ceiling fan
circles back all afternoon
and still arrives nowhere.
My unread emails breed quietly.
My salary sits in the corner
like a relative everyone knows
has failed me
but no one wants to insult aloud.
Somewhere, a country
is being translated into rubble.
Somewhere, a mother
is counting children
with a mouth that has forgotten
how numbers end.
Here, the window takes in light.
Here, the light lies down
on the floor
like nothing has happened.
I want to be fair to the window.
It did not invent distance.
It did not invent the room.
It did not invent the human habit
of seeing suffering
and calling it elsewhere.
Still.
All day it holds the world
just far enough away
to be bearable.
A tree leans into its frame,
green and shameless.
A crow lands on the railing
with the confidence of a bad omen
who has tenure.
The sky, that old absentee landlord,
collects its blue rent
from everyone.
For a moment,
I almost forgive beauty
for arriving without a plan.
Then the window shows me my face
laid over the street,
my eyes floating above the traffic,
my mouth superimposed
on a woman carrying vegetables home,
my forehead ghosted
over a scooter, a dog, a torn poster,
the ordinary republic
of things continuing.
Reflection:
from reflectere,
to bend back.
Of course.
Even looking out
is another way
of being returned to myself.
By evening, the glass darkens.
The aquarium becomes a mirror.
The border becomes a bruise.
The polite eye closes halfway
and keeps what it has seen.
My mother asks me
to shut it before the mosquitoes come in.
I do.
The room grows smaller,
as rooms do
when they are pleased with themselves.
Outside, the tree keeps moving
after I have stopped watching.
Inside, the curtain settles
with the tired dignity
of a woman who has worked all day
and is still expected
to soften the light.
And there it is again—
the window,
thin aquarium,
transparent border,
house-eye,
holding back the whole weather
with one pane of glass.
~ Oizys.
After-note: A small resource from my side: Since today’s poem keeps returning to looking, frames, and the fragile business of witnessing, I came across this today and wanted to leave it here with the poem: another aperture, another angle of light. So, for anyone who may want to support Gaza creatives. The initiative is accepting photography, original artwork, and short-form writing, and making prints from the contributions with profits going toward Gaza. Please read, share, or contribute if you are able. Gaza's Creative Allies.
Day Twenty-Five
Hello, all! Happy Saturday, and happy 25th day of Na/GloPoWriMo!
Our featured daily participant is Behind Door Number 3, where the response to Day 24’s “strange things at night” prompt involve socks going on walk-about.
Today’s resource is Boston University’s video archive of lectures and conversations stemming from former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinksy‘s course on The Art of Poetry.
And now for our (optional) daily prompt! In her poem, “The Apple Tree in Blossom,” Melissa Kwasny strings together several fantastical metaphors for the apple tree, before shifting into exclamations, definitions, and a series of nimble, tonal shifts – and seeming changes in topic – before circling around back to the apple tree. Today’s challenge asks you to write your own poem in which you use at least three metaphors for a single thing, include an exclamation, ruminate on the definition of a word, and come back in the closing line to the image or idea with which you opened the poem.
Happy writing!
-
Note: Day Twenty-Five asked for three metaphors for a single thing, an exclamation, a rumination on definition, and a return to the opening image. So, naturally, I chose the window, because apparently I cannot leave rooms alone. So, here is my offering for Day Twenty-Five.
-
The Window Keeps Its Own Counsel
The window is a thin aquarium
where weather swims past
pretending not to look in.
It is also a border
that learned transparency
as a public relations strategy.
It is the house’s most polite eye,
open all day,
reporting nothing.
Outside, April goes on
with its usual administrative cruelty:
heat entering early,
birds filing complaints in the wires,
a neighbour’s pressure cooker
hissing like an old accusation.
Inside, my mother folds a towel
with the patience of someone
who has been taught
that order is a kind of prayer
even when god is not listening.
The window brightens.
Traitor!
I say this softly, of course.
Even my outrage has indoor manners.
What is a window, anyway?
The dictionary says:
an opening in a wall
for the admission of light and air.
Admission.
As if light has filled out a form.
As if air has stood in line
with two passport photos
and proof of address.
As if anything that enters a room
does so legally.
There is another meaning too:
a period of opportunity.
Small laugh.
A window, then,
is either a hole in the wall
or a scheduled chance
to escape through one.
Both seem optimistic.
At work, they say
we should circle back
when there is bandwidth.
At home, the ceiling fan
circles back all afternoon
and still arrives nowhere.
My unread emails breed quietly.
My salary sits in the corner
like a relative everyone knows
has failed me
but no one wants to insult aloud.
Somewhere, a country
is being translated into rubble.
Somewhere, a mother
is counting children
with a mouth that has forgotten
how numbers end.
Here, the window takes in light.
Here, the light lies down
on the floor
like nothing has happened.
I want to be fair to the window.
It did not invent distance.
It did not invent the room.
It did not invent the human habit
of seeing suffering
and calling it elsewhere.
Still.
All day it holds the world
just far enough away
to be bearable.
A tree leans into its frame,
green and shameless.
A crow lands on the railing
with the confidence of a bad omen
who has tenure.
The sky, that old absentee landlord,
collects its blue rent
from everyone.
For a moment,
I almost forgive beauty
for arriving without a plan.
Then the window shows me my face
laid over the street,
my eyes floating above the traffic,
my mouth superimposed
on a woman carrying vegetables home,
my forehead ghosted
over a scooter, a dog, a torn poster,
the ordinary republic
of things continuing.
Reflection:
from reflectere,
to bend back.
Of course.
Even looking out
is another way
of being returned to myself.
By evening, the glass darkens.
The aquarium becomes a mirror.
The border becomes a bruise.
The polite eye closes halfway
and keeps what it has seen.
My mother asks me
to shut it before the mosquitoes come in.
I do.
The room grows smaller,
as rooms do
when they are pleased with themselves.
Outside, the tree keeps moving
after I have stopped watching.
Inside, the curtain settles
with the tired dignity
of a woman who has worked all day
and is still expected
to soften the light.
And there it is again—
the window,
thin aquarium,
transparent border,
house-eye,
holding back the whole weather
with one pane of glass.
~ Oizys.
After-note: A small resource from my side: Since today’s poem keeps returning to looking, frames, and the fragile business of witnessing, I came across this today and wanted to leave it here with the poem: another aperture, another angle of light. So, for anyone who may want to support Gaza creatives. The initiative is accepting photography, original artwork, and short-form writing, and making prints from the contributions with profits going toward Gaza. Please read, share, or contribute if you are able. Gaza's Creative Allies.
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