I tried writing a poem a day for a full year back in college, and was mostly successful… at the very least I succeeded in writing a whole bunch of often amusingly pointless musings, but that is success nonetheless. And maybe one day I’ll go back to that packed notebook to search for a phrase or two that may ring true into the present. Time will tell.
In March this year, I was encouraged by a poet who I very much admire to try the challenge of National Poetry Month’s poem-a-day (only 30 days of writing, not 365!). This individual’s recent collection came from a poem-a-day project, and I was reminded that you never know what might be produced with a little project and intent. One of my intentions for this year was to dive into new and different writing challenges – workshops, salons, open mics and readings, whatever opportunities might present themselves. So I decided to do it – with certain simple parameters.
I decided that I’d aim for short poems – five short stanzas maximum (when possible) – and that I’d have a theme for inspiration. That theme was photography-inspired poetry. Prior to the first of April, I gathered a nice varied selection of my own nature-centric photographs and threw them into a folder on Google Drive. Each day this month, I chose one photograph to inspire a poem. Some of the poems ended up seemingly quite polished in their initial form, and others will certainly require edits if I choose to move forward with them to the next steps of drafting.
I’ll return to these 30 ekphrastic works and who knows, maybe they’ll make their way further out into the world some day. I learned that we all need a project here and there. We don’t need a project all the time, but projects provide some sense of purpose and direction, and that can really help in moments – or months – of writers block. If you’re stuck, try a project, whether that be a single poem project, or a chapbook project, or a full manuscript concept project. From the small to large scale, a project might be the breeze to brush away the fog and create clarity, or the lighthouse with its soft glow of awareness in the distance, or the sounding of a foghorn to keep you from scraping your hull and provide at least some sense of direction.
Today is the final day of National Poetry Month, so I thought I’d give a taste of my project with one photo and poem pairing below. The featured image of this post is the 2024 National Poetry Month Poster.
Adirondack Evening
Screen sagging in its light, wooden frame
push against tight hinges
step out onto the wooden porch and let it slap shut behind
then down the stairs speckled with sap
cross the white pine needle carpet past crackling evening fire
avoid stray sticks and pinecones
climb over the presently unfilled hammock
to reach the dock of warped and weathered white boards
dip a toe – or a bit more – then settle in and simply sit
watch the sky, wait for the moon to rise and the loons to cry
marks in the sand 
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