Artistic Inspiration

The Artsenta Annual Exhibition was used as a starting point for this weeks writing. We were asked to choose an artwork that spoke to us and to write a poem that encapsulated four tasks: to describe what we can see; to reflect on what the art made us feel; to interpret what the artwork was telling us; and to relate the art work to something in our own life. Some people did four lines for each task creating a structure for their poem in the process, while others just let the inspiration flow. Art is a great place to start writing! 

ON TAKU RUA RURU

Two warmly comforting occupants of the night
                    - side by side-
 a take on Taku Rua Ruru; and a memory roused
 
A painter’s brush of green
Dark and Light, it’s all the same
Feathered owls, two ruru, sit
tinted green in a forest flood of
matching feathers and strangling leaves
    Larger than Life
               Staring, Unblinking
                                     Sightless
For each, a cape of feathers wrapped tight
Claws like forest tendrils twine around
A cruel curving beak like a haughty nose
and the always watching eyes
 
Sleep is now Awake:
You hide among the matching leaves
Watching, staring, silent
I sleep, almost
Time held by the chiming clock
Wrenched awake by your violent screech,
adrenaline bites with your feathered flight
 
- KJ  

A SAD FAIRY

The fairy’s glow has gone
Big grey wings hanging low
A long purpley/pink dress
That goes to her feet

She’s cradled herself on the floor
Her hands against her knees
That are against her chest
With her hair drooping low

Seeing this fairy
Makes me feel sad
And I can’t see her face
Since her head's between her knees

I feel exactly like this fairy
As when I lost someone close to me
I cradled myself in the same position as her
So I could be silent and pour the sadness out
 

- Julia Godfrey

Conflict resolution

Conflict is an inevitable part of life, but it doesn't always need to be bad or unhappy - it can be constructive; we can learn and grow through conflict. This week in our writing roopu (group) we took on the challenge of writing about conflict but to make it easier we focussed first on a conflict between two animals and then followed that up with people. We were asked to write a short story that incorporated some level of conflict and also how it was resolved. Like positive conflict it was challenging but rewarding!

STANDOFF 

Lost in her own world, Rubi rounded the corner and climbed the first step. She heard a low growl. Startled, she looked up and there was Bobbi, huddled up against Rubi’s cat door. Rubi’s hackles rose and she swished her tail angrily. Bobbie had no business sitting there! It was her door, Rubi’s door, and Bobbie did not belong. Rubi expressed her displeasure with a rumbling growl. Bobbie continued to sit there, her way of escape blocked by an angry Rubi. So, Bobbie just held her ground.

Bobbie was hungry and she knew from past experience that Rubi would complain but that she would not come any closer. Just to be sure she emitted a low growl and swiped a warning paw in Rubi’s direction. Rubi did not back away, but she didn’t come any closer either. Both cats gave a low growl and then began to complain loudly. It was a standoff!

The ruckus attracted the attention of the house’s occupant. Time to feed Bobbie. As she opened the door Bobbie made a mad dash to hide in the garden. A human, even one that fed her, was much scarier than Rubi any day. Rubi gave her a parting swipe and then trotted inside through the open door straight to her bed. With Rubi gone, Bobbie came a little closer. She was so hungry. The scary human put some food out for her and then disappeared, closing the door behind her. Now Bobbie felt safe. Time for a meal.

- AMH

CARING & COOPERATION

Jane looked up from her computer as her flatmate blundered in through the front door. She had a fast approaching deadline for her assignment and she needed quiet to concentrate so she could finish it on time. Sally continued to blunder through the room, kicking off her shoes and dropping her bag onto the floor with a thud. She collapsed onto the sofa and muttered, “Phew, what a day I have had. I must tell you all about it.”

Jane felt herself cringe. Once Sally got going there was no stopping her. Maybe distraction would work. “You sound as if a soak in a hot bath is just what the doctor would order. Then we can talk.”

Sally loved a long soak. This should give her time and the quiet she needed to finish on before the deadline. She was so close. But Sally wasn’t interested. She had too much to tell.

Jane tried again. “Why don’t you make us a cup of coffee.”

This time Sally trekked off to the kitchen and Jane tried to refocus on her task. It wasn’t easy with Sally crashing about in the kitchen. The noise was really very disconcerting. But she had to get this done. Even so, she did not want to upset Sally by seeming to brush her off when she so obviously needed to talk. Sally was a good friend and ever so sensitive. And she seemed pretty upset already.

How was she going to handle this? Maybe distraction was not the best way. Maybe she needed to be clear about her own situation. She had to get this done before she cooked dinner and time was ticking away.

Sally brought her coffee to her and then plonked herself down on the sofa. Jane took a deep breath,

“Sally I have an important assignment which I must email in before 8pm tonight. I am not quite finished but I can see that you really need to talk. If we talk now do you think you could cook tea tonight to allow me to get it finished? Everything is prepared and ready to go.”

Sally looked up from her coffee:

“Oh Jane, I am so sorry that I am disturbing you. I just don’t know what to do with myself until I get this off my chest. Of course I can cook dinner.”

Sally smiled. “And I will do my best to cook really quietly.”

Jane and Sally settled in for their talk.

- AMH

Olympic Poetry

Well the Olympics is on and there's some amazing athletes doing some incredible things. Much of their performance is beautiful to watch and contains highly choreographed movement with artistic flourishes. So our group was tasked with choosing an Olympic sport and writing a poem or short story about the athlete's prowess, poise, determination and perhaps their hopes. We then had to imagine we were the athlete and write about the moment just prior to the big performance and what was going through the athlete's head.

GOING FOR GOLD

I feel the nerves take hold,

Breathe, I tell myself.

Forget the skater now competing,

I have no control over what she does.

Maybe she will give a better performance,

Maybe she will not,

That is outside my control.

But my own programme is not!

Don’t watch.

Just breathe and breathe again.

What do I need to do?

Think girl, think.

I need to land my triples,

All of them!

I can do it,

I know I can!

This is no time to doubt.

I can do it.

I know I can!

Do I try for my triple axel?

Do I, do I?

I have landed it in practice,

I have landed it in my programme.

It’s hard, but I have done it.

But do I take the risk?

I am sitting fourth now.

Can I move up?

A triple axel and clean programme would do it.

Can I do it.

Yes, I have done it!

I can do it again!

What if my landing is shaky?

What if, what if?

I could tack on another jump.

Yes, I could.

It doesn’t need to be a triple,

A double will do.

Yes, that is the plan.

I have nothing to lose.

I only have something to gain.

Yes, I can do it,

I can really do it.

And I will.

My coach believes in me,

And so do I.

My goodness, it’s my turn,

My turn to be the best I can be.

I am ready.

- AMH

INSPIRATION 

The skater takes his pose

Waiting for his music to begin.

He glances at his coach

Who nods his support.

His music begins and his body sways

As the music appears to become a part of him.

He begins to move

As the music takes him with it.

He becomes caught up in the story

His music and his moves tell.

The music builds

As he prepares for his first jump.

His focus is intense.

Set it up,

Wait for the beat.

He summons the strength,

And he takes off.

Lift and twist.

Round once, twice, three times.

Landing backwards he lifts off again

Using the momentum from his landing

To gather the lift and speed needed.

He takes off.

Lift and twist.

Round once, twice, three times.

He lands with a smile on his face.

Perfect.

One element achieved, the hardest.

He feels on a roll.

His body works to the music

Flowing effortlessly with the beat.

He feels strong and in control.

Wait for the beat.

Now spin.

Wait for the beat.

Now change position.

Another element,

Perfect.

He feels strong and in control.

Again, and again,

Perfect.

He is near the end,

Now the music is all that matters.

It flows around and through him

Taking him through his movements

To that final dramatic sound and pose.

As the music fades away

He slowly becomes aware of the standing ovation.

In this moment he knows,

Knows he has achieved a personal best.

- AMH

THE HIGH JUMP

As the high jumper poised himself 

and got into his stance

he gathered his thoughts 

by having a glance at the bar 

and how far and how high. 

He thought, oh my

I will try and try 

to jump so high, 

I will even try to fly. 

Over the jump and 

over the lump and the bumps 

on the way to glory I will go.

Go for gold 

for gold is the best colour 

to seek and secure 

valour, prestige, honour. 

No guts, no glory. 

So I gather my prowess 

and try to jump 

as high as the sky

To jump and leap 

whether I dance 

or hold my stance 

in such a way to play 

and compete. 

To extend my arms and legs

to stretch and move 

as high as a kite.

To jump with all my might 

and to gracefully 

win to my delight.

- G Maynard

A walk in the country side

 

This weeks we took inspiration from the natural world and some writing of one of the artists at Artsenta who had written a detailed account of his walk in the country. So our writers were tasked with remembering a time they did the same and writing a short story based on that experience and trying to bring the sounds, sights and smells that went with it. We then were tasked with turning that prose into a poem that captured the experience in a more fleeting way.

Walk in the countryside

The cowpat is glooping over my shoe - yes, I am using gloop as a verb, no other verb seems to capture the visceral, unsettling sensation while the brown turns to green as it spreads over my previously cleanish shoes.  And here I was, more concerned by the ripped trousers and the bleeding thigh that I had just given myself trying to scramble over the barbed wire fence.  Why is there even barbed wire?  At least the next fence coming is one of those orange ribbons of modern temporary electric wiring, no barbs on that.

The smell from my shoe is so very 'rural'.  A smell I had tricked myself into thinking I had escaped.  A smell I had hoped was trapped in my childhood.  I smear it ineffectually across the grass, failing entirely to get my shoe remotely clean.  There is no escaping this smell.  Last week's grass.  Even the nearby brush of tussock is proving no help.

The big dumb eye of a cow dispassionately watches my awkward flailing.  I anthropomorphise it, tell myself it is enjoying my suffering, the unpleasantness it has caused.  But I can't fool myself, that eye is too stupid to know malice, too stupid to know anything.

I should have stayed in town.

 

- MJR

 

 

 

Confidence is Power, Misplaced

 

The orange ribbon sparkles

          with interwoven metal

Modern

Manufactured glory

Sparkling across the verdant earth

Held in place

         by plastic posts

            stabbed into the dirt

 

A reminder that man has conquered nature

          with this flimsy

          temporary

          obstacle

 

Stepping over it

          man is quickly reminded that he

               too

          is nature

 

The pulse hits

          somehow both sharp and dull

Simple

          but with panic inducing confusion

Tightening the muscles against escape

 

Why did we do this to ourselves?

 

          We too are nature.

 

- MJR

Repeat it if it's good

Inspiration for this week came from a song by Bob Dylan called 'Shelter from the Storm' which includes a repeated line similar to the title - 'Come in she said, I'll give you shelter from the storm'. The line is repeated at the end of each verse and creates a powerful structure. Repetition can be a useful device in poetry so the task was to use a repeating line. Thanks Bob!

THIS NEEDS TO BE HELD... NOT QUICKLY SPENT

This needs to be held

Not quickly spent...

 

The warmth as I enter 

My new home

 

The shaft of sunlight

Widening

As the sun glides around

The "other building"

 

The green, tenderly painted

Cast-iron ends of my

grandmother's seat

Standing guard

Offering rest

 

My mother's

Carefully chosen birdbath

Standing to the south

Reflecting sky

And shells

thoughtfully placed

 

All this

Needs to be held...

 

not quickly

spent.

- Pauline

If I was a Unicorn...

A chance meeting with a unicorn led to today's topic - unicorns! Okay it wasn't a real unicorn but what if? The challenge set for our writers was firstly to write a poem with the title "If I was a unicorn..." The poet could become the unicorn or look from the outside in a more detached way. And how does a unicorn move, think and feel anyway? So we had a bit of fun with that and then doubled down on the unicorn theme with a second poem that had to feature not only a unicorn, but a fluffy cloud, a sheep and a snowflake. These ideas were inspired by a lantern installation in Dunedin in the month of June at the Meridian Mall as part of the 2021 Dunedin Midwinter Carnival.

CLOUD SHAPES

From grassy bank, sky clear blue

in whose fluffy clouds imagination sees

a sheep jumping over a snowflake

a crystal tearing off, becoming a horn

ovine legs grow strongly long

now bouncing tail flows long and free

a fast and running unicorn, until

fluffy clouds reform, and all are gone

- Kate Jenkins

IF I WAS A UNICORN

Unique horn

Pointed

Sharp

Piercing eyes

Inward

To the heart

Lit from within

Shedding light outwards into

The dark and cold

Blackness of

night

- Pauline

IF I WAS A UNICORN

If I was a unicorn.

I would talk to animals.

Gallop along a field of grass.

I would jump over fences to explore the rest of the world.

I would feel free as my mane blows in the wind.

I would see animals in a different light.

I would meet people brave enough to meet a unicorn.

If I was a unicorn.

I would be happy forever.

Living in this fantasy world.

 

- Julia Godfrey

 

IF UNICORNS DIED OUT

Clamped in sediments am I

Old bones still strong and tight

Once in a forest I laid down

caught by storms of disbelief and doubt.

Historic?  Mythical?  Gone.

This life did not exist

But words held my pulse, and

Art kept my being light

A nursery tale, wandering, sought

Stories wished into open thought

I wait the day when scraping trowel

reveals my bones to show the 'now'

that I exist, I have not gone

Your dreams, your hopes

will trot my song

- Kate Jenkins

Micro Fiction

This week we were inspired by the national Flash Fiction competition which we didn't enter but at least it prompted us to write! We limited ourselves to 100 words and had four topics to choose from. Below are three using 'Night creature' and one for 'A letter in the wall'. The aim was to tell a dramatic short story in as few words as possible and to brush up on our editing skills as we often had to cut the story back to fit the required word length. We also focussed on ensuring our first and last lines were compelling as this is especially important when using so few words. Well done all!

THE NIGHT CREATURE

Her eyes were lost in a cloud of darkness. She blindly felt for switches. Scrabbling silence like a muted thriller.

All she could hear was a creaking floor board. Her creaking?

She was alone surely. Torch, she’d found a torch. It flickered like a dying candle.

Creak!

She desperately pressed the button on and off.

A giant shadow moved torward her. She screamed as someone grabbed her around the body.
She pulled an arm free and shined her stuttering torch at a maniacal laughing face.

“How dare you,” she shouted in frustration as her husband hugged her tighter.

By Julia Godfrey

NIGHT CREATURE

He woke, afraid, black silence slicing dark holes in his mind.  Intruders?  Earthquake?  Flood?  Rain drummed heavily on the cast-iron roof, pulsed by incoming wind gusts, poured along the channels, cascading where the down-pipe wasn't.

Detected again; a scratchy snuffling, wheezing, below the overlaying rain and wind.  He sat up, feet on the blanket, stretching for his shotgun.  Blast!  He flicked the bed lamp;  only darkness.  Bollocks!  He leaped, and stamped his feet heavily, drumming the floor; books from the untidy shelf cascaded into a literary mound.  Silence grew between the sounds of wind and rain.

- Kate Jenkins

NIGHT CREATURE

It was dark and the path was steep. The gradient climbing upwards, hugging the predator-free fence that wound around the eco-sanctuary - a ribbon draped on the rounded hills of Orokonui.

My breathing was becoming increasingly laboured. I needed a rest but was afraid of stopping. It was late and a warm hearth beckoned. Although the short-cut home had seemed like a good idea at the time, doubts were now creeping in.

From the quiet of dusk, night noises were beginning. A rustle here, a snuffle there. The crunching of gravel underneath my feet. The thumping of my own heart and then came that noise, the one that chilled my blood...

- Pauline

POSTE PAST

Chisel and crowbar worked around the chimney; mortar blew powdery onto face and arms; bricks crashed down.  David wiped dust from his eyes.  Among the bricks, a paper corner showed.  He drew it to the light.

"My Dearest Joe,

I heard today of the passing of your dear Mother.  A lovely lady; so kind to me, particularly at that dreadful time. 

I do wish we might have stayed together.  

My thoughts are with your family.  Please convey my sympathy to dear cousin Elsie.

                                                                                    Yours faithfully,

                                                                                           Florence  "

David slid the letter back into the envelope and, opening the wood burner, threw it in.

- Kate Jenkins