The writing challenge was to compose a pair of poems on each of six themes, these being:
Theresa May; map reading; making tea; writing a poem; bird song; dog bite.
The poems had to be a haiku and a tanka. A haiku comprises three lines with syllable pattern 5-7-5 and a tanka is a five line poem with a 5-7-5-7-7 pattern. Rhyming is not allowed in either form.
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Theresa May
A Prime Minister
Should prime all her ministers
Theresa may not
Theresa, P M
Stood in the street and declaimed
About the future
Will she keep her promises?
Or will the future keep her?
Map reading
I once owned a book
Called “The Map That Came to Life”
And it always does
To get where you want
Forget the sat nav device
A spouse with a map
Will take you both to places
That may not even exist
Making tea
Teabags are so cool
But useless for making tea
Until hot and wet
“You’ve made it too strong
And you know I put milk in first”
It all goes to show
Making tea and making war
Can be hard to tell apart
Writing a poem
Rhyme, metre, rhythm
Weave special magic to show
The power of words
Heroic couplets
Iambic pentameters
Flowing, perfect rhymes
When complete the poet gets
Heroic satisfaction
Bird song
The birds’ dawn chorus
Shouts their wish to rise and shine
Hours before you do
The songs of the birds
May have hidden messages
Should you choose to hear
The woodpigeon says to me:
“Take two books with you, you dolt”
Dog bite
When the dog bit me
No way did I remember
My favourite things
A bitten finger
Six trips to the surgery
Stitches and dressings
Waits for nurses and buses
Gave lots of time to read books
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(And an extra tanka for good measure)
In the library
On library shelves
Opportunities await
For curious minds
Imaginations bleeding
© John Welford
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