Tweetspeak Poetry

  • Home
  • Prompt Series—FREE
  • For Writers
  • Daily Poem-Subscribe! ✨
  • Teaching Tools
  • BOOKS Etc.
  • Patron Love

Twitter Poetry: Spinning for Tickets for a Prayer Wheel 3

By Glynn Young 4 Comments

red ribbon

At some point during the recent Tweetspeak Twitter poetry jam, the words and lines took a turn toward swans and music, gourds and petals. You read the lines and see the connections, understanding how the lines and words play against and with each other. Sometimes they join; sometimes they argue and fight, struggling as they do to emerge into a coherent story.

What struck me about this section of the jam was the sense of sadness that kept inserting itself. Perhaps it was the prompts from Tickets for a Prayer Wheel: Poems by Annie Dillard. Perhaps it was the mood of one or two participants that suggested itself to the others.

Despite the sadness, or because of it, some beautiful things emerged. Here are the next six poems from our Twitter poetry party. (The first group can be found here, and the second group here.)

Poems Inspired by Tickets for a Prayer Wheel

By @Doallas, @lwlindquist, @llbarkat, @SoniaJoie, @chrisyokel, @KathrynLNeel, @mmerubies, @lanearnold, @graceappears, @jen_rose, @BrighterSideblg, @flaxenprint, @Diana605, @VaporWhisp, and @MelJepson. Edited by @gyoung9751.

I am the swan
I am the swan pulled
laughing into space.
Breaking free.
Flown.
We are the wild swans
unclasped, floating miles apart,
and now in space, forever.
We are the wild swans
unclasped, satellites,
weaving between the gourds,
the petals, returning
with stories of our own,
our secret songs whispered
in words of petals, a lost secret
you never heard.
Halfway the swans, unclasped.
Halfway the petals, urging.
And to the universe the swans
still read that book of poetry.

Watch the laugh blossom

Watch the laugh blossom
Watch the blossom laugh
shaking spring rain
on my upturned face.
I dressed myself in petals,
grew tall my wedding day,
slippered feet in sandals,
lily lips that part halfway.
My bridesmaids were nothing
but petals in waiting.

Weave me a story

Weave me a story, you ask.
I will weave you anything,
Use all my favorite words, you say.
You pick the page. I’ll choose the ink.
You kiss me red. I’ll love you pink.
Book of poetry, you sing,
use all my favorite words.
Book of poetry, you call,
Bind us, weave us a story.
I dream of you. Always dream of you,
ink flowing down the page like a river,
words floating in gentle waves.

Music for strings

The universe plays blue music
upon an old guitar, thrumming,
drumming blue music, plucked,
strummed, picked.

A five-string blue grass banjo laughs;
Mama sang bluegrass gospel
with her Loretta-like voice
and I grew attuned to banjo strings
and steel guitar.

My fingers strum back, aching
to sip the sun. Chords I pluck
like a flower from a stream,
keeping them for blue music days.

Green skies, yellow thread

Green skies hold misted gourds,
all wrapped in yellow thread,
the Elvish fruit of summer.
We sing under yellow skies
to remember days of laughter,
days of misty blooming,
days of youth, days of swans
singing a song of sweet sorrow
as they died, their necks entwined
in finger shapes, your eyes
a mirror of the yellow day
when swans swam free.

Listening to gourds

Last night I dreamed of train wheels turning,
of people crying and songs burning
and my heart knowing it was time to say goodbye.
I put an ear to the gourd, the wild gourd.
I hear how it holds the sweet longings of seeing
your long-lashed golden eyes once more.
You never heard me tell how the swans
are a broken song, the damp castles keeping them
framed, one by one, until I fling them into space.
I fling the gourd.

Photograph by Vox Efx. Sourced via Flicker. Post by Poetry at Work™ post by Glynn Young, author of the novels Dancing Priest and the recently published A Light Shining.

________________

Buy a year of Every Day Poems, just $5.99 — Read a poem a day, become a better poet. In May we’re exploring the poetry theme Swan, Swallow, Phoenix.

Every Day Poems Driftwood

  • Author
  • Recent Posts
Glynn Young
Follow Glynn
Glynn Young
Editor and Twitter-Party-Cool-Poem-Weaver at Tweetspeak Poetry
Glynn Young lives in St. Louis where he recently retired as the team leader for Online Strategy & Communications for a Fortune 500 company. Glynn writes poetry, short stories and fiction, and he loves to bike. He is the author of Poetry at Work and the Dancing Priest Series. Find Glynn at Faith, Fiction, Friends.
Glynn Young
Follow Glynn
Latest posts by Glynn Young (see all)
  • Poets and Poems: Brad Lussier and “How Does He Love Me?” - April 12, 2021
  • An Epic Told in 500 Sonnets: “The Gift of Life” by Amanda Hall - April 6, 2021
  • A Novel About Hughes and Plath: “Your Story, My Story” by Connie Palmen - March 30, 2021

Related

❤️✨ Sharing is caring

Filed Under: Blog, poetry, Twitter poetry

Comments

  1. Chris Yokel says

    May 21, 2013 at 10:08 am

    Great stuff Glynn!

    Reply
  2. Maureen Doallas says

    May 21, 2013 at 11:06 am

    Some lovely stand-out lines here.

    A fine job putting these together, Glynn.

    Reply
  3. Heather Truett says

    May 21, 2013 at 11:38 am

    These turned out beautifully. I love them.

    Reply
  4. davis says

    May 21, 2013 at 4:50 pm

    many good words…i want to use them.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Take How to Read a Poem

Get the Introduction, the Billy Collins poem, and Chapter 1

get the sample now

Welcome to Tweetspeak

New to Tweetspeak Poetry? Start here, in The Mischief Café. You're a regular? Check out our April Menu.

Patron Love

❤️

Welcome a little patron love, when you help keep the world thoughtful and poetic.

5 FREE POETRY PROMPTS

Get 5 FREE inbox poetry prompts from the popular book How to Write a Poem

Join the Club

Join the poetry club, when you become a subscriber to Every Day Poems ✨

Now a Graphic Novel!

"Stunning, heartbreaking, and relevant illustrations"

Callie Feyen, teacher

read a summary of The Yellow Wallpaper

meet The Yellow Wallpaper characters

Your Comments

  • P.R. on Book Club: Meet the Great Gatsby Characters—Couches Included!
  • Katie on National Poetry Month Book Giveaway—Tell Us Your Personal Poetry Story to Enter!
  • Katie Brewster on Poet-a-Day: Meet Elise Paschen
  • debfelio on National Poetry Month Book Giveaway—Tell Us Your Personal Poetry Story to Enter!

Featured In

We're happy to have been featured in...

The Huffington Post

The Paris Review

The New York Observer

Tumblr Book News

Stay in Touch With Us

Categories

How to Write Poetry

Learn to Write Form Poems

How to Write an Acrostic

How to Write a Ballad

How to Write a Catalog Poem

How to Write a Ghazal

How to Write a Haiku

How to Write an Ode

How to Write a Pantoum

How to Write a Rondeau

How to Write a Sestina

How to Write a Sonnet

How to Write a Villanelle

Free Printable Poet Bios

Browse all poet bios now

Shakespeare Resources

Poetry Classroom: Sonnet 18

Common Core Picture Poems: Sonnet 73

Sonnet 104 Annotated

Sonnet 116 Annotated

Character Analysis: Romeo and Juliet

Character Analysis: Was Hamlet Sane or Insane?

Why Does Hamlet Wait to Kill the King?

10 Fun Shakespeare Resources

About Shakespeare: Poet and Playwright

Top 10 Shakespeare Sonnets

See all 154 Shakespeare sonnets in our Shakespeare Library!

Explore Work From Black Poets

About Us

  • • Generous-Annual Theme 2021
  • • Our Story
  • • Meet Our Team
  • • Literary Citizenship
  • • Poet Laura
  • • Poetry for Life: The 5 Vital Approaches
  • • T. S. Poetry Press – All Books
  • • Contact Us

Write With Us

  • • 5 FREE Poetry Prompts-Inbox Delivery
  • • 30 Days to Richer Writing Workshop
  • • How to Write Form Poems-Infographics
  • • Poetry Club Tea Date
  • • Poetry Prompts
  • • Submissions

Read With Us

  • • All Our Books
  • • Best Love Poetry
  • • Book Club
  • • Charlotte Perkins Gilman Poems Library
  • • Every Day Poems
  • • Literacy Extras
  • • Literary Analysis
  • • Poems to Listen By: Audio Series
  • • Poet-a-Day
  • • Poets and Poems
  • • VerseWrights Journal
  • • William Blake Poems Arts & Experience Library
  • • William Shakespeare Sonnet Library
  • • 50 States Projects

Celebrate With Us

  • • Poem on Your Pillow Day
  • • Poetic Earth Month
  • • Poet in a Cupcake Day
  • • Poetry at Work Day
  • • Random Acts of Poetry Day
  • • Take Your Poet to School Week
  • • Take Your Poet to Work Day

Gift Ideas

  • • Give the Gift of Every Day Poems
  • • Our Shop
  • • Everybody Loves a Book!

Connect

  • • Donate
  • • Blog Buttons
  • • By Heart
  • • Shop for Tweetspeak Fun Stuff

Copyright © 2021 Tweetspeak Poetry · Site by The Willingham Enterprise · FAQ & Disclosure