After a solid, seven-year case of writer’s block, poet L.L. Barkat decided to write to a 30-Day Challenge. The challenge was offered on Substack by The Write to Poetry.
The result? Beyond the Glass: Poems.
If you take anything from Beyond the Glass, the poet hopes it will be this: you can make it through. The poems themselves are testament to life’s surprising turns; they look both backwards and forwards, with the realization that it is art that holds us (or can). What else holds us? The love of those we choose to surround ourselves with, whether from past or present.
All thirty prompts are included at the back of the collection, so you can use them, too—compliments of The Write to Poetry.
Table of Contents
Prelude
A Bonus Poem Before We Begin
Sparrow Beyond the Glass
The 30 Poems
1-sparrow
2-would
3-Night
4-Writing to the “Favorite Hot Drink” Prompt
5-After a Collage by Catherine Abbey Hodges
6-First Memory, Cherished
7-Despereaux, Darling
8-Salary
9-The Big Red Heart Box
10-Ford Torino
11-Father Fashion
12-Titania’s Note Left by the Door, Photocopied by Oberon
13-Giveaway
14-Plaint
15-After Emily
16-Cut
17-1930s Bedroom Closet
18-Grand Jury
19-Secrets (Yours)
20-Sloansville II
21- To the Road That Intersects Corbin Hill, Where a Corner Store Sold Orange Creamsicles (Which I Loved)
22-Avatar
23-Lessons in Glass
24-Photograph: Aruba, 1938
25-Twins with My Sister’s Steel Grey
26-Repair Woman
27-Paris to London, 1992
28-To Earth
29-Garnet
30-The Spice Carousel
The 30 Prompts
Full Cover
About the Poet
L.L. Barkat is the author of The Novelist: A Novella; Rumors of Water: Thoughts on Creativity & Writing (twice named a Best Book of 2011); and Love, Etc. Her poems have appeared at Every Day Poems, Best American Poetry, VQR, NPR, and the BBC.
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