Tag Archives: #poetrycommunity

by | July 6, 2023 · 5:15 am

Does It Have Pockets and #TankaTuesday

This week, Colleen’s #TankaTuesday prompt is to write a syllabic poem inspired by your Celtic tree. I had never heard of this before. It seems similar to an astrological sign in that your birthday determines the tree. My tree is holly, which I had never thought about before. I mean, I know the holly berries and leaves design for Christmas decorations, but that is about it. I discovered:

HOLLY – THE RULER

JULY 8 – AUGUST 4

Among the Celtic tree astrology signs, the Holly is one of regal status. Noble, and high-minded, Holly signs take on positions of leadership and power. If you are a Holly sign you take on challenges easily and overcome obstacles with rare skill and tact. When you encounter setbacks, you remain vigilant to obtain your end goals. People look up to you and follow you as their leader as you are rarely defeated. You are competitive and ambitious even in the most casual settings. You are quite generous, kind and affectionate. Highly intelligent, you skate through academics where others may struggle. Holly signs may look to Ash and Elder signs for balance and partnership.

https://onetreeplanted.org/pages/what-kind-of-tree-are-you

No doubt these descriptions are set up to flatter, but there are aspects of this description I can relate to. Taking on challenges, (trying to be) kind, things like that. But the ruler? My husband would laugh himself silly because we both agree that while some are leaders, some are followers, there are those like me that are neither. I don’t like being a boss as in: do this, do that, don’t do that, I’ll judge you, etc. I do like the “noble and high-minded” thing, though. Whether it’s simple flattery or something more, I can take a guess 😉 but one of my literary role models (and here I use literature to mean Broadway musical haha) is King Arthur in Camelot. He has to choose between the legal choice for the good of the country (meaning lots of people) or his love for his wife. Really really admire that character.

I thought I would try a tectractys today, and I’ll tell you why in a minute. So here it is:

Your

ruling

quality

must come from tact

and the ability to see both sides.

Tectractys is a five-line poem with this syllabic configuration: 1, 2, 3, 4, 10.

The literary journal Does It Have Pockets? has published a Red Riding Hood story of mine that is darker than anything found in my chapbook Our Wolves. “Why I Always Wear Red” is flash fiction that finishes with a tectractys, making it a hybrid genre. You can read it here:

https://www.doesithavepockets.com/fiction/luannecastle

If you missed my reblog of Rebecca Budd’s podcast interview of me, here is the Spotify link. You can also find it on Soundcloud.

You can also follow Rebecca’s Tea Toast & Trivia series for more author interviews.

Welcome to Tea Toast Trivia

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by | July 3, 2023 · 12:51 pm

Season 5 Episode 14:  Luanne Castle on A Poet’s Voice

“Note how the red rose,velvet worn by early frost,clings confidentlyto its own treacherous stem,never accursed by mirrors.” Luanne Castle Welcome to …

Season 5 Episode 14:  Luanne Castle on A Poet’s Voice

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by | June 26, 2023 · 7:55 pm

Syllabic Synonyms: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested writing a syllabic poem using synonyms for the words OPEN and CLOSE.

When the sun unfurls

in the rosy morning sky

the owl shuts her eyes.

In my haiku I used unfurl as a synonym of open and shut as a synonym for close.

Speaking of animals I have a cat poem in a new anthology of ekphrastic poetry published by Moonstone Press. It can be purchased here if you like ekphrastic poetry. https://moonstone-arts-center.square.site/product/ekphrastic-poetry/423

By David Ryckaert III – Web Gallery of Art: Image Info about artwork, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15541707

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by | June 20, 2023 · 7:33 am

Meditation on Art: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested writing a syllabic poem inspired by an art meditation video posted by Rebecca Budd on her chasing art.com website. https://chasingart.com/2023/06/02/the-national-gallery-5-minute-guided-meditation/

You see a cup on a pewter dish and a thornless rose. Actually the rose looks like more of a fantasy rose whereas the cup and dish are realistic. I found watching the video to be an amazing experience.

I wrote a haibun.

The Realism of Winter, The Fantasy of Spring

In this portrait of a cup of water, I find my mind focusing on the slivers of light on pewter and pottery. I have to be directed to see the large shadow on our right that is so obvious once pointed out. Then I note its power. The water looks refreshing enough to dive into if only I could make myself smaller like Alice. In fact, I feel myself becoming both smaller as the scene looms bigger in front of me and also larger as the space in my mind that this painting inhabits grows. Eventually I have to recognize the two aspects that poke at me, pay attention to me, they say. One is the fantasy flower with petals so curvy they could be dying or so unreal as not to include thorns. The other is the handles of the cup are misshapen. They don’t match, and only a child’s fingers could enter their spaces. Only a fantasy child like Alice.

Shadows of winter

once greeted bring forth treasures

of fantastic spring.

###

My girl Kana is the Box Queen. She is the one of my five cats who finds a box or bag the minute it enters the house. The other day she went one better. I set a buckled belt I am using for an exercise on the couch. When I turned back to it she had climbed in it.

On another note, I had a banner/header made with my two full-length poetry books and my two chapbooks made by someone who knows what they are doing because I clearly don’t. It’s for this blog and my social media. What do you think?

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by | May 30, 2023 · 1:14 pm

Spirit Animal: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested writing a syllabic poem about our spirit animal. She provided a quiz to find our spirit animal. I took the quiz and discovered that at this moment mine is the turtle. The website, spiritanimal.info, says that “The turtle totem symbolizes our peaceful walk on this earth. It represents the path we take as we embark on our journey through life.  In contrast to emotional or spiritual development occurring in bursts, the way of the turtle anchors our personal unfolding in a slow, more grounded series of steps and longer cycles of transformation. The turtle is associated with our physical and embodied evolution on the earthly plane. Call this spirit animal for help to be more grounded. You can also get help slowing down and pacing yourself, so you can take your next step with more confidence.” While I doubt my spirit animal is always a turtle it does fit right now. I’ve had this torn meniscus and other issues since January, and I am trying to resolve myself to stop fighting it and just proceed in the right direction, working hard at physical therapy, icing, and REST. Yes, this past week it was so bad that I actually rested, and wow, that actually helps . . . a lot. I had a good physical therapy appointment today. Fingers crossed. Moving at my turtle’s pace, in the right direction.

For this poem, I wrote a tanaga, which is a form from the Philippines. This is a 7-7-7-7 Syllabic verse, with an AABB or AAAA rhyme scheme.

###

Accepting the Turtle as My Guide

For this part of my journey

I learn to walk with this knee.

A turtle guide teaches me

to keep on without hurry.

###

Another thing that I like about a turtle is that while they are slow and seem clumsy on earth, they are quite graceful and fast in the water. With my Sun in Cancer, I was born under a water sign. And grew up in and around the lakes of Michigan.

When I was a little girl, I had a beautiful painted turtle as a pet. The turtle’s shell was at least 4″ long. I must have been about five. I took him or her outside to play a few times. She would fall into the window well and need help out. I recall my father helping me release her to live free, but I don’t remember the details. Today it is illegal to release a captive turtle into the wild. But I do remember that I felt wonderful letting that turtle go have her own wild life.

Then when I was in 4th grade, I was given two tiny turtles to live in an aquarium. I don’t remember what happened to those turtles, but I did used to love to feel their scratchy claws scrabbling at my palms when I held them. Looking back, I wonder if the idea of releasing the big turtle was sympathy for it because of it’s size or if I was too young to take proper care of it.

green and black turtle in close up shot
Photo by Andrew Patrick on Pexels.com

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by | May 23, 2023 · 5:15 am

Acrostic Prompt: #TankaTuesday

Colleen at Wordcraft poetry suggested writing an acrostic poem based on a word from a list she provided. She asked every line to be 8, 9, or 10 syllables long. I used the word ORACLE. Each line begins with a letter from that word so that if you read down instead of across you see the word oracle. I created a form of 8, 9, 10, 10, 9, 8 and rhymed same count lines with each other.

Voice of the Gods

On the sunwarmed rock she holds court

Ruling a man’s world with prescient words.

All listen and quake, even mighty kings

Clothed in velvet vestments and golden rings.

Love and riches–often doom–they heard,

Even took heed or to the heart.

The Oracle
The Oracle by Célestin Nanteuil is licensed under CC-CC0 1.0

A couple of years ago Memoryhouse Magazine published an acrostic poem I wrote using the title of my favorite Whitman poem, “Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking.” Note that my title starts the phrase and then the first letters of each line the last part, “endlessly rocking.”

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by | May 8, 2023 · 3:48 pm

A 3rd Poem Up at MasticadoresUSA

Thanks to Editor Barbara Leonard, MasticadoresUSA has published my poem “Screaming.” https://masticadoresusa.wordpress.com/2023/05/09/screaming-by-luanne-castle/

person s shadow
Photo by Nadi Lindsay on Pexels.com

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by | April 19, 2023 · 5:15 am

A Love Poem to My Cat and #TankaTuesday

I had a poem published today in a cool Australian lit mag. It’s called Trash to Treasure Lit, and the idea behind it is that “every writer has a piece of ‘trash’ that we can treasure.” Look through your drafts, your poems you figured you could never do right by, and if you can write something that explains why this “trash” can be a “treasure,” they might publish it. In my case, I wrote a love poem to my cat Perry, who as you may know, suffers from a couple of terminal illnesses (so far so good in case you’re wondering). I hope you can tell from this poem that Perry is the real treasure.

https://www.trashtotreasurelit.com/publishedpieces/perry-by-luanne-castle

Colleen Chesebro’s prompt for #TankaTuesday this week is in celebration of her 65th birthday. (Happy birthday, Colleen!) We were to create a poetic form using 65 syllables.

I created a form I will call the aînée, which is the French word for a female elder. I was going to use the Spanish word anciana, but I didn’t like the connotations which seemed less positive. Plus I like that I am honoring the French language which is a language that has originated a lot of syllabic poetry. 65 syllables are arranged this way: ten lines of six syllables each, followed by a line of 2 syllables, and a final line of 3 syllables.

Decades to Medicare, or We Count Slower Later On

The first we play and learn,

then anguish for ten more.

Finally on our own,

we screw it up or not.

Next years we develop

into who we will be.

In our forties we whine

that we are now so old.

Those next decades are fine

for comfort in ourselves.

Now count

more slowly.

You might recall that I have been submitting a poem every month to Visual Verse for their ekphrastic challenge. Here is my April poem: https://visualverse.org/submissions/dont-look-back-2/ They showcase each poem next to the inspirational art.

Finally, here is another review of Our Wolves. This review addresses the issue of abuse in some of the poems. https://impressionsininkblog.com/2023/04/13/review-our-wolves-by-luanne-castle-poeticbooktours/

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by | April 11, 2023 · 8:24 am

Poem Up at MasticadoresUSA

Thanks to Editor Barbara Leonard, MasticadoresUSA has published my poem “The Not Sonnet.” Of course, it is a sonnet.

This is the second poem of mine that Barbara has published. And there will be a third next month.

https://masticadoresusa.wordpress.com/2023/04/11/the-not-sonnet-by-luanne-castle/

Cactus blossom season is here. The gardener took this pic. He is a much better gardener than photographer, but you can still see how beautiful the blossoms are.

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by | April 10, 2023 · 4:32 pm

Poetry Reading Video

I had fun reading my poetry via zoom through the Well-Versed Words program, hosted by poet Alison Hurwitz. There was time to read quite a few poems from Rooted and Winged, as well as two from Our Wolves and to yak a bit about the poetry. Having to talk about my poetry taught me things about my poetry and my life. Alison is an excellent moderator and offers a reading every month. Check out her website at https://www.alisonhurwitz.com/events.

The video is 48 minutes long (eeks). It has the name of the wonderful moderator, Alison Hurwitz at the beginning, but you are in the correct video. And of course you can skip around if you want to check it out! As for me, no way can I watch it and see myself and listen to my voice hahaha.

https://vimeo.com/816303312

My leg has been diagnosed as an inside meniscus tear and arthritis of the kneecap exacerbated by my primary lymphedema. Surgery is a very very last resort because of the lymphedema. Going to see a PA in sports medicine this week. Long waits for actual doctors. I hope to be able to travel because I have plans to see my mother in Michigan this month. I will be traveling with my daughter while the gardener stays home with the kitties. Yes, I’ve booked a wheelchair at the airport! If you’ve read my blog very long you know there is always a new physical problem ;).

A spot of good news. My son got my sewing machine fixed. It’s been broken for about 15 years. I want to use it for journaling, and now I just have to remember how it works. You would think that the granddaughter of the Head Fitter at The 28 Shop (couture at Marshall Field) would be a natural at sewing. But it was my cousin Leah who inherited some of that talent. Sadly, Leah has now been gone for twenty years.

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