The Poetry Marathon

hour 4

Considering the life

of a small spoiled dog

Popped

fed and

back to bed

hour 3

Lune Pretirement

Everyday, feeling blessed and relaxed
I drink the first cup in bed
Then move into the day

hour 2

Dinner for us all

Menopausal woman
Desires dehydrated
But flavored by experience
We become two resourceful cooks
These days

hour 1

Like a scar, Down’s Syndrome or other difference

can be a bright red raised line or

faded pale line barely noticeable.

Scars are something we all have.

Some of us show them off,

some try to hide them, and

some want to compare them to others.

Morning Dew

As I sit outside on the porch looking out across the fields.

Drinking my tea and sitting in my rocker waiting for the sun to come up.

The air smells fresh and clean while it is cool outside caused by the dew on the ground yields.

You can see the wetness from the dew upon nature called “The Morning Dew” yup!

 

The morning dew showers all of nature and it is so beautiful to watch!

When the flowers kiss the dew with their blooming leaves so new.

The bees taste the nectar wet and quench their thirst while I swatch!

So they all kiss the dew and then when the sun comes up, they all bid the dew adieu!

 

By:  Lori Tennessen

WELCOME READERS AFTER THE MARATHON!

I would appreciate your comments on #15, Boomer Identity Crisis, which is the most likely that I will submit

#18 and #23 are about love and lost love and are certainly the most personal.

#5 is a nature poem
#17 rewrites the myths of creation.

#14 is an attempt at a Golden Shovel using a poem from this marathon

Number 1 & 24 morning from my window.

YOur comments on any of them would be appreciated.

1, 5, 14, 15, 17, 18, 23, 24
The rest I have eliminated from consideration.

Anthology Submissions are Open!

Submissions to the 2017 Poetry Marathon Anthology are open now and will stay open through the 15th!

Read our guidelines carefully before submissions.

All submissions must include two poems, no more, no less.

All submissions must be made via our email address (poets@thepoetrymarathon.com).

The subject line of all emails must be Poetry Submission. Poems must be included in the body of the email.

All poems submitted must be written during the 2017 Poetry marathon. All poems should be completely edited and contain no major grammatical errors. Revisions are allowed and encouraged. Please check your punctuation before submitting. All poems should be single spaced. Any extra space will probably be interpreted as a stanza break.

The first word of every line should not have a capitalization unless it is intentional! Word has an auto caps feature that you can turn off by following the instructions below.

You must indicate which hour each poem was written in. Only poets who completed the whole or half marathon will be eligible to submit. Also Indicate your location. Please include a link to your page on the Poetry Marathon.

Thank you for following the guidelines! I know they might seem a little strict but they make it possible to put together an anthology in a few months, while having a child and a job that pays the bills.

There is no guarantee that by submitting your poem will be selected, although the goal is to include one poem by everyone who submits.

Digital copies will be made available for free to any contributor. Print copies will be available for a reasonable price (last year it was 8 dollars to purchase a copy) and any money that is made from selling the anthology will go towards covering the cost of the marathon.

Want to know what the 2016 Poetry Marathon Anthology was like? Pick up your copy here.

The Future of the Poetry Marathon

Many of the posts and comments I read refer to next year’s Poetry Marathon. Jacob and I even use this phrase when talking to each other, and then we catch ourselves.

The poetry marathon has been going for five good years now. We love participating in the challenge, we love having this amazing supportive creative community, but also it is a lot of work.

When we started it we were a young married couple. We might have thought we had a lot of responsibilities at the time, but frankly we did not. We had plentiful free time for the most part. Each year though we accumulated more responsibilities – a growing business,  a dog, more community involvement, a house, also there were always health problems, but they seemed manageable, temporary even.

Then two years ago we had a wonderful little one. This year we faced a health crisis. I don’t know what else to call it without revealing more about it. It is something we will always have to deal with, even though hopefully it will be better in the future.

But still we pushed forward thinking this would be the last year maybe. And the way it currently is it is unsustainable. Unless our life was to get dramatically easier in the next year it just won’t be possible to put the kind of time in we do every year.

So here are our options going forward as we see it.

1. We find one (or possibly two) person who can take on up to 75% of the work. This person would be in charge of things like writing emails, answering questions, doing the occasional blog post, etc. We would still cover the costs of hosting the website and help where we could in terms of technology, image making, and prompts. We would also provide a clear outline of what needed to be done. If this happened the agreement would just be to try it for one year and see how it goes.
2. We take a year off and hope that enough improves to attempt hosting the following year. We did this once before because we were between homes in the summer. This was the year between the first and second marathon.
3. People take it into there own hands and have their own marathons linking to our website for idea credit.

2 & 3 of course could happen together. What do you think? We really are a community and we really want to hear feedback and opinions.

Welcome Readers!

Welcome readers!

I appreciate you stopping by to look at my efforts from the marathon. Of course you are welcome to read anything, but I’d particularly like comments on Hours 1,3,6,8,10,16, and 18. It is from among these I’ll be selecting what I’ll submit to the anthology. hanging the lights (hour 3) is a definite. I haven’t picked my second one and would love to hear your suggestions and advice. Thanks!

Roses

Poem 18

🌹 🥀

Roses can never be a symbol of my love

My love does not decay

it grows each day

when you open your eyes

It grows with your kisses and hugs goodbye

My love comes without thorns

because I like being held

And I don’t want you to fear

when I share

the words…

I love you