The Poetry Marathon

For the third year in a row we are offering word and image prompts. The first prompt every hour will be text based (with occasional variations), and the second, if you scroll down, will be image based. You can choose either prompt or not use prompts at all (or only sporadically). All images are either taken from unsplash, or contributed by a poetry marathoner with credit.

Text Prompt:

Lately I’ve been finding a lot of inspiration in the work of others.

Often when I read a poem, there will be a line (or 5) that sounds spectacular and presents a really interesting idea, but then doesn’t explore it.

One of these lines is from the poems Selkie Weaning Young (Redux) by Diana Khoi Nguyen. The line that particularly stands out to me as containing multitudes is: “This is how she found us/ the past draped about us like a cloak”

You can read the whole poem (it’s short!) to see if there is another jumping off point for you, but if you do end up using the line in your poem, make sure to say “after Diana Khoi Nguyen” in a right alligned line after the title. That way the original poet still receives credit for their idea.

Image prompt:

Photo credit, Birk Enwald