Prompts Hour Sixteen
Text Prompt
I lost the ability to smell years ago.
I miss the smell of strawberries.
like I miss my Grandma Emily.
I miss the smell of freshly baked bread
like I miss my childhood.
I miss the smell of Roses
like I miss how roses were once made for the eyes and the nose.
I miss the smell of dirt after a rain
like I miss growing up on a farm.
I need to take in a different breath in life.
I need to relearn to breathe.
I have learned with my eyes that I need to breathe only through my nose.
I have noticed that my sense of smell is returning
in just a little time I have started to be more mindful of how I breathe.
I never thought that breathing is a sense too.
I never thought that there is a right and wrong way to breathe.
Is there a more correct way to see, to hear, to touch, to taste, to move, to smell, to listen, to be?
Write a poem focusing on an experience through a sense other than vision – or a sense you don’t often use or ignore.
Contributed by Janette Rosebrook.
Image Prompt
Wow. Just wow. I shied away from this prompt and, in reading this, have discovered just how well it can be completed! The opening stanza is incredibly moving – the juxtaposition between a particular scent and then a person (your grandmother) or a passage in time (your childhood) is handled masterfully and stopped me in my tracks. I paid close attention, for I didn’t know where you were going to take me. And the second stanza? The conscious awareness and care that you give to something we usually take for granted – breathing through our nose to smell – will stay with me. As will the question in your final line. An absolutely stunning poem.
This goes right to the heart of the matter. Smell and what it reminds one of. The loss of it is bittersweet. This is a very personal poem. Thanks for sharing.