NaPoWriMo 09 recap meme

I’ve sort-of answered these already, but since January has set it up as a meme (and because I’m finding it hard to let the whole thing go) here’s my contribution. Thanks to Catherine for the original link.

1. Number of poems written in April.
If we’re allowing posted rough drafts to count, thirty. (Woohoo!) No, make that 31 – I forgot I Coulda Bin a Contender!

2. Number of poems you’ll keep and revise.
A surprisingly large number. Looking back, there are only a handful that don’t feel like there’s something stiring in there. (Even if it’s a long way from the surface in some cases.) For a number … probably at least twenty. (Now there’s a result!)

3. List the titles of your top-three NaPoWriMo poems.
Hmm, this is harder than I expected. And not just because I seem to have called quite a few “untitled”. If we go by how much tingle I get at them in prospect (which is more about potential than current completedness), it’d be Imago, Bride and Lost. Oh, and untitled. If we’re just going on their current incarnation, it’d be Matadora, untitled, and The Cold, Darkening.

4. List your three least-favorite NaPoWriMo poems.
Now we’re getting ugly. Ok, my three cringe-poems: You Could Drown (aka “Please Do”), Found Abecedarian for New Zealand Cricket (aka “Move Away from the Keyboard NOW”) and Aubade for the Milkman (aka “What Did Cheese Ever Do To You?”).
Sorry.

5. Favorite line from one of your NaPoWriMo poems.
A tie between “you are ash, you are rumour, you are a loved, abandoned room” (from untitled) and “yes, you are drum./ Now come.” (from Matadora).

6. Notice any patterns?
The usual – death, sex, autumn, animals, violence, trees …

7. What surprised you most about writing a poem a day?
Looking back, how not-utterly-crap a lot of them were!

8. Now that you have momentum, what’s next?
Resist the temptation to take a break! Keep t going. Revise, revise, write and revise. And keep reading the blogs of my fellow lunatics NaPoWriMo-ers! Hurrah!