Poetry on the fly

I’m going to give you some examples over the next little while of some stuff I wrote recently at my school poetry club. The exercises are to just write on the fly with something like a picture or a list of words or a particular topic as the starting point. I think he said these exercises are from a book about the Iowa Writers Workshops. So these are raw and unedited (much). Unlike my usual stuff that I have sweated over and rewritten sometimes for 20 years or more.......

On pictures of the back fence

I will plant a trellis rose
Will mirror tendrils of my hair
When July blooms have come to bear
I’ll keep just one to wear

This time I’ll take the time for earth
For crumbling leaf moulds in my hand
For troweling compost into sand
Inhale the rich breath of the land

This year I will not stint
To give myself such moments
Which calm my hectic torments
Just are, not needing comment