NaPoWriMo Day 4 Prompt:

Poetry often takes us to strange places – to feelings and actions that are hard to express except through the medium of a poem. To the “liminal,” in other words – a place or sensation that exists at or on both sides of a boundary or threshold, neither one thing nor the other, but something betwixt and between.

In honor of the always-becoming nature of poetry, I challenge you today to select a photograph from the perpetually disconcerting @SpaceLiminalBot, and write a poem inspired by one of these odd, in-transition spaces. Will you pick the empty mall food court? The vending machine near the back entrance to the high school gym? The swimming pool at what seems to be M.C. Escher’s alpine retreat? No matter what neglected or eerie space you choose, I hope its oddness tugs at the place in your mind and heart where poems are made.

Artoonsinn Prompt for Day 4: Hide your name or the meaning of your name somewhere in the poem.

I’m combining the two prompts by choosing the featured picture from the handle @SpaceLiminalBot and using the word “prayer” (my name “Vandana” translates to “prayer” in English) in the poem.

Floating in the desert

In between the azure and the green

I float to find my place

What really is my space?

–

A space that I can call my own

A space where who I am, I can be

Should I look for my roots or should I find my wings?

–

Sometimes, my feet touch the ground

My wits become aware of one extreme

A tryst with reality sets in

–

The humdrum, the extraordinary,

The boundaries, the accountabilities

The convoluted multifarious maze of living

–

As I reach the threshold

I look at the sky-

Cerulean, pristine with divinity glistening

–

It lifts my spirits like wind beneath wings

Slowly and steadily, I touch the zenith,

Surrounded by white, I find myself

–

A fairy tale seems to be unfolding

An exquisite, wondrous place it is

Is it not far away from my reality?

–

To another extreme, I seem to have stretched,

In the bliss of nature, away from human living

In a fantasy world, I try to find my footing

–

But not for long, as equilibrium is again lost

I spot an urge for the truth, the realities

I now set up my space on the vastness of sand

–

A place that’s real, still away from reality of reality

On the secluded piece of land,

I hope to be, who truly I am

–

I grapple for words, to describe my quest

A quest I believe in, a quest for self,

To discern emotions, the quintessence of experiences

–

Searching for myself, I find akin to a prayer

A prayer to dive in the profundity of ocean within,

Somewhere in between the azure and the green

©Vandana Bhasin

04.04.2021

PS: I’m finding some trouble with spacing between stanzas using these blocks on WordPress, so used a “-” after each stanza. Hope it’s not drawing too much attention 🙂

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