Tag: escapril 2021

For those who don’t know, Escapril is the brainchild of poet and novelist Savannah Brown, who challenges the poets of Instagram to write and post a poem every day of National Poetry Month. Whilst Brown wouldn’t call herself a leader of the challenge, she is the “managerial ghost” of the @letsescapril Instagram account.

Today’s prompt is “clock.”

Time has always been a problem for me. There have never been enough hours in the day. I rediscovered a barely used journal from 2012, and across several pages I’m lamenting my struggle with taming time. Little did 15-year-old me realise time would only become even more elusive without deadlines and structure.

But I didn’t want to write a poem about “wasted” hours. For starters, you waste more hours by lamenting lost time, so it’s counter-productive. That’s what I try and remind myself when those guilty feelings about unproductivity try to bring me down.

For those who don’t know, Escapril is the brainchild of poet and novelist Savannah Brown, who challenges the poets of Instagram to write and post a poem every day of National Poetry Month. Whilst Brown wouldn’t call herself a leader of the challenge, she is the “managerial ghost” of the @letsescapril Instagram account.

The prompt today is “nightmare.” Immediately, my mind went to the worst nightmare I’ve ever had. I had the nightmare when I was eight. I’ve had many nightmares since, but none have succeeded in terrifying me as much as Samara.

See, when I was eight, my mum decided to let me watch The Ring (2002). For those who don’t know, the movie is an American remake of Hideo Nakata’s Japanese film Ring (1998), which is itself an adaptation Koji Suzuki’s 1991 novel of the same name. The plot concerns a cursed videotape, whereby anyone who watches the tape will receive a phone call telling them they have seven days left to live. Once the seven days are up, Samara – or Sadako Yamamura in the original novel and Japanese adaptation – climbs out of your TV and kills you.

For those who don’t know, Escapril is the brainchild of poet and novelist Savannah Brown, who challenges the poets of Instagram to write and post a poem every day of National Poetry Month. Whilst Brown wouldn’t call herself a leader of the challenge, she is the “managerial ghost” of the @letsescapril Instagram account.

The prompt today is “naked.” I knew I wanted to write about vulnerability. It’s something I’ve been thinking a lot about in recent years, and it’s still something I’m learning how to do.

The angle I decided to take with the poem was inspired by Tim Kreider’s excellent Medium article “I Am a Meme Now.” Specifically, this quote:

[It’s] scary putting yourself out there, letting yourself be seen, vulnerable to people’s wrong opinions and dumb judgments. I’d sooner let a stranger see me naked than show them a first draft, which is like letting them see my naked brain.

As someone who writes, I very much connected with Kreider’s anxieties about exposing my naked brain to a stranger. It’s one of the things that has kept me from publicly blogging over the past year. Even posting these poems to Instagram has taken a great deal of mental strength to resist overthinking and excessive editing. It’s most certainly the reason why I couldn’t keep up with the challenge and post daily.

But I feel comfortable with this poem. In fact, I even feel a little proud of it.

This month, I’m trying to force myself to be more creative. I had intended to follow the rules of the Escapril challenge. Alas, I missed the first four days and I’m doubtful I’ll be able to keep up this year. But on the days I am able to dip in, I’ll share my poems here, too.

For those who don’t know, Escapril is the brainchild of poet and novelist Savannah Brown, who challenges the poets of Instagram to write and post a poem every day of National Poetry Month. Whilst Brown wouldn’t call herself a leader of the challenge, she is the “managerial ghost” of the @letsescapril Instagram account.

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The prompt today is “here’s what I remember.” I knew from the get-go I wanted this to be a personal piece, the prompt lends itself perfectly to it.

I expected the poem to be a direct transcription of very real events, and that’s certainly how it began. But about halfway, I decided writing events as they literally happened was less honest than the truth of the feelings that transpired.

People come into our lives, and I don’t know about you, but it’s not uncommon that I forget the very first time I meet someone. There are people who make a strong first impression, and sometimes that can be all they leave. But other times, an unextraordinary greeting may lead to that person growing into a very special person in your life.

This poem is heavily inspired by such a person in my life. But I’d like to think it’s dedicated to all the relationships that take us by surprise.