Today's prompt:
Our prompt for today (optional, as always) is to write an “occasional” poem. What’s that? Well, it’s a poem suited to, or written for, a particular occasion. This past January, lots of people who usually don’t encounter poetry got a dose when Amanda Gorman read a poem at President Biden’s inauguration. And then she followed it up with a poem at the Superbowl (not traditionally an event associated with verse!) The poem you write can be for an occasion in the past or the future, one important to you and your family (a wedding, a birth) or for an occasion in the public eye (the Olympics, perhaps?).
On the face of it this seemed like quite a good prompt but I really struggled finding a subject that I knew much about or even inspired me. I've written poems like these before, but I like to read up on things and churn a few ideas in my head for a few days, so writing something in a day for this was hard. Also the kids have been pretty hard work today too, so most of my mental energy has been focused on that.
Anyway, I managed to write a poem in the end, based around the Swedish Midsummer celebration. It's kind of important to me as it's when I first met my wife to be, not that the poem really reflects any of that however:
In a very special way
Erect a pole under the sun
Drink and dance and have some fun
Each town and hamlet are unique
And they hold them in a different week
But beware their songs will have you agog
As one indeed concerns a frog
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