Poetry

Poetry vs. Strategic Outcomes

| Mac

Earlier this week I acknowledged that there was something lacking in my SMART News Year’s resolution model. By adopting the SMART technique it means that some of the overarching, higher level, bigger picture goals aren’t explicitly captured… these north stars are relegated to the land of the implied.

In my professional world of suits and ties here is how we would tackle this problem. We would take my list of SMART goals and categorize each of them under a heading, probably called a “Strategic Outcome”, so for instance you might do something like this:

Strategic Outcome: Increase Professionalism of Writing

  • Join Victoria Writing Society in January
  • Get published somewhere other than Exploring-Art.com this year
  • Complete a writing portfolio submission… by December

But that would not be very artful! So instead what I did is I wrote a companion poem to go with my SMART goals. Defy pigeonholes, embrace individuality and explore your passions – be brave! Without further ado, here’s my poem:

Three hundred and sixty five days make a year
Fear as always
Is the predominant barrier
Be brave – profess your goals
I must pursue writing with a professional rigour
I will spend effort, resources and time
transforming Exploring-Art
into a noteworthy cultural endeavour
I shall romance my darling wife and will also
pursue a healthy and nonjudgmental life.

Creative Challenge: Write a Poem

| Mac

Creative Challenge Number 7

This week’s creative challenge… write a poem! Yes inspired my poetry for peace entry… but I have a new one… and I must say poetry seems to bring out my dark side.

Stalemate

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Children raising children
Mistake begetting mistake
I search for meaning
I search for hope
But I find none
Only Evidence
That progress, humanity and enlightenment
Have come undone

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Write a poem, and share it with us!

Poetry for Peace: Bloody Hands

| Mac

So some late night inspiration floated up from my super-conscious and prevented me from sleeping… so I wrote this poem in response to the Poetry for Peace competition. The poem is entitled Bloody Hands.

Bloody Hands
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Murdering civilians has always been wrong.

Our ability to do so has exploded exponentially with the rise and fall of atomic bombs.

Yet we chose to repeat our old habits of war, insulating ourselves in ignorance with labels such as al-Qaeda or Vietcong.

We must confront our deliberate delusions, we must soberly see, murdering civilians will always be wrong, it will always shame you, it will always shame me.

Dismantle our bombs, lay down our guns and dispense with our disputes.

We are all related, human, people, no matter where we are born. We must come together and mend the world we have allowed to be torn.

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If you like this poem you can vote for it here.