About the Challenge

"Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquillity" ~ William Wordsworth

A Poem A Day Challenge is a week-long (5 days) challenge that runs every third week of the month.

Participants receive writing prompts, daily, for which they write and submit a poem by 10 pm on the same day.

The best THREE (3) poems are selected and published the next morning.

TO PARTICIPATE: enter your email address here http://eepurl.com/eQCM6 and you will receive a daily prompt.

RULES OF THE CHALLENGE:

  • you have to sign up to receive the writing prompts
  • you have to write a new poem for the writing prompt and submitting by 10pm on the same day
  • you may not submit a poem you have already written before.

CHALLENGE PRIZE: From August we are offering a prize for the best overall poem. More info on the prize and how this is decided will follow.

QUARTERLY PRINT EDITION: Poems selected for the publication will be compiled for a quarterly print edition of A Poem A Day challenge. More info on this will follow.

submit here or here make sure to include the words:  APOEMADAY at the top of your submission


April: Freedom Week

When Common asks Assata Shakur 'what is freedom?' at the end of his tribute song, Song of Assata. Assata responds, "You're asking me about freedom? i know a whole lot more about what freedom isn't... coz i've never been free." She goes on to imagine what freedom could be.

It's Freedom Week in South Africa, that historical first vote for the oppressed Afrikan masses of South Africa happened eighteen years ago on 27 April. Now let's writer great poems, interrogate, question, image, dream about freedom.

peace

zamantungwa
editor, publisher

A Poem A Day Challenge, Every 3rd Week of the month

Poems

Taste of change by Thabang Moabi

Posted by Poetry Potion on Thursday, November 17, 2011 In : Soweto Poets 

Sins of shadows
Let not haunt him
For he washed you away with tears of remorse
He washed from the ninth floor while slipping

Let not provoke the guilt he felt
Agony made him believe he is cursed
Neighbours keep distance
Give him a chance
To sip the taste of change

He vowed to heal
Pains of non madicine
In every heart he has hurt

© Thabang Moabi

Day 3 | 16 November 2011


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Day 3 Writing Prompt | 16 November 2011

Posted by Poetry Potion on Wednesday, November 16, 2011 In : Soweto Poets 

(Soweto Poets Week)

"He washed from the ninth floor while slipping"

In detention by Christopher van Wyk

He fell from the ninth floor
He hanged himself
He slipped on a piece of soap while washing
He hanged himself
He slipped on a piece of soap while washing
He fell from the ninth floor
He hanged himself while washing
He slipped from the ninth floor
He hung from the ninth floor
He slipped on the ninth floor while washing
He fell from a piece of soap while slipping
He hung from the ninth floor
H...


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flee from me fear by Morula Wa Kutukgolo

Posted by Poetry Potion on Wednesday, November 16, 2011 In : Soweto Poets 

Flee from me fear,
For you are not from the father
But from the foe.
Flee from me fear,
For you become a barrier
Where I need to boldly enter.
Giving me cold feet
Where I need to be courageous.
You make me say yes
When I need to say no,
No when I need to say yes.
You show me a bleakness
Where there is brightness,
Weakness where there is strength.
Showing me no way
Where the way is wide and open.
Flee from me fear,
Stop following me around
Like I am your friend,
For a foe of my father
Is no fr...


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Sometimes, love hurts by Alyssa Campbell

Posted by Poetry Potion on Wednesday, November 16, 2011 In : Soweto Poets 

A romance story like none before
One morning, he broke down her door
He gave her a ring made out of rope
And without a word they both eloped

It took her a while to love him back
A few missed teeth and eyes made black
Her Stockholm love tore her apart
With the fear-filled flutter of her heart.

© Alyssa Campbell

Day 2 | 15 November 2011

short bio: I am a cook who works at the University, loves to read, and express herself through words and art. (Kelowna, Canada)


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Alien by Su...

Posted by Poetry Potion on Wednesday, November 16, 2011 In : Soweto Poets 

They come at night
Flaming torches
Angry voices,
"Come out you dog!"
They yell,
"Come out you dog!"
They drag me out

I look back at her
My wife
Clutching her belly
To protect life
As I sense
"the fear-filled flutter of her heart"

They say
"Go home",
Because I don't belong
They say
"You thief",
Because I do what they won't

In a country
Not my own
A country
Part of a continent
Our home

© Saurell Boyers

Day 2 | 15 November 2011

(South Africa)


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