Wisdom

By definition, having wisdom is to possess a power, the power of discerning and judging properly as to what is true or right; also scholarly knowledge or learning. Many people relate wisdom to age, believing that it is accumulated over time, thus the symbol of the wise old owl. Some relate it to spiritual or ancient teachings that have stood the test of time. Some believe wisdom is found within through meditation or dreams, tapping into the collective unconscious of ancestral memory. “-wise” as a suffix denotes manner, position, direction, reference, etc. as in counterclockwise or edgewise. Wisdom may lie simply in knowing where you are, your position, your reference points, and the direction you are heading.

Happily, I have an owl filter already cut. For today’s images I will try to capture its accumulated wisdom by hunting for its reference points and direction.

The Prompts

NaPoWriMo

Today’s prompt is to write a duplex poem, a form created by Jericho Brown and my favorite poems in The Tradition. I wrote my first duplex and talked about the form last year in my post Playing in the Duplex.

Poem A Day

Today’s prompt is to write a remix poem. This should be an interesting challenge, to remix one of this month’s poems into a duplex. For today’s remix, I decided to work with lines from day nine’s poem “Hope Breaks Eternal” and day sixteen’s poem “Needs For Sale.”

The Poem

Last Night’s Forgotten Bruise

Hope breaks through last night’s disappointments
Swirling the spiral when need’s a deep bruise pressed

Need is felt like a forgotten bruise pressed
When hunger turns to feed on its own tail

Turning to yearning when finding tales stale
Hope breaks the mold of expectation

Molded clay days of expectation have
A brittle grasp on reason’s crumbs to break

Reason’s crumbs scatter as the days break
and a vacancy needs filling, love’s ache

Hope sees a need-filled hollow, vacancy’s ache
And jumps, unstartled, unique and new

To flip perspective for the world anew
Hope breaks through last night’s disappointments