DAY 9 (January 14th, 2018)

WILDFLOWERS

What is this futile little game—
finding words for that which transcends words?
But still, I like to play—
It keeps me close—
like the peasant boy that gathers wildflowers
for the mysterious girl he once saw fields away—
springs ago.

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 8 (January 13th, 2018)

THE LAST DAY

What is this? The last day?
On that day you’ll surely wonder—
What is this? The last hour?

And what is this? The last tear shed
for a tiny, tremulous bird
that for flight an undying love
beats in its tiny breast.

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 7 (January 12th, 2018)

ANTEROOM

Sunbeams stream
in perfect planes,
cutting polygons in thick shadows
where an old man sits—
a limb may creak and turn
at every half-revelation—
in a dusty anteroom
off the crowded hall—
in a meditative nexus of
sunlight,
silence,
and thought.

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 6 (January 11th, 2018)

THIS BUILDING SOMETIMES SLEEPS

This building sometimes sleeps,
sometimes warmly thrums
and one’s dreams get lost
in its monotonic vapor.

And then one hears the crows’ caws–
high-pitched, gravel-throated exaltations–
and out of the savage cleft of
Tiamat’s torn, water-laden corpse
gloriously rises the sun.

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 5 (January 10th, 2018)

MUSING

What is this pure ocean heart,
this blue water love,
that piques the nose
like a pink bourbon rose?

Such a one to know!
To unfold, perhaps,
to trace her eyes
with a million tender questions—
and still to know …

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 4 (January 9th, 2018)

TRUE WORDS

True words—
petals plucked from the air
delicately
with pillow-soft fingertips
and a dancer’s alabaster wrist
bent just so—
yielding—
like a forlorn lover’s kiss

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 3 (January 8th, 2018)

from LETTERS ON CEZANNE

You also notice, a little more clearly each time, how necessary it was to go beyond love, too; it’s natural, after all, to love each of these things as one makes it: but if one shows this, one makes it less well; one judges it instead of saying it. One ceases to be impartial; and the best—love—stays outside the work, does not enter it, is left aside, untranslated …

The love is so thoroughly used up in the action of making that there is no residue.

— Rainer Maria Rilke

You may buy this book here: https://www.amazon.com/Letters-C%C3%A9zanne-Rainer-Maria-Rilke/dp/086547639X

TO SEE A THING

To see a thing
as it is
unembellished with
one’s imaginings—
a moment remembered—
it lives forever
and breathes in a dimension beyond one’s own.

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 2 (January 7th, 2018)

LIFE IS BUT A SHADOW

If life is but a shadow,
then a dream is a shadow’s shadow,
and more is revealed of a thing in shadows
than in a hall of heralds’ trumpets.

For you must have eyes
to see without them,
and ears like a frightened fox,
before the din of this world is muted—
you must be what you are before
what you’re not you may become.

from the BOOK OF HOURS

What will you do, God, when I die?
When I, your pitcher, broken, lie?
When I, your drink, go stale or dry?
I am your garb, the trade you ply,
you lose your meaning, losing me.

What will you do, God? I am afraid.

— Rainer Maria Rilke

You may buy this book here: https://www.amazon.com/Poems-Hours-Rainer-Maria-Rilke/dp/0811226689

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!

DAY 1 (January 6th, 2018)

I SAW YOU IN A PAINTING

I saw you in a painting—
under a bone black sky,
in lemon yellow windows,
behind which souls, like tallow candles, consume themselves—
in mirth and fear, in shame and longing,
in tendernesses—
would I but expose my wounds for them—
but why add to their frailties?
I am stronger than a thousand men
and can swim forever
above the terracotta rooftops—
a minim lost in the open sea

The 100 Day Project

The 100 Day Project is a creativity excavation. It’s about unearthing dormant or unrealized creativity by committing to a daily practice everyday for 100 days.
Creativity is a skill. The more we practice, the more skilled we become. Practice takes time. Practice takes commitment. Practice is a radical act in this speeded up world. Through practice, we develop a creative habit. Through habit, we reconnect with and know ourselves again as a creative being.

I started this, my third, 100 Day Project on January 6th. My project is to write at least one first-draft stanza inspired by a poem, a quote, an idea, a painting—anything really. I’ll post the results at www.bradseverance.com/category/100-day-project-number-three/

Enjoy!