Random Access Poetry: The Day Before Writing

Photo by: Jocelyn777 license: under a Creative Commons (BY) license view on flickr
Photo by Joanbrebo license: under a Creative Commons (BY-NC) license view on flickr

For quite some time now, I have been writing poems mostly every single day and keeping them curated at another space (and sharing those poems on Mastodon most mornings with the #smallpoems tag, along with other poet friends).

This month, in connection with April’s random designation as Poetry Month, I want to use images and photography and art as inspiration, and after a call out to some friends on Twitter for some help, as I wondered how I might access a random Creative Commons image from Flickr when I need one, I have settled on a couple of paths forward.

First, I discovered that my friend, Bud Hunt, is going to continue to post an image every day at his blog for folks to use as poetic inspiration. Bud has done this most years (every year?) for some time now, and I have often used his visual prompts for poems. Bud’s blog is here but I wonder if he has another place for sharing in mind …. Note to self: ask him.

Second, when not using Bud’s image posts, I hope to use a tool that my friend, Alan Levine, shared (or created — that isn’t clear to me but it sure looks like something Alan would make and share with others) that culls Flickr for forgotten photographers, and shares their images. It’s called Don’t Look At My Photos, and I love how it allows a deeper look at the talent pool of Flickr. (Note: I use Alan’s handy Creative Commons Attribution bookmarklet, too.) Alan also wrote about a few other things he has brewing.

Third, John Johnston reminded me of his Random Flickr Blender tool, which grabs and blends Flickr images into strange art that is always evocative to look at. You can even tweak the blending tools. That’s what I used to find an image for the top of this post, but I wish there was an easier way to provide a linked attribution to the blended image than I did here. The blended image changes so quickly and I needed to grab the image and the text of attribution before it went away. It was a scramble for attribution (even though the attribution text is on the image, I wanted to be sure to provide links to photographers, if possible). John wrote a bit about this topic this morning.

Fourth, John also created a specialized search engine for Creative Commons via Flickr, and so I might pull daily themes from National Poetry Writing Month site into that image search engine and see what emerges. Or maybe I’ll find random words (finger a page in a book, for example) and do it that way. The newspaper is another good source for random words and phrases. Or just eavesdropping during the day.

My aim in all this is to be surprised, and to expect the unexpected, and to use visuals to spark poetry, and to see where it goes as a writer. So I anticipate I may be using a variety of ways to get images and try to write poems, and to share them out here as much as possible. I won’t promise to make public a poem every day, or that what I post will be a quality poem every day, but I’m going to try for both.

Another friend, Mariana, even suggested the Daily Muse concept — of a site set up like the DS106 Daily Create where an image is randomly grabbed and posted, and used by anyone to inspire writing. I like that concept. She reminded me, too, this morning about the Daily Stillness – a quiet place to be inspired with image and text.

Whatever way you find for yourself, I hope you write, too.

Thank you to all who responded with ideas yesterday. Networks are magic.

Peace (in poems),
Kevin