***MARK YOUR CALENDARS NOW!***
dVerse LIVE will be Saturday September 14th from 10 AM to 11 AM EDT.
The link to join us with audio and video will be embedded in the OLN prompt published on Thursday, September 12th. 

“Poems are wide open terrain that welcome the reader in exactly as they are. Poems are accepting.”—from “A Conversation with Poet Tina Chang”

Hello, and welcome to Monday Prosery here at dVerse Poets Pub. This is Melissa from Mom With a Blog. I hope you are all well and your creative juices are flowing.

What is Prosery? A very short piece of prose or flash fiction that tells a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end. It can be any genre you choose, but it does have a limit of 144 words. Somewhere within your story, you must include given lines without changing word order or adding any words. You may add or change punctuation.

Today I have selected a line from a poet who is new to me, and by whose words I am greatly intrigued.

Tina Chang, American poet, educator, and editor. A daughter of Taiwanese parents, Chang was born in Oklahoma in 1969. She moved to New York when she was a year old, where she lived for most of her life.

She earned her Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from Binghamton University, where she currently works as a professor and as Director of Creative Writing. She earned her Master of Fine Arts degree in poetry from Columbia University.

In 2010, she was the first woman to be named Poet Laureate of Brooklyn, and she held the role for over ten years. She is the author of three collections of poetry: Hybrida (2019), Of Gods & Strangers (2011), and Half-Lit Houses (2004).

The following are several links to interviews with Tina Chang and audio including her reading her work. Please peruse at your leisure.

Tina Chang—Brooklyn Poets

Tina Chang—From the Fishouse | an audio archive of emerging poets

Tina Chang

I have also selected excerpts for you from a few of her poems.

There is mythology planted in my mouth which is like sin.
Keep fires inside yourself.
My mother once said, When you were a baby,
            I let you swim in a basin of water
until your lungs stopped. Since then, my eyes were open windows,

the year everything fell into them.

Cicadas hissing.
Ashes on my open book.

Ashes in mother's hair. Ashes on my baby brother.
The streets are arid, driven toward fire.

If I hurry, I will dance with my father before the sun sets,
my slippers clicking
on a thin layer of rain.

from “Origin & Ash”

This landscape of Taiwan looks like a body
black and blue. On its coastline mussels have cracked
their faces on rocks, clouds are collapsing

onto tiny houses. And just now a monsoon has begun.
It reminds me of a story my father told me:
He once made the earth not in seven days

but in one.

from “Invention”

I am haunted by how much our mothers do not know.
How a republic falls because of its backhanded deals,
stairwell secrets. My mother does not know I am lying
with a man who is darker than me, that we do not
have names for how we truly treat our bodies.
What we do with them. The other possesses me.
Without him the perception of me fails to exist.

from “Love”

For your Prosery prompt, I have selected the first line from her poem “Love”: “I am haunted by how much our mothers do not know.” I hope it will inspire a diverse array of responses.🤞🏻

If you’re new, here is how to join us:

• Write a piece of prosery of up to or exactly 144 words, including the given line in the order in which it has been given. You may add or change punctuation, but you may not add or delete words.
• Enter your name and a link directly to your post into Mr. Linky. Remember to check the box to accept use/privacy policy.
• Read other writers’ work as they enter their links into Mr. Linky. Check back as more will be added.
• Please link back to dVerse from your post.
• Have a wonderful time!🎉

Mr. Linky will remain open until 3pm EST on Monday, September 16, 2024.