The Sun Gathers Form: A Prompt Poem for Poetry Month 2026

For this year’s poetry month in April the wonderful online literary journal, Epistemic Lit, held a one-sentence poem contest. A one-word prompt was shared online each day and participants posted their entries on social media.

I started the month strong, but then had a PSC flare on April 5 and ended up hospitalized by April 20th. I was very sick, but writing a one-sentence poem almost every day felt possible. Honestly, I think the process kept me sane through the entire month’s health ordeal.

Four of my one-sentence poems were chosen for their special poetry month edition. You can read — and hear — all 30 winners here: https://epistemiclit.com/nationalpoetrymonth-one/

Most Canadian literary magazines don’t accept previously published work — including pieces shared on social media — so I decided to edit my 30 one-sentence poems into one long poem and share it here. You may find some symptomatology writing in this piece given just how sick I was while I was writing some of the entries.

The Sun Gathers Form

The morning opens with birdsong & I find my breath nestled between bedclothes each wrinkle smoothed into release the spectacles of sunrise & bright sky melodies from tiny round bodies alighting in trees your hands on my skin.

I engulf you in the chasm of my arms each touch a new depth each breath a new ocean threads spun & woven, the edges of my bones softened by my skin as fibres soften with handling, time, & movement tattered cuffs at my wrists I wrap your edges in strips of cotton so you will not fray in your restless sleep stitch this binding with sharp needles of protection small cathedrals the buttresses that honeycomb inside our bones marrow transepts place each rock, each shell, each dried body in this wooden box — a collection of intuitions of nature calling your heartstrings.

Each tooth a standing stone each bite breaking bread each taste a suspended memory each grain the chicken pecks a letter, a poem in a circle, a divination to summon the will to surrender to each moment — an exhalation, an exaltation the spring wind finally warm with each melt I detect more greenness in the air cotelydon wings volatile on the breeze the script of mycelium leaves traces hiding in cool earth — words or light?

Colour called through ground & branches red & green quickening roots, leaves, scents thunderheads on the horizon, the sight of distant rain & the light oh, the awe of opaline light.

Each shadow a shift in the corner of my eye a recognition of what can be hidden what can be softened what can be true waves in the air all around us, ripples we walk through our solid bodies shift frequencies, hearts oscillating the sun heats our lungs pneuma slow & steady pass this torch to the world through bright eyes, calm days, minuscule stitches & in knowing what is beneficial quietly press piano keys then hum those sympathetic strings to brightness, to eloquence, to stars.

The crust of the earth breaks open violently, ash fills the sky & we gaze at the shift from golden sunsets into purple & red a thousand orange petals fallen at our feet, gold dusted our steps resound the sun the hot bloom of fever, the rustle then quake of chills jaw strung so tightly you could play it like a harp.

Tiny scratches on my skin, rifts from my nails, this morning’s minute scabs scrape this husk with fingernails until it sloughs off its yellow skin such brightness beneath enervated with gold, with red, with viability each gourd organ-shaped acorn squash heart, zucchini pancreas, butternut liver kabocha uterus full & undulant like the moon each bulbous rounding each layer each scent of earth & sun gathers light gathers liquid gathers form.

I sense rain on the horizon fill myself with air so I am buoyant on the water a swollen body that catches currents sway & return, draw circles sway & return, draw breath sway & return, draw the centre we always come back to.

In my fatigue I press against strong winds contrary to my path I climb uphill with each movement deceptively agile each step a feint until I sink into the earth again, a heavy thing rooted in soil every thought a sudden pocket in the fog a wake of bone-fed birds, cracks of blue beaks to marrow psychopomp wings wide to lead the dead.

The portal vein of the human liver. From The Physiological Anatomy and Physiology of Man by Robert Bentley Todd (1859)

Current work

I’m continuing my work on my made of starstuff embroidery and now that I’m back to being able to write and edit in earnest I’ll continue to work on my Four Seasons Mitosis Sampler pattern. More information on those in my last blog post.