Paper Poetry’s July Prompt Update

Respect Respect on Repeat

It’s not too late to join our poetry prompt

Respect to you, fine friend We embrace in revered silence even as life tests our endurance poetry powers our resilience

I write to you on behalf of Paper Poetry’s editorial team — Suntonu Bhadra, Indubala Kachhawa, and myself — to announce that our July prompt, Respect Respect, will be extended for another month.

The Respect Respect prompt will now close on Thursday August 31 (UTC-10hrs, Cook Islands 11:59 pm).

We’re delighted with the response we’ve had to the prompt — the calibre and diversity of poetry in terms of perspective, context and form has been astounding. Thank you most sincerely to the wonderful poets who have contributed already to the prompt. 🙏 ✨

Please visit Paper Poetry’s home page where you will find the prompt poems assembled in their own designated section: Respect Respect prompt poems. A list of the prompt poems can also be found here. Please support our talented community of poets by reading and rewarding their efforts with claps, highlights and comments. 🙏 💖

The theme, Respect Respect, is one that speaks to all of us in some way — maybe many ways. Given the times we live in, the notion of respect and the need for it to be practiced in micro and macro forms has never been more relevant — indeed urgent.

Respect is what will save us from ourselves.

It was with that thought in mind that we felt it wise — necessary, even — to give poets more time to respond to the prompt.

The decision to extend the prompt was also driven by the personal circumstances each one of us — Suntonu, Indubala and myself — is currently experiencing.

I will respect Suntonu’s and Indubala’s privacy and let them share their own stories if and when they choose to do so. In the meantime, please join me in wishing them both well as they navigate and adjust to their respective new normal.

For me, I am in a place I never thought I would find myself. For one thing, I had no idea that within 12 hours of having released the Respect Respect prompt on July 1, I would be holding my mother’s hand and preparing myself for her imminent death. I wrote about it here. More recently, I wrote about how I have struggled to write anything since.

I’m grieving. I know that.

I’m grieving for my mother. I’m also grieving for me. My marriage has broken down and my life has changed forever. I write to you, not from my own desk in my home but from the safety of another’s dining table. Life has suddenly become unfamiliar. I need to respect myself and take each day as it comes. Most of all, I must respect God and have an abiding faith that He knows what He’s doing because I’m not at all sure I do.

I’m sharing my story with you now because I don’t know what the future holds for me and what it might mean for my time here on Medium — and indeed, for my writing. I’m sharing my story out of respect to you and the connection we have made through our common love of writing, and especially poetry.

I have a deep love and respect for poetry. It’s a unique form of human expression that truly is a testament to our resilience and capacity for creativity even in the direst of circumstances.

Poetry powers resilience

For full details of the Respect Respect prompt, please refer to the original prompt announcement —

Many thanks and all due respect to you. 🙏 💕