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Poetry Play Thursday

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:45:45 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

Today’s poetry prompt is a photo. I hope it will inspire you to write. If it does, I hope you’ll share you poem, or a link to it, here in our comments. We’d love to read what you’ve written! Have fun!

Train Tracks by Peter Griffin

Poetry Play Thursday – 11/12/09

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 04:58:17 +0000

Imitation: Does it kill originality?

Some people believe that trying to imitate a favorite poet’s work will stifle originality in your own work. I believe this can certainly happen, but can it also do just the opposite by helping us discover what we truly enjoy about reading and writing poetry Could those discoveries then help us hone in on what and how we should be writing?

Try this:

Read a poem or two by one of your favorite poets.
How did the poem(s) make you feel?
Write down what you really enjoy about those poems: sound, imagery, length, language choice…
Write down why you liked what you chose in Step 3.
Write a poem using the same techniques you enjoyed about your favorite poet’s poem.
Can you spot the similarities and differences between your poem and the poem that inspired it?

Here are a few much loved poems to help inspire you:

HALCYON DAYS

Not from successful love alone,
Nor wealth, nor honored middle age, nor vic-
tories of politics or war.
But as life wanes, and all the turbulent passions
calm,
As gorgeous, vapory, silent hues cover the even-
ing sky,
As softness, fulness, rest, suffuse the spirit and
frame like freshier, balmier air;
As the days take on a mellower light, and the
apple at last hangs really finished and in-
dolent ripe on the tree,
Then for the teeming quietest, happiest days of
all!
The brooding and blissful halcyon days!

- Walt Whitman

THE PLAID DRESS

Strong sun, that bleach
The curtains of my room, can you not render
Colourless this dress I wear?—
This violent plaid
Of purple angers and red shames; the yellow stripe
Of thin but valid treacheries; the flashy green of kind deeds done
Through indolence high judgments given here in haste;
The recurring checker of the serious breach of taste?

No more uncoloured than unmade,
I fear, can be this garment that I may not doff;
Confession does not strip it off,
To send me homeward eased and bare;

All through the formal, unoffending evening, under the clean
Bright hair,
Lining the subtle gown. . .it is not seen,
But it is there.

- Edna St. Vincent Millay

I hope you’ll give this a try and share your results here in our Comments or leave us a link to where you’ve posted your poem. I’d love to read what you’ve written!

Today’s prompt was inspired by Sage Cohen and her book Writing The Life Poetic.

Poetry Play Thursday

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 04:00:31 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

My recent free time has been all about reading for book challenges, so I threw a few book titles together and created another Wordle for today’s poetry prompt. Let’s see what you can create from one or more (or all) of these words:

Just click on the box for a better view.

Please share your poems with us here in our comments or leave us a link to where you’ve posted them. Have fun!

Poetry Play Thursday

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 16:00:38 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

In this day of lightning speed technology, we zip emails off here and there, transmitting our thoughts and feelings to any number of people all in a matter of minutes, even seconds. The messages we receive from friends, by email or voicemail, tend to be short blurbs saying they’ll catch up with us later that night for happy hour or golf on Saturday.

We no longer write letters to each other unless one of our children is away at camp or we drop a postcard in the mail to say, “Wish you were here!” I miss the day of the honest to goodness handwritten letter; the kind of letter that was thoughtfully composed and sent with intention. Do you remember the thrill of receiving one of those letters and how you couldn’t wait to open it but you’d wait until you were in just the right spot and all alone so you could savor every word, taking the time to read and re-read it?

Why not write a letter right now? Write it to your mother, a good friend, or the company that sold you defective sneakers. Why not write a letter to yourself? It can be written in traditional letter form or as prose or a poem.

While you’re at it, why not share it with us so we can experience the thrill, too! If you do, just leave it, or a link to it, in our comments, and we’ll be sure to savor every word!

Poetry Play Thursday – 9/3/09

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 11:13:03 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

Let’s go back to a more structured prompt today and write an Octopoem. An octopoem describes someone or something in eight lines using this formula:

Line 1: A color

Line 2: A season

Line 3: A place

Line 4: A type of weather

Line 5: A type of clothing

Line 6: A piece of furniture

Line 7: A TV show

Line 8: A type of food.

Here’s an example I found at ETTC (Education Technology Training Center):

Wild gray outdoor cat
Hungry for summer treats
Draped and lazy across my front stoop
When steamy July thunderstorms rumble through
She pants and huddles inside her war torn fur coat
Feline survivor
Thriving at the neighborhood buffet

What will your Octopoem be about? Why not write two? Or three? Please share them with us, or a link to them, in our comments. I look forward to reading them all! Have fun!

Poetry Play Thursday

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 03:45:20 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

It’s time to get back to some poetry fun! Today’s prompt harkens back to an earlier PPT about found poetry. Your mission is to pull your material from one of the many social networking sites available to us: Facebook, Twitter, Identi.ca, Plurk, Ning, Jaiku, SocialGo, you name it. Find a note, tweet or post that intrigues you, play with the words and create a poem!

I used some of Warren Ellis’ tweets for the following examples:

Feral interns abandoned
fashioning a spear from
roaming WB producers

(Original: Abandoned to feral roaming producers on the WB lot. Am fashioning a spear from the bones of interns.)

A fine aphrodisiac
Twitter is f!@#ing the world
Of complete stupidity

(Original: Twitter is a fine guide to those parts of the world where complete fucking stupidity is clearly a searing local aphrodisiac.)

Forest pubes
Do not concern yourself
For I am the Wise Man

(Original: I am The Wise Man Of The Forest. Do not concern yourself with my lack of clothes. Or the Things nesting in my pubes. For I am Wise.)

If you don’t know who Warren Ellis is, what are you waiting for? Go, check him out!

I hope you’ll share what you’ve written, or a link to it, here in our comments. Good luck and have fun!

~ Pamela

Poetry Play Thursday

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 05:14:27 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

Have you been over to www(dot)wordle(dot)net? For some reason, I find much enjoyment creating wordles and changing their configuration. What do you do with them once they’re created? I guess whatever you like. Today, I’m going to use one of the wordles I created as a prompt for you to use for writing a poem. You may use some or all of the words to create a poem of any length. Bonus points to anyone who can use them all! I hope you’ll share what you’ve written by posting your poem, or a link to it, in our comments! Have fun!

~ Pamela

Poetry Play Thursday – Can’t Live Without My Lists!

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 04:30:41 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

Today’s prompt is:

List Poem

Some of us love lists; can’t make it through the day without them. Some of those lists might prove interesting and can be turned into a poem! What’s in the attic? What’s in the kitchen junk drawer? What’s on the shelves in the workshop? You could try one of these as your opening line, followed by a list of what you found in that location.

Line 1: What’s in the [name the place] ?
Line 2: [name and describe item 1]
Line 3: [name and describe item 1]
Line 4: [name and describe item 1]
Line 5: [name and describe item 1]
Line 6: [name and describe item 1]
Line 7: [name and describe item 1]
Line 8: [name and describe item 1]
Line 9: [name and describe item 1]

If you’d prefer to start with a different type of opening, say…”Tasks to complete this week,” go right ahead! You can’t go wrong!

Here’s my example:

What’s on top of my bedroom desk?
Stacks of bills old and new
A bottle of Mediterranean perfume
Baubles and bling in jumbled piles
A lamp, a clock, markers and files
The ashes of Indya, my beloved cat
A transcript of a troubleshooting chat
Books and magazines to be read
A bottle of Ibuprofen to soothe my head

Whatever you decide to do, have fun with this and I hope you’ll share your poem with us in our comments or give us a link to where you’ve posted it. Hey, you might even find those long lost keys you’ve been looking for!!

~ Pamela

Poetry Play Thursday – Moon

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 05:03:48 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

Sunday, June 7th will bring us a full moon, the Full Strawberry Moon (also known as the Full Honey Moon and Full Rose Moon). To celebrate this, my prompt today is to write an ode to the Moon (or at the very least refer to it in some manner).

For an example, I’d like to share with you a gift I received from the beautiful and kind hearted Genie Sea when she held a giveaway to celebrate the one-year anniversary of her blog Reality Insanity. Genie gave away five wallpapers she created and lucky me, I won first pick! Here is the wallpaper I selected along with the poem she wrote to go along with it.

Pink Moon

She rides a wave
in moonlight beam
the delicate touch
of a pink dream

The rise, the fall
No wonders small

A simple breath
of translucent light
Slips through the air
kisses the night

The touch, the smile
lingers a while

And rises up
in wish-filled air
and showers starlight
everywhere

To Pamela
With Love
Genie

Thank you, Genie, for the beautiful poem and wallpaper! I love it! Okay now, let’s see how the moon inspires you! I hope you’ll share your moon poem, or a link to it, in our comments!

Poetry Play Thursday – Shadow

Pamela Sweet — Thu, 14 May 2009 05:04:25 +0000

Welcome to Poetry Play Thursday!

Last week was so much fun, I can’t wait to see what you do with the following prompt! I thought your poems could prove revealing. I guess we’ll just see now, won’t we?

ME & MY SHADOW

Line 1: My shadow wears
Line 2: [an item of clothing described]
Line 3: [another item of clothing described]
Line 4: [a third item of clothing described]
Line 5: and [he/she] knows
Line 6: the order of things
Line 7: [His/Her] hair is like
Line 8: [description of hair using simile]
Line 9: My shadow is a [______________]
Line 10: [phrase using metaphor]
Line 11: [continue the metaphor]
Line 12: [complete the metaphor]

EXAMPLE

My shadow wears
black boots with spiked heels
polyurethane pants
soft leather dusters
and she knows
the order of things
Her hair is like
a bolt of silk midnight
My shadow is a panther
smoke and mirrors, stealthy
striking quickly
to protect the innocent

by Pamela Sweet

Okay, friends, show me what ya got! I hope you’ll share your poem with us by leaving it, or a link, in our comments. Have fun!