Before I start, I want you to know that I\u2019m going to be part of a read-aloud this Saturday, May 17th, sometime between 11:00 am and noon at Byrd\u2019s Books at 126 Greenwood Ave in Bethel, Connecticut. I\u2019ll be there for a nationwide event for independent bookstores, not to promote my books, so I\u2019ll be reading from someone else\u2019s book, although I\u2019m not sure whose yet. If the audience is toddlers it will be a picture book–otherwise, something for older readers. If you can make it, if you’re anywhere nearby, I\u2019d love to see you. I believe there will be time to chat.<\/p>\n
Writeforfun has asked if I\u2019m still taking poetry classes and I promised poetry prompts this week. My classes thus far haven\u2019t yielded prompts or I would have shared. These two came along because I had an opportunity to submit a poem to an anthology in honor of the late poet Gwendolyn Brooks (high school level and above). At first I misunderstood what I was supposed to do and did it wrong. Then I did it right. Both ways, wrong and right, yield interesting prompts. Wrong way first:<\/p>\n
To show how it\u2019s done, let\u2019s take this sonnet by Shakespeare, which I picked because it\u2019s in the public domain, so I can copy it here:<\/p>\n
Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer\u2019s day?
\nby William Shakespeare<\/p>\n
Shall I compare thee to a summer\u2019s day?
\nThou art more lovely and more temperate:
\nRough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
\nAnd summer\u2019s lease hath all too short a date;
\nSometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
\nAnd often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
\nAnd every fair from fair sometime declines,
\nBy chance or nature\u2019s changing course untrimm’d;
\nBut thy eternal summer shall not fade,
\nNor lose possession of that fair thou ow\u2019st;
\nNor shall death brag thou wander\u2019st in his shade,
\nWhen in eternal lines to time thou grow\u2019st:
\n So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
\n So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.<\/p>\n
Since it comes from Elizabethan England, some of the language is outdated, so, although Shakespeare may be spinning in his grave, I\u2019m adding a step and doing an update, a step you won\u2019t need if you use a modern poem:<\/p>\n
Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer\u2019s day?
\nby William Shakespeare<\/p>\n
Shall I compare you to a summer\u2019s day?
\nYou are more lovely and more temperate:
\nRough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
\nAnd summer\u2019s lease has all too short a date;
\nSometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines,
\nAnd often is his gold complexion dimmed;
\nAnd every fair from fair sometime declines,
\nBy chance or nature\u2019s changing course untrimmed;
\nBut your eternal summer shall not fade,
\nNor lose possession of that fair you owe;
\nNor shall death brag you wander in his shade,
\nWhen in eternal lines to time you grow:
\n So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
\n So long lives this, and this gives life to you.<\/p>\n
Alas, my revision ruins the final rhyme. If you decide to use this sonnet for your own poem and you want to change eyes can see<\/i> to eyes can view<\/i>, the rhyme returns but the wording isn\u2019t as strong. You decide, or find another word to rhyme with you<\/i>. Or you can stick with the old-time wording throughout the poem.<\/p>\n
Since this is a sonnet, it has fourteen lines, so this example poem will too, and each line will end with the last word in each of the sonnet\u2019s lines. I\u2019ll just write three lines:<\/p>\n
What, I wonder, will be the flavor of this day<\/u>
\nthat just began? Monday stormy, Tuesday temperate<\/u>?
\nI want to improve on yesterday, but, come what may<\/u>,
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah date<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah shines<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah dimmed<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah declines<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah untrimmed<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah fade<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah owe<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah shade<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah grow<\/u>
\n blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah see<\/u>
\n blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah you<\/u><\/p>\n
Got it?<\/p>\n
Notice that I turned the month of May into the word may<\/i>, and you\u2019re free to do the same with this sonnet or the equivalent in the poem you pick to honor. In this example, if I were to change see<\/i> to sea<\/i> when I got there, that would be fine too, in my opinion. Notice also that I dropped Shakespeare’s punctuation. You don\u2019t have to stick with the punctuation in the original. And I didn’t capitalize the first letter in each line. You decide if you want to or not. Shakespeare\u2019s sonnet is metrical: iambic pentameter. There\u2019s no need to duplicate the meter, if there is meter, in the poem you pick.<\/p>\n
So that was the prompt based on the wrong way. Here\u2019s the right way:<\/p>\n
Take a line or two or three in the poem you pick and make each word end the lines, consecutively, creating a poem that\u2019s from six to twenty-six lines long.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s take Shakespeare again, and suppose I pick the line Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May<\/i>. Nine words in Shakespeare\u2019s line; nine lines in the new poem. If I do the next line as well, which also happens to have nine words, I\u2019ll have an eighteen-line poem. Here could be the beginning:<\/p>\n
The strangest wedding I ever attended was a rough<\/u>
\naffair–outdoors, on a beach, where the winds<\/u>
\nof March howled. I never heard the bride\u2019s \u201cI do<\/u>.\u201d
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah shake<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah the<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah darling<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah buds<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah of<\/u>
\nblah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah may\/May<\/u><\/p>\n
If you read down the last word of each line, you’ll discover Shakespeare’s line. See?<\/p>\n
Notice that we lose Shakespeare\u2019s rhymes entirely. I think this prompt is harder, because we have to end lines with words like the<\/i> and of<\/i>, which aren\u2019t often end words, although some poets use them.<\/p>\n
Your lines can be any length, but the instructions I got were to make them more or less consistent, all long or all short.<\/p>\n
These two prompts force us to use words that aren\u2019t the ones we usually pick, and when we leave familiar territory, in prose as well as in poetry, interesting things happen.<\/p>\n
What I love about a challenge like this and about form poetry (sonnets, haiku, acrostics, etc.) is that they\u2019re puzzles. We try them this way, then that way, then a tenth way, and finally they fit together–thrilling!<\/p>\n
One more thing: If you choose a modern poem as the basis of your poems, be sure to write under the title of your poem, After Such-and-Such Poem by Such-and-Such poet<\/i>. My example would read, After Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare<\/i>. Then no one will think you\u2019re stealing. Instead, it will be obvious that you\u2019re honoring the poet and his or her creation.<\/p>\n
If you try these prompts, please let us all know how they went for you. Post your poems if you like.<\/p>\n
Back to fiction on the next post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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