Found Poems

I made these for a postcard exchange….it’s interesting how differently I approach words when cutting them out of a magazine or newspaper….

What’s really interesting about doing poetry like this is way that you make meaning based on the size of the words/whether they are in caps or not etc. How much do these things matter? As I was transcribing the poems I wondered if I should keep the line breaks, caps and size of the words as they are on the cards….also, how much do the images contribute to the meaning or richness of the poems? Not that I am saying these are masterpieces or even terribly meaningful but it certainly sparks the imagination, no?

Contact doesn’t
make
these dark times. We are finding ourselves
a little bit of us
hungry
for those running.

 

Free! When they flew they always kept within a few feet
walking inside the story
lost breaking blood
the stars shimmer

Low-lifes
light up
dark. Honoured
war
move.
( I especially had a lot of fun with this one, not sure why..is there an “s” at the end of “move”? Perhaps…)

 

My body….

Advice from a magazine writing course that I wished I followed more closely:

–Strip sentences to their simplest components

–clear thinking becomes clear writing (no hope for muddle-headed me, then;)

–Constantly ask, “What am I trying to say?” and continue to ask this as you write

–thinking clearly is a conscious act that writers must force on themselves

I believe those are all excerpts from On Writing Well, by William Zinsser.

It was pissing rain this morning but now only the thick gray clouds. Light on the top, dark on the bottom as though the colour had settled at the bottom like a glass of juice. I’m not going to lie to you, I am not pleased. Please come back sun! Bad weather makes me grumpy, but not anguished, the least conducive mood to writing.

Exercises:

1. Write about nature. Include the following words: hard drive, stapler, phone, car, billboard. (Ooooh, you could use them as metaphors for things in nature!)

2. The most beautiful smile I ever saw…

3. My body (not my body!)…

Ok, feeling a little more creative now. I’m going to sink my teeth into my body…er…

Three of Four–the Unknown in the space you live…..

I’ve been focusing a lot on poetry and felt that I needed to put some prose exercises in here, so here is one that really intrigued me. I think it is even more interesting when you add the theme for the week to the exercise…..

 

From http://www.davidrm.com/thejournal/tjresources-exercises.php#prose

Prose Prompt - Writing the known and the unknown. Close your eyes, let a landscape appear. Allow yourself to view the landscape, taking note of texture and mood. Next, pretend that you have a rose petal in your hand. Feel it between your fingers and give it color and scent. Allow yourself time to make it a realistic experience. Now go back to creating your landscape, again focusing on details and texture. Continue writing about your landscape.

 

And now I have a glass of wine that needs my attention;)

Two of Four–Imperative

The imperative in poetry is something I really enjoy. I find that when you take an authoritative tone of voice it really changes the way you approach a subject–at least for me. A subject that I might have approached tentatively or that I might have tended to beat around the bush about will suddenly come more into focus with the use of the imperative because I have suddenly become an authority on it, I am telling the reader what to do whether I actually know anything about it or not. I am taking the active, upper hand.

Below is from ( http://applehousepoetryworkshop.blogspot.ca/2009/02/february-poetry-prompt-1-imperative.html)

 

Patricia Debney is one of those poets.

How Not to Be a Woodlouse

Avoid damp, dark places. Try not to hide. Your shell is for protection only.

Seek sunshine, dry weather, fresh flowers. Develop a taste for clean, clear water, and the smooth, pungent skin of just-picked fruit.

Celebrate the lightness of your touch, the way your feathery caress holds people still.

Remember, that, like you, the world is not black and white, but made up of delicate shades of grey.

Patricia Debney
from How to be a Dragonfly
Smith Doorstop 2005

Buy now from The Book Depository

The imperative is the verbal form that expresses command, entreaty, advice, exhortation, and generally exists in the 2nd person (Pick up the book - literally ‘you’ pick up the book) or the 1st person plural (Let’s catch a train.)

We use imperatives from day to day for different reasons, e.g.
telling people what to do: Close the window.
giving instructions: Put the coin in the slot and press the red button; Add 3 oz of sugar.
giving advice: See the doctor – it’s the best thing.
making recommendations: Have the fish, it’s always good here.
making offers: Have a bit more wine. 

There’s an idea of authority behind the use of the imperative, but its use doesn’t imply that the addressee will succumb to the suggested authority of the speaker.

Patricia Debney’s poem is a list of instructions that takes the form of an extended metaphor: we realise that these actions and insights translate to the human condition. This is persuasive, gentle advice (to the poet herself, to a specific person, or to a more general audience) that transcends any one individual’s experience and addresses a collective consciousness. The use of the imperative is an essential part of the poem’s effect on the reader.

However, the imperative can also be aggressive, accusatory, judgemental. It can express anger, fear. It can exhort, and even suggest hopelessness. Think of Dylan Thomas‘s ‘Do not go gentle into that good night/ Rage, rage against the dying of the light’ - a poem that asks for the impossible, that is without authority to change anything.

 

 

So, try to use the imperative with the “Spaces” theme and see what you come up with….

 

Cheers!

It’s the holes that stop it falling down: Pontypridd Bridge

One of Graphite Bunny’s “Spaces We Live in” pieces. Love it!

It’s the holes that stop it falling down: Pontypridd Bridge.

via It’s the holes that stop it falling down: Pontypridd Bridge.

One of four this week

It would appear I owe you, my faithful readers, four posts this week as I only put two up last week. As I mentioned earlier, I want to try out weekly themes and see how we all like it. Let me know if this works for you….

The theme this week was suggested by Graphite Bunny (the only one to respond to my request for feedback. Thank you kind sir!).

He said: I think you should do a themed week on the space in which you live. Maybe writing and or photography describing its magnificence as well as its grotty bits (possibly the characters in it).

Theme: the space in which you live.

You can write or post pictures along with the writing or interpret this theme in any way you like. I’ll still post exercises that you can use with the theme in mind. Join in people, this’ll be fun. If there are some really good contributions to this I’ll feature them on here…..

Summer where I live:)

I have synesthesia. I see letters and numbers as colours when I read them. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

With the temperature rising and plants almost unanimously in bloom I feel that I can finally say, “Spring is here!”. So in honour of this joyous occasion todays exercise will be to write something about spring. It can be prose or poetry, it should be full of imagery and just for fun try to use synesthesia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia).

 

Alais on the Hill (no dirty puns needed:D)

Here is post #3 which I put together in the pain and agony of the aftermath of falling clumsily down the mountain skiing on Blackcomb Mountain yesterday. I don’t know what happened, I just kept falling! My sweet husband didn’t laugh once, though my daughter and I were breathless with laughter as I lay there with snow up my back and down my pants. But how could I have been anything less than cheerful with the sun (mostly) out, a view that left me speechless, and Grandpa watching Henry the whole day ( oh, he made me pay for that last night. “What’s that Mommy? You want a day off? I’ll give you a day off…by crying for an hour before falling asleep! How d’you like them apples?”). So, not only am I one human-sized bruise, I’m also exhausted. But still smiling because it was SO worth it! And we’re going to do it all again today:D

This is not a photo blog but I promised pictures:

“What’s this?” you might be asking yourself right now. Unless I happen to be a fat baby an d the ski hill looks strangely like a subdued cat, I’ve put up the wrong picture. Well, for some reason I can’t put up those pictures so I decided to put a picture of my son harassing the cat instead….because I can.

Writing exercises:

• Take a piece of your writing that you have written in first person and rewrite it in third person, or vice-versa. You can also try this exercise changing tense, narrators, or other stylistic elements. Don’t do this with an entire book. Stick to shorter works. Once you commit to a style for a book, never look back or you will spend all of your time rewriting instead of writing.
• Try to identify your earliest childhood memory. Write down everything you can remember about it. Rewrite it as a scene. You may choose to do this from your current perspective or from the perspective you had at that age.
• Remember an old argument you had with another person. Write about the argument from the point of view of the other person. Remember that the idea is to see the argument from their perspective, no your own. This is an exercise in voice, not in proving yourself right or wrong.

Key

Key–Children’s Fiction

 

A key is full of possibilities. It can tell you things you would never have imagined if you hadn’t bent down to investigate the dull gold glint that caught the sun just as you were walking your usual, boring route to school at 8:35 on a Wednesday morning. A key can fill your head with ideas even when you aren’t the kind of person who usually has ideas, and you aren’t usually. But on that Wednesday morning when you found the smooth gold-coloured key the sheer volume of ideas and possibilities was so overwhelming that were late for school (you are never late for school. Your teachers call you “punctual” and your parents are always proud of the fact that you never have any Ls on your attendance record). As you rushed into the office to ask for a bright pink late slip you didn’t even think to be ashamed and when you walked into the classroom it didn’t bother you that all the students had turned their heads to look at the last person to get into class (usually it was Thomas, but even he had already hung up his backpack and sat down with his black binder on the desk) what was foremost in your mind was the warm feel of the gold key in your pocket, as though the key had captured a little bit of sun in it and now it was your little piece of sun, caught in the key that you had found.

You aren’t sure why this key is important but you are sure it is, it has to be. At recess you are reluctant to show it to your best friend Andrea, not just because she is playing elves with Rachel (who you don’t really like) but also because you’re not sure Andrea is going to understand how special this key is, or she might tell you to turn it in because it might belong to somebody. It belongs to you.