Poetry Challenge #55-Poem Stew
Bill Cosby (the comedian before he became the predator) was hilarious! One bit I still chuckle over (and admittedly copy) was him riffing on how his mother could turn anything into a weapon.
“But mom, it’s just a shoe…”
“Just a shoe…I’ll show you just a shoe!!!”
“But Mom… I asked for scrambled eggs?”
“You want scrambled? I’ll give you scrambled—with bacon!”
This is not a selfie…really!
Which got me chuckling about what Bill’s mom could have done with stew? or jam? or pickle?
Maybe not the weapon part,
but definitely the both a noun and a verb part.
Poetry Challenge #55
Poem Stew
Time for another poem stew! You need:
1. One noun-something you can see or touch, not capitalized if possible.
2. One noun that can also be used as a verb (like stew or pickle)
3. A color
4. A place (not capitalized),
5. An adjective (a word that describes)
6. A verb (an action—yes this absolutely can be #2)
7. One abstract noun (a word that you can’t touch that names an idea: beauty, hope, justice, chance).
Noun list to get you going:
negligee, mannequin, pink, garage sale, awkward, refrain, subterfuge
Stew on the words you’ve chosen for a bit and then mix them up into a savory—or sweet jam— poem.
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it.
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl).
Poetry Challenge #54-Alphabet Jam
Sometimes—often—the most interesting things begin with “I Can’t…”
That’s exactly what I said when author/teacher/mentor/friend Tim Wynne Jones shared this prompt at a VCFA session quite a few years back. But, once I committed to giving it a try, it turned out I Could! And best, had fun! And the results were interesting. With hopes you’ll find it the same, here goes:
Poetry Challenge #54
Alphabet Jam
Plant a subject you’d like to explore in your mind. It can be as broad as “Sports” or “Weather;” it can be specific as “My tenth birthday” or “Daisy,” your choice.
Now, beginning with the letter A, work your way through the alphabet assigning one word to each letter in order: A-B-C-D…end with Z. (X is wild, or if you can use a word that begins with the “ex” sound.)
There are only 2 rules:
1. While the sequence you create might be outlandish, it must make sense—i.e. work as a sentence or series of sentences.
2. You cannot insert or delete letters.
Consider the 26 word sequence you created: Did you stick with your initial subject? Did you veer off in a different direction? Did you surprise yourself?
Lastly, keeping the words in alphabetical order, use line breaks and punctuation to shape your Alphabet Jam into a 26 word poem.
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it.
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl).
Poetry Challenge #53-Shandorma Anyone?
Sometimes when you want to write a poem, it helps to use a poetic form. It helps you stretch…
Poetry Challenge #53
Shandorma Anyone?
The Shadorma is a six-line poem which originated in Spain.
A Shandorma has a fixed number of syllables on each line: 3/5/3/3/7/5. That’s it. That’s the one rule.
A Shandorma can be written about any subject. It does not need to rhyme.
You can connect many together to write a longer poem.
Here are two samples Cindy Faughnan wrote:
Now it’s your turn (and mine)!
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it. (Below is an image for inspiration.)
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl).
Poetry Challenge #52-Contronym-nally Thinking
New Year’s Eve/Day being both an end and beginning, a time to look back and forward, the omega and alpha is a contronym isn’t it?
So are bolt, buckle, bill…and, in keeping with the season, trim.
When we trim our trees, we snip away bits.
When we trim our Christmas trees, we add decorations, garlands, shells and bling.
So then, what do we call it when we remove the decorations? Trim-trim or untrim?
And to keep our Christmas trees cozy, we skirt them.
I mention the tree’s skirt because it too is a contronym (and to skirt the question, of course).
If you’re not sure what a contronym is, never fear:
Note: contronyms are not homonyms, homophones, or homographs.
Now…To the Challenge!
Poetry Challenge #52
Contronym-nallity
Choose a contronym as the subject of your poem. Along with those mentioned above (and below), a simple search will unearth scores more.
Use that contronym as the title of your poem.
Explore both aspects of a contronym within one poem.
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it, or don’t…
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl).
Poetry Challenge #51-For the Way We Were
“Remember blah-blah-blah..”
“Of course!”
“And blah-blah-blah…”
“How could I forget…”
Maurice and Hermione had much to remember, and at the same time so little when they sang “Oh yes, I remember it well…” in the movie, Gigi
Isn’t that the way of things! And the difference between autobiography and memoire? Memories aren’t reliable. They can be rose-tinted, dangerous, lost, and revised.
For this prompt, our memories can be any/all of those or true. Who will know by me and you?
Poetry Challenge #51
For the Way We Were
Pick one thing you remember. Maybe it’s the first thing that came to mind when you began reading this post. Maybe you need to scroll through your memories until you find one that creates a vivid picture in your mind.
Write a poem beginning with the words “Remember when…”. If you get stuck, write “Remember when…” again and go on with another memory. Extra credit for adding colors, smells, sounds, feelings.
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it.
For The Way We Were Playlist:
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3020 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl).
Poetry Challenge #50-Ode to the Lone (Ly)
“DON’T USE ADJECTIVES AND ADVERBS TO PRETIFY YOUR PROSE!” The warning—BOLD & ALL CAPS—is issued at least once, in ever writing class. So much so, that it’s the title of a Writers’ Digest article expounding the excellence of Raymond Carver via his teacher John Gardner’s leaner-is-neater adverb and adjective-free prose.
If "Ly" were a dog, this is him. Sad.
Following in Carver/Gardner's footsteps has let us to “cast a suspicious eye on these forms of speech because many times they add little to what is already on the page.” As a result those ly-ending adverbs (and adjectives*) we once sprinkled throughout our prose as liberally as we sugared our Lucky Charms have been unnecessarily shunned, ignominiously tossed aside, and relegated extremely disposable.
A sign, at the entrance to the Cooper Hewitt Museum's exhibition “Design Beyond Vision” caused me to wonder: Where have all the adverbs gone? Long time passing . . . What has become of those lowly, loathsome “Ly”s? They are, frankly, lonely.
Here's the juicy sign. What's missing?
Hence today’s battle cry and prompt: Down with Understated. Let’s bravely go where no adverb has gone before…(or at least not for a long, long time.)
Poetry Challenge #50
Ode for Lonely "Ly"
Let’s write an adverb poem. Begin with the simplest sentence: A subject and a verb. For example: Jack ran. Mary ate. Unicorn flew.
Now ask yourself “how?” or “when?” or “Where?” Answer by adding an adverb. Repeat that adverb and ask “how?” Answer with another adverb.
Keep repeating this pattern, asking “how?” or “when?” or “where?” and answering with adverbs, one after the other after the other after the other, until you’ve used all the adverbs you want. Then, bring it to a rousing—or not—finish.
As an example, here’s my effort:
Your turn!
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it.
Ode For Lonely "Ly" Playlist:
Link to the article “Don’t Use Adjectives and Adverbs to Prettify Your Prose”
Where Have all the Adverbs Gone by Peter, Paul & Mary
Ode to the Lowly [Ly] by Roy Orbison
**To paraphrase McArthur and Arnold: “Adjectives! We’ll be back!”
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):
Poetry Challenge #49-Poetry Stew
The ground crunches in the morning. My knuckles and knees do too. It’s that time of year. What time? Stew time!
Ingredients for a poem all around you, ready for the plucking.
If people are nearby, ask them for the words the way you’d ask to borrow a cup of sugar for a favorite recipe.
Poetry Challenge #49
Poetry Stew
You will need two nouns (something you can see or touch, not proper nouns), a color, a place (not capitalized if possible), an adjective (a word that describes), a verb (an action), and an abstract noun (a word that you can’t touch that names an idea: beauty, hope, justice, chance).
Here are some ingredients in case your word cupboard is bare:
milkweed * laughter * mulberry * market * delicious * yearn * hope
Stir the words together, let them simmer a bit as you would a stew, then shape them into a poem. “Season” your poem with a smattering of other words, connectors, modifiers, etc.
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it.
bon appétit!
Poetry Stew Playlist:
A Little Pinch of This & That by Giara
Les Poisson from Littlest Mermaid
Antevka from The Fiddler on the Roof
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):
All who subscribe, comment or share a poem will be entered in . . .
Poetry Challenge #47-Can I Have a Word?
At a loss for words? Aren't we all sometimes--which can be a total drag if you're trying to scratch down some lines, Daddy-o...
The cool thing about words is. . .
they are free, available, reusable, recyclable . . .
There are many excellent sites for Words of the Day.
Thank you One Squiggly Line—a great website!
One way to collect words is by looking through the Dictionary. (That’s a book.)
Absurd Words by Tara Lazar is a funny-bone tickler of a book listing odd, unusual, ridiculous words.
(Hint: It a great kid-teacher-word nerd gift!)
And the trendy, hip thing to do—the way to stay current Daddy-O, is to use trending words. Here’s a few trendy words ala FluentU Language Learning. (The list was updated in September 24, so there might be even trendier, trendy words.)
Poetry Challenge #47
Can I have a word?
For today's stretch, what say we get hip, with-it, happening dude, by riffing off the trend!
First you need to collect a few words—at least five from any source that amuses you. (Stretch a bit and include at least one trendy word)
Now write a poem/story/something using those words.
Set the timer for 7 minutes.
Start writing!
Don’t think about it too much; just do it.
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge at least 3000 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole dang poem. Scroll down and click on the comments!
Want the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sent to your email? Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):
All who subscribe, comment or share a poem will be entered in . . .