I do admire poets who can say so much in a few lines. Rae Armantrout has great short poems, and poet Tom Snarsky is a wonderful poet to follow: for his poems and for his #smallpoemsunday feed. Tonight I tried to be less wordy than usual in appreciation but failed.
For the first prompt, describe a pet’s behavior and connect it to a human trait in a poem, essay or story.
I particularly enjoy the surprise created by the break between the poem’s second and third lines. The second prompt is to take an old poem that feels unfinished and play with its line breaks, trying to create unexpected turns.
I find the poem’s snarky tone delicious. For the next prompt, write a poem or story narrated with a similarly sarcastic voice. Let your target be a politician, media personalty, even a family member or coworker—anyone is fair game as long as you don’t share it with them or people they know. A snide poem may even prevent an unfortunate outburst.
Notice how the level of detail changes among the stanzas: the first introducing the cat and offering a twist, the middle providing a clear description and the last two making the intended connection with rather abstract language. For me, the language and word choice works. I love how “assiduous” suggests both diligence and fawning especially in combination with “self regard.” For the last prompt, write a poem or story using the following list of words: “self,” “assiduous,” “bland,” “patch,” “claws,” “angles,” “superior,” “balanced” and “same.”
Bonus prompt: write whatever this photo of the younger cat annoying the older one inspires. Or use it as a metaphor for sibling rivalry, dating, office politics or other pesky human interaction.
Good luck!