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Belated Easter Prompt

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I meant to post yesterday but didn’t have any ideas and then I saw this reposted. For your first prompt, write a poem about what this Easter bunny gives you.

For a second prompt, repurpose the Daphne and Apollo myth into this metamorphism. What was chasing the rabbit, and who transformed the rabbit to save it?

For the next prompt, write about the creature that hatches from this seed pod. What—or who—does it eat? What does it want?

And the final prompt, what do you wish would hatch from these eggs?

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The Science of Capturing the Invisible—Prompts

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Sorry for missing last week’s prompt. It has been a rough week. I hope you are writing; I am managing only a couple a week. I may try to do a binge day, but the results are likely not to be very useful, even for editing projects.

Rather than using a sample prompt, let’s try to science a poem.

For the first prompt, write a love poem using the following terms: “hydrogen,” “subatomic,” “cloud chamber,” “bubble chamber,” “supersaturated,” “superheated,” “electromagnetic,” “recompressed,” “collider,” “interactions,” “voltage,” “amplifier,” and “positron.”

If none of those words resonate with you, try reading CERN article “Seeing the Invisible: Event Displays in Particle Physics” or the “Bubble Tracks: A Window on the Subatomic” from PhysicsCentral. Or use one of the articles as the subject of an erasure or blackout poem.

Finally write an ekphrastic using one of the images above. What messages or sigils do you see in the patterns?

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Prompts Inspired by Caroline Bird and Levitation—with Thanks to John McCullough

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Follow John McCullough for the great insights and poems he shares. So, yes, the line breaks in Caroline Bird’s “Mid-air.” So much yes.

For the prompt, use the first line “There is a corner of the city where the air is” as a ghostline and describe your city. Make it a love letter to your hometown or the city you still daydream of when the days are a slog and the nights the ceiling stares back at you in bed.

For the next prompt, write a poem in which your line breaks recreate the moment a trapeze artist let’s go of the bar. Break them in the middle of the sentences, even in the middle of exclamations, and pair the breaks with music or movies—think of the note held as a victim looks back at the killer during a chase scene.

For a third prompt, write a poem describing a kiss as “If composers kisses were scored by composers.” Make it a full orchestra or perhaps a jazz duet of saxophone and trumpet, or a trill of flute and clarinet. Make each breath count.

And the final prompt, create a poem from the following word list: “corner,” “hardens,” “suspended” “scored,” “breath,” “tightens,” “tongue,” “locked,” “ caught,” and “landed.”

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First Day of 30/30–Prompts Inspired by Nicky Beer

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Let’s start this April short and brutal. Thank you, Suzanne Richardson, for posting this poem! So much said in so few words.

For the first prompt, write a poem that is limited to just nine words or that is consists of variations of the same line. For poems this short, you will likely need the title to provide the context.

For the next prompt, use the first line “they want it to be true” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line. Or use the line as your title, and go from there. Either way, give credit to the poet.

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It’s World Poetry Day—So Many Great Poems!

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Celebrate World Poetry Day by reading poets from around the world. It’s important to support your local poetry community and learn from its members, but don’t forget to explore new perspectives and new techniques.

For your prompt, read the selection of poems at the Academy of American Poets site and write a response to one of the poems. Be sure to credit the original poem that inspired you, especially if you use a line from it as a ghostline.

Bonus prompt: discover new poets and analyze their techniques. Try one of their forms they’ve perfected or particular style.

Happy reading and writing!

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“The frame is a door”—Prompts Inspired by Paul Tran

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This week’s prompts are inspired by Paul Tran’s “Let me be clear./Inside this story is another story” from their All the Flowers Kneeling, shared by Victoria Chang whose book Barbie Chang is one you should check out.

For the first prompt, write a sonnet about your language choices, or be truly ambitious and write a sonnet crown in a modified terza rima. I found this interview with the poet in Electric Literature fascinating.

For the second prompt, use the line “Inside this story is another story” as a ghostline. For an added constraint, reference another story within the poem. Look into the “box” of the story.

For a third prompt, think what your purpose is and lead the poem up to explaining what that purpose is.

The fourth prompt is another ghostline: take the line “Behind the door is another door” and describe the room within. Or use the line “Behind the door is another door as your title (crediting the poet) and jump into an immediate description.

These prompts of course reflect my own obsession with boxes—the ones others place us in as well as the boxes we trap ourselves and the gaps between the boxes inside boxes.

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Ars Poetica—Prompts Inspired by Aracelis Girmay

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I know that I have a previous ars poetica prompt, but I so love this poem: its depth, the lack of pretension, its humanity. I have written a few, but most of them are self-deprecating, one of them even titled arse poetica. But this poem is truly lovely.

For the first prompt, write your own ars poetica. Keep to a single image, unrelated to actual writing techniques and paraphernalia. Let it open up to your own life and hopes.

For the next prompt, use the line “Everywhere I go” as a ghostline and say what you have left of yourself.

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Hybrid Times—Prompts Inspired by Boris Khersonsky

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Like many of you, I am following events and spend evenings doomscrolling. It’s not productive nor helpful, but impossible to look away, and I am afraid if I were to close my eyes to events, people will try to tell me it never happened. We’ve been lied to so much, so often. Remembering becomes an act of defiance.

These next poems are inspired by Boris Khersonsky’s “They Printed in the Medical History.”

For the first prompt, choose a number that represents a significant period of time for you. Connect that number to your own life or a historical event and end by alluding to a passage or event in a religious text.

For the second prompt, use the structure of the line “It was a time of hybrid hospitals. Now is a time of hybrid war.” but replace “hospitals” and “war” with your own nouns. Remember to give credit to the poet.

For the third prompt, use the last line “because they don’t exist” as a ghostline, erasing the line after you’ve finished the poem. Again, remember to acknowledge the poet by using “after Boris Khersonsky” under your title.

For the last prompt, write what you were told never happened. No matter how small or seemingly insignificant, write it down for yourself. Keep these records. Don’t let anyone take your history away.

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The Mother of All Poems—Prompts Inspired by Lydia Davis

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Some poems are terrifying: “The Mother” by Lydia Davis for example. Notice how the poem is a story that builds intensity with its simple language and repetition. It has the feel of a children’s book like If You Give a Mouse a Cookie but for homicidal mothers instead of a demanding (but adorable) mouse.

For the first prompt, write a narrative prose poem that portrays a scene between parent and child.

For the next prompt, use the pattern of a line of action followed by a line of dialogue. Try writing it one one or more stanzas and then revise it into a prose poem. What changes? Which form works best for it?

For the third prompt, Mad Lib this poem by replacing all the verbs and nouns, but do not allow yourself to repeat any of the verbs.

For the last prompt, use “But how much better if it were a real house” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line and acknowledge the poet.

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Break Hearts and Prompts—Prompts and editing tips inspired by John McCullough and Lucille Clifton

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For years, I struggled most with line breaks. I know I have improved now that I second guess as much with other parts of the poem (or regressed in other skills, hard to say). So much of progress seems to be retracing steps and back pedaling assumptions.

Thankfully, so many writers share their insights and poems (their own or of others) for me to learn from.

Something that stood out for me was how the interplay of the last word of the lines—“yesterday” followed by “backs” and then “tomorrow,” the logical connection of “circulation” and “blood,” but the contrast between “round” and “edge” and ending on “now” after “mistakenly.”

Those ending words themselves are a story (carried along on the lines of course but could themselves create meaning. For the first prompt, write a poem from the last word from each line and of the title but in reverse order or in a different sequence from the poem: “now,” “mistakenly,” “time,” “edge,” “round,” “water,” “past,” “blood,” “circulation,” “tomorrow,” “backs,” “yesterday,” “anything,” “forth,” and “gulf.”

What I also loved about the poem (ok, one of many things) is the motion. I felt the rocking back and forth in that initial “so forth,” the forward momentum and then that abrupt stop at “edge” before falling into the next line and finally ending on the swaying “only here. only now.”

Of course, John McCullough explains this so much better than I could:

For the next writing prompt, take a poem that just isn’t working for you and break the lines so that you have a momentum that pauses and then rushes forward. If possible, try to revise the title so that it continues into the first line.

Choose a poem that’s content fits the movement; obviously, time, oceans and rivers all work well. Let the form reflect the metaphor: time as a road with the travelers moving atop it, or the river rushing past and splashing the stones submerged in it. What other themes would mesh equally well with the movement: birthing, breathing, falling into a kiss, a falling out of a relationship, stalking, dancing.

For the next prompt, use the line “every day someone is standing on the edge” as a ghostline. Remember to acknowledge the poet with “After Lucille Clifton” for this poem.

Kill Your Darlings—It’s Editing Time

So I am even less productive with covid. I am better but still foggy. I would like to write surreal poems since the world seems so hazy, but the words keep slipping off the page onto the floor.

Since nothing is bubbling up, let’s take an old poem and make it better or maybe just break it for fun. Perhaps it’s time to take a scalpel or an ax, possibly dynamite, to a poem that just isn’t working for you.

The advice “kill your darlings” is one you may have heard. Often it refers to overly flowery language that while beautiful doesn’t push your poem or story forward. For me it is often the stumbling at the beginning of a poem before taking off or editorializing phrases or hiding behind poetic conventions.

As discussed in a previous post on editing, try splitting your poem into two halves, using the bottom half as the beginning and writing a second half and writing a beginning for your previous first half. Sometimes the heart of the poem is four or five lines from the bottom line; find that line and start there. Or you can take your last line and use it as your starting point. Replace all of your verbs with their antonyms. See what happens.

After you’re finished, see what you think of the new version. If the edited version is a lurching Frankenstein’s monster, put it down. Walk away. You are still writing even if what you got was practice rather than a poem. And if that doesn’t seem enough, ask for suggestions from a reader or writing group you trust. Or from another entity.

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A Belated Happy New Year’s with Prompts Inspired by Twitter and Kate Baer

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Just returned from Mississippi, where I felt as if I were trying to swim through molasses. I am not productive at home and seem to be even less on vacation…yikes.

But the new year has begun, and it is not a kindly one so far. More of the same. I am approaching this year on tiptoes and with my fingers to my lips.

My daughter of course chooses the opposite approach.

For the first prompt, write about your approach to the year. Will 2022 be cat lounging in a beam of sunlight, a china shop, or a raging bull?

The next prompts are inspired by Kate Baer’s “New Year.”

For the next prompt, take the first line, “Look at it, cold and wet like a” but choose another noun, not a newborn. Use this as your jumping off point. You can use this modified line as ghostline, erasing it, or keep as your opening line. Regardless, make sure to credit the poet.

The third prompt is a ghostline: use part of the last line, “It only wants to live” and describe how it (the year or something else) wants to live. What does living mean to you or to the subject.

For the last prompt, write a sonnet for the year to come using the description and language for a lover rather than that of a newborn.

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A Croc and a Croc—More Twitter Prompts

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Nature vs man (or man’s footwear), mythology, and metaphor, let’s have some fun.

For the first prompt, write a persona poem from the croc (your choice). Are you carrying your namesake to safety (or being carried), or are you displaying the trophy from your recent battle (or are the trophy)? For fun, throw in references to mythology.

For the next prompt, center the poem around another homonym pair (or multiple homonyms), such as “stalk” (follow) vs “stalk” (part of a plant) or “tire” (wheel) vs “tire” (fatigue). Or expand to heterographs (words that sound the same but have different spellings and meanings), such as “bear” and “bare,” and heteronyms (words with different meanings and pronunciations but are spelled the same), such as “tear” (moisture in the eyes) and “tear” (to rip).

For the last prompt, take a famous painting such as Francisco de Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son and reimagine it with a modern photo. Write an ekphrastic poem of that photo but use the original artwork’s title.

If you need some inspiration, check out people’s recreations of famous paintings during the early stages of the pandemic here. The photo below was posted on Reddit.

Happy holidays!

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“Hey, everybody, let’s have another year of this” — Prompts Inspired by Amber Sparks

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Let’s celebrate another year with rising infection rates and denial because 2020 just won’t leave the building. Or at least try to write.

I love the poet’s parody of William Carlos Williams and the personification of the virus. For more information on Amber Sparks’ writing and events, check out the website.

While many people are justifiably tired of the pandemic and the resulting poems, go ahead write another because most of us have at least a few my-ex-is-an-ass poems. Add another.

For the first prompt, write a persona poem on anything related to the pandemic: isolation, grief, loss, masks, particular phrases or statistics. I will never forget how powerfully Patricia Smith’s personification of Hurricane Katrina in her Blood Dazzler affected me.

For the second prompt, write your own version of “This Is Just To Say.” I thoroughly enjoyed that not-too-distant viral spate of its parodies on Twitter.

For the next prompt, write an epistolary poem (a poem written as a letter) to a lover. What tone do you choose?

For the last prompt, write a hopeful poem about the coming year. Focus on the light reflecting on the water, tree leaning over the rock as if to whisper an endearment. Never mind the skull spray painted on the rock. It’s a poem for the light and water and the rustle of leaves.

Prompts Inspired by Carl Phillips with Thanks to Richie Hofmann

[Note: this prompt was scheduled for last week but did not publish.]

Today’s prompts are inspired by the beautiful poem “And If I Fall” from Carl Phillips, shared on Twitter by Richie Hofmann. While I mostly doomscroll on Twitter, I still come across gifts.

For the first prompt, write a sonnet in which the last two lines are repeated. Don’t forget that the last lines are the lens through which the rest of the poem is viewed. Make lens stained glass and shining.

For the next prompt, turn a noun into a verb as the poet did with “cathedral” and build the poem around it.

For the third prompt, use the first part of the line “Light enters a cathedral the way” as ghostline and finish the line with your own comparison. Remember to erase the line and give credit to the poet.

For the last prompt, write a poem about “what is everything” to you. What place would you bring back if you could. What would you people it with?

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Prompt Inspired by Danez Smith—Thanks to Tara Skurtu

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So this month has not gone well. Family emergencies and unplanned out-of-state travel certainly do not make me more productive… But there is much to be grateful for. Even in decay, there is beauty; in a fall, movement and a change in perspective. I see the brilliance of the stars much clearer lying on the ground.

Here is another amazing poem by Danez Smith (whose most recent book is Don’t Call Us Dead), posted by the fabulous poet, Tara Skurtu (most recent book The Amoeba Game). Check out their websites for links to their poetry and other projects: Danez Smith and Tara Skurtu.

For the first prompt, use the first line “let ruin end here” as ghostline. Remember to erase the line after finishing your poem and give credit to the poet.

For an exercise prompt, replace every noun and/or verb in the poem with its opposite. For example, change the first line to something like “Forbid rebirth a beginning there / Forbid them vinegar.” This would be just an exercise: the resulting poem would be too much like its inspiration, but this is a good process to keep practicing.

The last prompt is another ghostline: use the lines “let him enter the lion’s cage & find” as the jumping off point for your own poem.

Good luck and keep writing.