Choose a sentence from a newspaper whose meaning gets larger and stranger when taken out of context. Use it as the first line of a poem. If you get stuck partway into the poem, try repeating just part of the line and vary how you complete the rest of the sentence, changing the meaning and music of the line each time. When you have a draft you like, try moving the full sentence to the end of the poem, or somewhere to the middle, or maybe take it out entirely. Stir, and see what happens.
This week's poetry prompt comes from Idra Novey whose debut collection The Next Country received the Kinereth Gensler Award from Alice James Books and was included in Virginia Quarterly Review's list of Best Poetry Books of 2008. She teaches in the School of the Arts at Columbia University.
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Comments
enderwiggin replied on Permalink
bullets
“More bullets were flying over the weekend”
a strange sight to all who spied
the feathered metal projectiles
and no one died.
Their whizzing, winged forms could be seen across the globe
chirping merrily and lighting a strobe
ricochet, dismay and disbelief,
but their flapping banality was a relief
and no one died.
mary replied on Permalink
Thanks for posting this.
Thanks for posting this. Beautifully done!