In our Craft Capsules series, authors reveal the personal and particular ways they approach the art of writing. This is no. 281.
For three to six players.
Equipment needed:
-Index Cards (Pack of two hundred, unicolored)
-Writing Instruments
-Game board depicting the first floor of Emily Dickinson’s house, the Homestead. A map can be found at emilydickinsonmuseum.org.
-Six game pawns taken from any board game. Each color assigned to a different player: Susan Gilbert, Vinnie Dickinson, Mabel Loomis Todd, Thomas Higginson, Charles Wadsworth, Otis Lord. Six pennies or chips or other markers to be used as Praise Tokens.
-A copy of Emily Dickinson’s Poems: As She Preserved Them (Harvard University Press, 2016), edited by Cristanne Miller
-A small egg-timer hourglass
Game Objective: To advance from the threshold of the house to the kitchen, where Emily Dickinson is making jam. A player must visit all five locations—the foyer, the library, the conservatory, the front parlor, and the rear parlor, before entering the kitchen.
Set Up: Each player selects a pawn and receives a Praise Token. Each player receives three index cards. Using the Miller volume in turn, each player opens at random and writes one couplet by Dickinson on each of their cards. Once all players have completed this step, the cards are combined and shuffled to create the Prompt Deck. Each player is dealt six blank index cards. The remaining cards are kept in reserve. All players except Vinnie begin on the threshold. Vinnie begins on the staircase. Each turn, a player has the chance to advance into the next location, in the order given.
Game Play: Beginning with Vinnie—then, in order, Susan, Charles, Mabel, Otis, and Thomas—the player draws a card from the Prompt Deck and lays it face up on the table. Each player now has the time of one turn of the hourglass to write a couplet or short poem in response. Once complete, these cards are placed face down next to the Prompt and shuffled. When all poems are complete, they are turned face up. Each player places their Praise Token on the poem card they appreciate the most, but they cannot place their Praise Token on their own poem. The player with the most Praise Tokens on their poem card advances one space in the order given above. If there is a tie, then all players who tied advance one space. For games with four players or more, if, in any round, one player receives all Praise Tokens but their own, then they advance two spaces. If the Prompt Deck is exhausted, reshuffle and draw again.
The game ends when one player reaches the Kitchen.
All players can then turn up their cards, create a collaborative poem, and/or share cards with other players to continue writing.
Kazim Ali is a professor of comparative literature and literary arts at the University of California in San Diego, and the founding editor of Nightboat Books. His newest volume of poetry is The Man in 119 (Copper Canyon Press, 2026).
image credit: Alexandar Todov