Summer Poetry Fun

This summer I am taking a poetry class.  It has been both fun and has challenged me to think about poetry writing in a bit of a different way.  I have been pulling on memories, creating sensory experiences, and thinking about craft to shape my poetry.  The class has given me ways to get in to revise my poetry, something that has, beyond word change, been more difficult to do in the past.

Below is one of the poems I wrote for this class that had to do with a first memory.  For the assignment we needed to dig into memories and choose three that occurred before the age of twelve.  With each memory we wrote sensory details.  We then we asked to recreate the experience in twelve lines of six couplets and use specific words.  I used the words trace, glance and crowd.  After we did each of these exercises we were then able to take out the restrictions to make the poem fit the need of the poem.  I did not need to do that part, as each of the parameters that were given allowed my poem to emerge.  What I have struggled with is how best to use first or third person to create image and tone.

Blessed Is the Fruit of Your Womb

As we kneel before the tiny bed

to offer up ritual night prayers

traces of White Shoulder linger on her neck

delicately defying the staleness of the small space.

Repeat after me she whispers, “Hail Mary, full of grace…”

The girl of three mimics the sing-song prayer,

a nursery rhyme tracked in memory one line at a time as

two brothers breathe slowly in sleeping cribs that crowd the room.

With the song, comes a glance between lashes at a familiar silhouette--

long, fingers laced in prayer,  delicate lips,  newly protruding middle.

“I want to be just like you,” the small girl muses,
and the room contracts a little tighter.

Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for dedicating space and time for teachers and teachers of literacy to come together to share ideas, practice and life experience.