2013 April PAD Challenge: Day 8
The April PAD (Poem-A-Day) Challenge is designed to help poets do one thing and one thing only: Write more poems! The process of revision may go on for weeks, months,…
The April PAD (Poem-A-Day) Challenge is designed to help poets do one thing and one thing only: Write more poems! The process of revision may go on for weeks, months, and years later, but this challenge is all about getting that first draft. Please poem along with us--either in the comments below or silently at home.
For today's prompt, write an instructional poem. Your instructional poem could list instructions. Or it could capture an instructional moment.
Here's my attempt at an instructional poem:
"how to spin"
she watches the birds tweet
but can't stand their singing
songs that sound so happy
while she in misery
twists into a bottle
like a miniature boat
assembled with tweezers
never touched never held
always left on display
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Writing poetry is exciting, but the hard work of poeming is working through the revision process. The best way to work through this process is to workshop the poems with other poets, and that can be done with the Writer's Digest 6-week course, Advanced Poetry Writing.
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Follow me on Twitter @robertleebrewer
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Quick note on commenting: Please always save a copy on your computer. There have been moments in the past in which comments have disappeared, and I don't want anyone to lose their work. Heck, I've lost some of my work here in the past, and it's not a great feeling. That said, commenting here is a lot of fun, especially in April. If you're completely new to the site, you'll be asked to register (don't worry, it's free), and your comments might not appear initially until I manually accept them. However, after that initial phase, your comments should appear without my help.
Want some more poeming fun? Check out these previous Poetic Asides posts:
Robert Lee Brewer is Senior Editor of Writer's Digest, which includes managing the content on WritersDigest.com and programming virtual conferences. He's the author of 40 Plot Twist Prompts for Writers: Writing Ideas for Bending Stories in New Directions, The Complete Guide of Poetic Forms: 100+ Poetic Form Definitions and Examples for Poets, Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming, and more. Also, he's the editor of Writer's Market, Poet's Market, and Guide to Literary Agents. Follow him on Twitter @robertleebrewer.
