2014 November PAD Chapbook Challenge: Day 16
For today’s prompt, write an explanatory poem. Back when I took dozens of creative writing courses in college, the mantra was, “Show, don’t tell.” Well, today’s prompt is sort of…
For today's prompt, write an explanatory poem. Back when I took dozens of creative writing courses in college, the mantra was, "Show, don't tell." Well, today's prompt is sort of different--in a way--in that it's a tell poem, or explaining poem, though how and what you explain may vary a great deal.
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Submit a Poem for a Chance at $1,000!
Writer’s Digest has extended the deadline to their Writer’s Digest Poetry Awards competition to November 21. As you may have guessed from the bold statement above, the winner will receive $1,000 cash!
The winning poem will also be published in a future issue of Writer’s Digest magazine. And the winning poet will receive a copy of the 2015 Poet’s Market.
Even poets who don’t win can win, because there are prizes for 2nd through 25th place as well.
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Here's my attempt at an Explanatory poem:
"I'm not sure how I got here"
I mean, it started with an arcade game over
before picking up Tetris on my Game Boy,
which I played under cover of my blanket fort
wondering about Thor (new and old versions)
and numbers. Now or later, I will dream about
being blinded by the moon and bomb cyclones.
Ultraman doesn't have these kind of troubles,
or maybe he does--I don't know. The point is
that I think I've been here before in this car--
the back seat--fighting with my siblings, even
though we had the "no fighting" option at our
disposal, and we'd fight over everything,
especially who would be the leader, though
we were always followers--in the back seat--
with our "holey" pants, and speaking of who
set the house on fire, you sure look nice today.
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Robert Lee Brewer is Senior Content Editor of the Writer’s Digest Writing Community and author of the poetry collection, Solving the World’s Problems (Press 53). He edits Poet’s Market, Writer’s Market, and Guide to Self-Publishing, in addition to writing a free weekly WritersMarket.com newsletter and poetry column for Writer’s Digest magazine.
He often has no idea what he's going to write for these prompts before he writes it. And it often shows. And that's all right. And it's fun.
Follow him on Twitter @robertleebrewer.
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Find more poetic goodies here:
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.
