National Poetry Month

I discovered last week (before being offline for almost a week) that April is National Poetry Month,  and by coincidence, my writing lesson for last week was on writing poetry. I'd planned that lesson before knowing about National Poetry Month, but it still worked out great.

I offered several options for writing,including the word grab bag which I had done as a previous lesson.  Everyone seemed to like that idea so much that most people did not try my other ideas. So this week, since it's National Poetry Month, I'm gong to try these ideas again. I will not be having the grab bag as an option this week.  Here is the lesson I'll be offering next week:

Look through the books of poetry (I have some I will bring to class) and find one you like, then choose one (or more) of these options:

1. Write a mirror image poem, made up your thoughts in response to the original.
2. Rewrite the poem in your own words.
3. Take out 5 to 10 words or short phrases to use in a poem of your own.
4. Take one line from the poem to use as the first line of your own poem (it need not resemble the original).
5. Without reading the poem, look at the title only and make up a poem that fits the title. 

If you feel like writing poetry, these are good exercises to try.

I'm trying to make this easy, since this is new t most of the people participating,  If there is any interest, I may try some more complex forms later.  

Meanwhile, I plan to read some more poetry books this month for the poetry reading challenge I'm doing this year.  I will probably go over 10 books, just a little. Right now I have Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass checked out.