I feel like this is pretty important...

It's Samuel L. Jackson reading a poem about the TV show "Boy Meets World."  Watch it here.

@GOOGLEPOETICS #internet

I don't know if anybody else enjoys twitter, but I think it is a wonderful outlet for written expression. It is sometimes difficult to trim an idea or a feeling into 140 characters or less. #wordeconomy #amiright In my honest opinion, the twitter account @googlepoetics is a novel account.

Google poetics are poems submitted to @googlepoetics based off google's search prediction feature.

Sometimes the google-inspired poems are awesome and shocking.

#herearesomethativemade

No weekly prompt this week

All,

This is a note to say that there will be no weekly prompt this week, because I want you all to write in form for your next assignment, and you should turn in either your meter/sound poem or your form poem for the next workshop. Happy writing!

Jenny

Assignment Five: the Formal Poem

ASSIGNMENT FIVE: THE FORMAL POEM

MOLBERG: ENGL 3150

Due Monday, 4/7

This is the first and only assignment in this course in which I will ask you to stick close to “the rules.” Mary Oliver reminds us that a great dancer knows the rules of the dance, and in order to successfully break or bend these rules, that dancer must practice. Though the process of writing in form can be challenging and sometimes frustrating, it is a way of exercising a muscle which, if trained and flexed, will strengthen your free verse poetry.

For this assignment, choose one of the forms outlined in our course packet entitled “form” (Petrarchan sonnet, Shakespearean sonnet, villanelle or sestina). I have provided you with many examples of each form. For further reading, see the anthology section of Rules of the Dance. Follow closely the requirements of your chosen form. If the form calls for meter, use meter; if it calls for rhyme, use rhyme. You may choose to utilize techniques like enjambment, caesura and slant rhyme to give yourself a break from stilted verse, though these techniques are not required.

The best thing you can do in preparation for this assignment is to read voraciously. If the examples I have given you aren’t enough, check out poets.org, and search your chosen form. This site provides many helpful examples, old and new.

Finally, the most important and productive step of this assignment: revise, revise, revise. Read your poem aloud and revise some more. If taking on the challenge of writing a poem in form seems daunting, practice first. Try writing a few singular lines in iambic pentameter, or make a word bank of rhyming words (or words that utilize slant rhyme) that you enjoy. This poem itself is practice. It need not be perfect—we’ll make use of workshop in order to hone the poem. Have fun. Writing in form will open new worlds of language.

Personally worthless & Krebs vs. Snopes

Comments/statement: On page 68 of The Triggering Town, Hugo says, "Many American poets seem to feel personally worthless unless they write." I'd like to disagree with this. I think that the use of the word "worthless" may be over the top. I wouldn't say that writing doesn't make people feel like they're doing something worthwhile with their lives, but I would say that not all writers feel like they are of no value themselves unless they write. I don't really understand why he says such a strong thing, especially when writing in and of itself does not necessarily make people feel worthy--take Plath for example. If writing all those poems made her feel worthy, would she have killed herself? I think, instead, that writing something that others appreciate is what makes people feel worthy, and I think that a poet CAN write a poem without having that nagging feeling of personal worthlessness being the driving force. Basically, I just have a problem with that whole idea Hugo presents.

Question(s): What would Hugo have to say about someone who isn't a Krebs or a Snopes? Would he even consider them legitimate poets (or writers)? 

Glee vs Misery

I've read some comments on the The Triggering Town by Richard Hugo and it makes me curious... In happiness versus misery, which would be the winner? Well, it would depend on the perspective. Many poets that we know of are best recognized for their powerful (and often confusing without some context) poems that are both beautiful and perturbing. When the word "poet" comes up, what do most people picture? I won't use that as my question, though it's an interesting thought.

Do we picture a soft landscape with someone writing of their love for nature? Or do we more often imagine a frantic writer desperate for their words to be heard, or at the very least to relinquish their minds of the flurry of provoking thoughts?

Shall I compare thee to a poet's glee?

Not really.

Thing is: you're more likely to compare stressful feelings to things you've never actually experienced.

Cloud nine? Sure. Happiness can feel like floating. You can feel relaxed and calm, but those are still things you've physically experienced. You've floated in water. You've been relaxed, before. I... can't actually think of more descriptions of happiness except comparing it to the blazing of a thousand suns, which I imagine none of us have seen before.

Think of when you have lost someone close... Perhaps a relative or a friend? Maybe even something happened in your life? And everything came crashing down... You felt as though you had a thousand pounds on your shoulders causing them to droop... Your eagerness to talk about these things lessens, but you often do have a lot to say. Often times, frustration becomes overwhelming.

Perhaps it's just me? I wouldn't exactly suggest that misery, depression, or anxiety can make for the best poetry all the time, but these troubling emotions tend to have a louder voice than the soothing tone of v-a-c-a-t-i-o-n.

You are more inclined to get creative when you're expressing something distasteful. Triggering things are what make us write, and in this world... what triggers you?

Watching the news, seeing the world in such madness with its riots, starvation, and murders?

Here's my question:

Which catches your attention first: singing or SCREAMING? Now, see, that's unfair. I capitalized that whole word as compared to the singing... But it's unpleasant, isn't it? Out of place? A bit forceful? Unsettling?

Ha. Just kidding. That wasn't my real question.

My question is: which do you think is more powerful for writing muse? What drives you more?

This is just my personal curiosity after reading. Nobody likes sad endings, but you remember them more than any other part.

I'm getting caught up more in the psychology of it than anything. My apologies.

Have a good Spring Break, guys!

Krebs vs. Snopes: The battle of the ridiculously miserable ones.

I'm feeling insanely sick, so I'm going to keep this brief. (Woo, spring break.)

After reading and re-reading Hugo's Krebs/Snopes theory, I've been struggling to decide whether or not Plath fits into either of these categories. Of course, I'd think she'd call herself an outsider, but would she then be a Snopes? It's safe to say she had a hard time handling success.

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Are you a Krebs or a Snopes?

I'd like to think of myself as a Krebs, but that's probably my younger Hemingway-obsessed-phase me talking.