Write Better Poetry / 40 posts found
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 11
For today’s prompt, write a power poem. Your poem could somehow involve electricity, solar power, fossil fuels, wind, or water. It could illustrate a power play or someone exerting their power over someone else. Of course, you could also write about a power outage. You alone have the power to poem your way through this prompt. Remember: These prompts are springboards to creativity. Use them to expand your possibilities, not limit them. Note on commenting: If you wish to comment on the site, go to Disqus to create a free new account, verify your account on this site below (one-time […]
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 10
After we get through today’s poem, we’ll be a third of the way finished with this challenge. Keep the poems coming! For today’s prompt, write a taste poem. Back on day three, we wrote a smell poem; let’s write about the sense of taste today. Of course, I’m thinking about tasting wine or cheese or chocolate. But feel free to indulge in a person’s taste in fashion, cars, or whatever else requires real taste. Remember: These prompts are springboards to creativity. Use them to expand your possibilities, not limit them. Note on commenting: If you wish to comment on the […]
WD Poetic Form Challenge: Chanso Winner
Here are the results of the Writer’s Digest Poetic Form Challenge for the chanso along with a Top 10 list. You can check out all the chanso entries in the comments on this post. Click here at any time to see what current WD Poetic Form Challenge we’re running. We’re currently running one for the kimo. Here is the winning chanso: “The Waking of a Tree,” by R. E. Wu The woods were still in slumberWhen I took a winter tryst,With powder-dusted umberTwining through the snowy mistOf scattered snowflakes falling,Falling slowly through their midst. Above, the somber branchesStretched and murmured, all […]
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 9
If you want an extra challenge this month, try participating in our current WD Poetic Form Challenge for the kimo. For today’s prompt, write a breaking poem. The poem could be about breaking down walls, break dancing, breaking up, or breaking stuff. However you’d like to break it down and then write your poem. Remember: These prompts are springboards to creativity. Use them to expand your possibilities, not limit them. Note on commenting: If you wish to comment on the site, go to Disqus to create a free new account, verify your account on this site below (one-time thing), and […]
WD Poetic Form Challenge: Kimo
I’m hoping to announce the winner of the chanso WD Poetic Form Challenge within the next week, but let’s go ahead and start another new poetic form challenge. This time around, we’ll write the kimo, an Israeli three-liner. Find the rules for writing the kimo here. So start writing them and sharing here (on this specific post) for a chance to be published in Writer’s Digest magazine–as part of the Poetic Asides column. Note on commenting: On this new site, you have to set up a free Disqus account and then scroll to the bottom of this page (or any […]
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 8
And just like that, we’re starting the second week of this challenge. Poem on! For today’s prompt, write a what they never tell you poem. I’m not sure who “they” are, but “they” talk a lot, and there are things people tell you, and there are things you just have to learn on your own, because “they” (them again) never tell you ahead of time. Like, for instance, “they” never told me that I’d still feel like a teenager in my 40s, but here we are. Think about what “they” never tell (or told) you, and write that poem. Remember: […]
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 7
So believe it or not, and for better or worse, we’ll be a full week finished with this challenge once we write today’s poem! Are you excited? If so, would you say you have an abundance of excitement? For today’s prompt, write an abundance poem. There can be an abundance of things, both good and bad. An abundance of sunshine, money, and chocolate. Or an abundance of rain, debt, and liverwurst. Today, I hope there will be an abundance of poeming! Remember: These prompts are springboards to creativity. Use them to expand your possibilities, not limit them. Note on commenting: […]
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 6
The April Poem-A-Day Challenge is the big daily poeming challenge each year, but it’s not the only one. We also do a poem-a-day challenge in November based around the concept of creating a chapbook manuscript of poems, and I just announced the winner of that challenge last night. Click here to learn the winner of the 2021 November Poem-A-Day Chapbook Challenge! For today’s prompt, take the phrase “(blank) in the (blank),” replace the blanks with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem. Possible titles might include: “Poem in the […]
2021 November PAD Chapbook Challenge: Results
Here we are. It’s time to reveal the results of the 2021 November PAD Chapbook Challenge. There were more than 80 entries this time around from all around the country and the world. I saw quite a few familiar names, but I also discovered some poets who were completely new to me. It was all a fun read, and it was incredibly difficult to make a decision once I got it down to the Top 10. In this post, I share the winning chapbook and poet, along with two finalists and seven honorable mentions. ***** Play with poetic forms! Poetic […]
2022 April PAD Challenge: Day 5
Here we go: The first Two-for-Tuesday prompt of the 2022 April Poem-A-Day Challenge! For first timers or those with short memories, I provide two prompts on Tuesdays, and poets get to decide whether to write one type of poem, the other type of poem, and/or tackle both simultaneously (or separately). Here are the Two-for-Tuesday prompts: Write a Make Sense poem, and/or… Write a Don’t Make Sense poem. Remember: These prompts are springboards to creativity. Use them to expand your possibilities, not limit them. Note on commenting: If you wish to comment on the site, go to Disqus to create a […]