Read the poetry available at the hyperlinks below. Then, after reading the directions that follow, write your own poem.
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/6649/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3884/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3880/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3883/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3869/
“Write a poem which, like ‘The River-Merchant’s Wife,’ is a letter. The person you write it to doesn’t actually have to be far away. Write it, perhaps, to a good friend,
or to someone you know very little but have thought about, or to someone you imagine, or … to someone that you don’t know whether you’ll ever see again. It can even be to someone who is dead. You might try organizing the poem in somewhat the way this one is; that is, in each stanza you could talk about a different time in your life, a different age. It might be helpful to think of a certain day you remember very strongly when you were that age. Where exactly were you? And what were you doing, what did you wear, what was your hair like then? Was the person you are writing the letter to there? Instead of talking about your emotions, see whether you can suggest them by talking about what you said or saw or did. In the last part of the poem, talk about what is happening to you now. Again, talk more about the weather, and the way everything looks, and what you are doing than about what you feel. Maybe the last stanza could, as in Ezra Pound’s poem, contain a wish. This poem doesn’t begin with ‘Dear’ or end with ‘Love,’ but you may begin and end your poem that way if you like. Or you can show that it’s a letter only by its title.”
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/6649/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3884/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3880/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3883/
http://plagiarist.com/poetry/3869/
“Write a poem which, like ‘The River-Merchant’s Wife,’ is a letter. The person you write it to doesn’t actually have to be far away. Write it, perhaps, to a good friend,
or to someone you know very little but have thought about, or to someone you imagine, or … to someone that you don’t know whether you’ll ever see again. It can even be to someone who is dead. You might try organizing the poem in somewhat the way this one is; that is, in each stanza you could talk about a different time in your life, a different age. It might be helpful to think of a certain day you remember very strongly when you were that age. Where exactly were you? And what were you doing, what did you wear, what was your hair like then? Was the person you are writing the letter to there? Instead of talking about your emotions, see whether you can suggest them by talking about what you said or saw or did. In the last part of the poem, talk about what is happening to you now. Again, talk more about the weather, and the way everything looks, and what you are doing than about what you feel. Maybe the last stanza could, as in Ezra Pound’s poem, contain a wish. This poem doesn’t begin with ‘Dear’ or end with ‘Love,’ but you may begin and end your poem that way if you like. Or you can show that it’s a letter only by its title.”
