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Piaster 004

Often writers look inward to their detriment. Use one of the topics given to broaden the perspective of the character(s) in your poem. Last week's piaster challenged you with writing similes. The exercise created some great figurative phrases. In the current exercise, add depth to your poem by again using simile. Your poem should make a commentary on culture, world affairs or humanity in general. Try to illustrate conflict and conclude with resolution on some level. The resolution does not mean you solve the issue, but the work must draw a conclusion about your topic. Try to avoid generic phrases, images and sound bites. Your title must be used at least once in the body of the poem. Minimum two strophes. No line length restriction. As always tell a story, make sure your poem has a beginning middle and end.

Please leave a link. We’d also like permission to repost your draft here in a central location where all participants and readers can get an overall sense of what this piaster inspired. If you prefer not to have your draft here, publicly decline when you post your link. Each draft will have its own page for comments, and we will link to your individual blogs encouraging readers to read more of your work.

What do you see?

Once again we ask that you create vistas for your readers. The first piaster simply offered an action with a defined result. Our second, urged you into the dark to create an outcome. The third piaster is similar to the second but expands like ripples from a pebble hitting the water. Remember the first piaster? Rocks, ripples and water? Ignore the babble seems I am making white noise again. I want to remind you that like us, These exercises are all connected and have a purpose.

Piaster 003 Vision Burn Brain Drain

Integrate each of these 11 phrases unchanged and in the order listed throughout your poem. There are no other restrictions. This exercise should cause a few of those synapses to fire.



the moon, broken off like
a red flower brilliant as
her fingers delicate as
the island stretches off the coast like
your backbone rigid like
the bicycle careening down the hill like
soft as
crazy bird its song like
she spun off like
his monotonous voice like
days pass like


Next piaster we look at style, word choice, and how they fit together to affect imagery.
Note on poem structure: as always construct your poem as a story with a beginning, middle and end. Or you could use a variation of three-part organization:

· The description of the scene.
· A meditation on that scene (Examine the experience.)
· A resolution or understanding of the scene. (In this structure the resolution should take place where the poem began but become altered by the meditation.) The key is that the resolution returns to the opening in an altered way.

Example:

· Scene: The poem begins with the speaker overlooking a beautiful bluff, sun sea blah blah blah.
· Meditation: She remembers an event that occurred there. Her first romance, perhaps a whispered secret or an over indulgence of a controlled substance whatever; this causes the speaker to reflect inward and examine deeper feelings around that event and how those experiences changed her.
· Resolution: She scans the bluff feels the sun, sea and realizes she is standing in bird droppings, and not far off the Starbucks at the strip mall has intruded on the space and maybe the view ain’t so great unless you have blinders on, and maybe thats how memory works also.

Piaster 002

Previously we talked a wee bit about imagery, and we offered an exercise that required description of a physical act but had a list of words that could not be used. The purpose was to illustrate a way to keep the image open. Open is good, open means the reader can understand and still has room to interpret and wander around a bit inside the poem to make it their own. This is a critical attribute if you want your reader to share the experience. Here is an example: Let’s say I want my protagonist to go down into a cold windowless basement. I could say:

“It was black as night and the damp cold reached into her core.”

Sure that works, but the first problem is we have all read those exact words used that way before. The second problem is the reader can do nothing but observe. Consider:

“Her eyes useless she searched with numb fingertips.”

The second sentence probably brought an image to your mind while the first one did not. The second sentence begs to continue the first not so much. This is what I mean when I say open. With further thought I know you could write a much better line than I did.

Piaster 002

The scene:

A person walks down into a dark cold basement.

Write a free verse poem 25 words minimum begin your poem with your variation of the demonstration line. Be conscious of word choice keep it open for the reader. Remember your poem must have a beginning, middle and end. Avoid cliché and have fun.

For those that did the first Piaster now is a good time to go back to that poem and note how you used imagery. Is it open? If not try rewriting it.

A word about the images we use: They are a kind of extra piaster to help jump-start your work. Do not describe the image but use it as a door, look past it, imagine what happened before and after the image. Don’t let the image influence you. You influence the image.

Post a link to your work in comments. Do support each other and provide feedback to your peers. When commenting, try to say more than you like it. Mention something you specifically like and say why or ask a question. We're not looking for in depth analysis but we are looking for useful feedback as well as encouragement. Have fun.

Piaster: A fractional monetary unit typically one-hundredth

Every poem started presents an opportunity to get to the last piaster within. The wonderful thing about writing poems is that you never quite get there. Like many things worth doing, the journey is far more important than the destination.

Everything starts with inspiration or determination so while all those ideas are percolating and flowing to paper/screen enjoy the ride and try to stay out of your own way. After the flirtation, it is the time to begin your poem. A successful poem is a story, and like any story it should have three things: a beginning, middle and end, and as you refine your work make sure the poem has an arc. The prompts, ideas and exercises we toss around here at Piaster will help you fill in that story with four components.

• Uses of image or images open enough to be accessible to the reader
• Technique and form
• Style
• Voice
  

These four components give a poem its soul/essence or whatever you want to call it. We will talk more about this later; for now here is a piaster dealing with imagery to get you started.

Post a link to your work in comments. Do support each other and provide feedback to your peers. When commenting, try to say more than you like it. Mention something you specifically like and say why or ask a question. We're not looking for in depth analysis but we are looking for useful feedback as well as encouragement. Have fun.