POETRY WRITING EXERCISES (Break Writer's Block!)

Here are some poetry exercises, some are my own, some are taken from books on writing poetry, some from websites. These exercises can be done just for the practice, or for fun, or to challenge yourself. They can also be very effective at breaking writer's block.

I will add more exercises to these, but would also appreciate other P&Q members posting their own exercises or others they've run across that are not listed here.Your contributions are greatly appreciated.

This topic/thread is meant as something myself and other members can return to time and again for the reasons stated above.

Peace, poetry & Power,

Gary Jurechka

POETRY WRITING EXERCISES

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Get the Poetry Party Started: Ten Easy Exercises

Poets and writers engage in writing exercises for individual reasons that are as varied as individual personalities. Whether stretching new creative muscles, battling writer’s block, or frolicking with words for fun, writing exercises are a proven method for catapulting an author to previously unexplored vistas of the mind.

Although the exercises in this article are designed for the poet, many are adaptable toward many types of prose writing. They are provided for use with discretion, as these exercises work. Authors are advised and duly warned that inspiration will flash, and that writing will improve with continuous use.

1) An exercise may begin by picking up almost any book or magazine. Circle between ten and twenty words on any interesting page. These words are the word bank used to construct a poem.

2) Keeping the vital notebook and pen beside your bed at night may allow enough memory of dreams to linger long enough through the morning to jot down impressions. Write a poem about a recent dream envisioned while sleeping, the more odd the dream, the better.

3) Choose a magazine photo and pick a short form poem. Haiku and cinquain work well for this exercise. The photo is the springboard, and imagination may carry the poem to places that surprise the poet when incorporating the use of a photo into a strict form poem.

4) Use a hand held recorder, or ask someone to write for you. Close your eyes and breathe deeply until your mind is calm. Start speaking as soon as words, images, and sensations hit your brain. Transpose to paper afterward if recording. Take at least a ten or fifteen minute break, then return to see if you have a poem or an idea for one.

5) The next poem may be as close as your next jaunt to a public place if the simple tools of a pen and notebook are in your hands. Parks, malls, grocery or video stores, and public theaters are great places for the somewhat addictive pastime of people-watching. While watching people, do you catch their eyes? Are you able to see beyond physical appearances to imagine what he thinks and feels right now? Imagine a life for this person. Where does he live? Does someone exhibit strange mannerisms or tones of speech? What animal does he remind you of? Take copious notes. Later, write a poem about one person or about the place and all the people and impressions you experienced.

6) Listen with closed eyes to a song without words. How does it make you feel? Think of all five senses and imagine a connection to this song through the five senses? What beautiful (or horrible) thing do you see within the sound of this song? What do you taste? Smell? Play the song again with these notes and perhaps you have a poem.

7) Spend an hour with family photos. Write about a particular family member or a tribute poem to the whole family. Or write a poem for your own funeral (which hopefully will happen someday far far into the future).

8) Think of ten or twelve of your favorite things in life or ten things you love or hate about someone or something. Use your list to compose a poem.

9) Considering the past year, what was the most exciting thing that happened to you? Compose a poem about this experience.

10) Think of other “most” phrases. What was the most disturbing thing that happened to you this year? The most rewarding? The most encouraging? Extending “most” phrases to include a lifetime, the poetry begins on a different dimension.

Some of the work composed from exercises may be unusable, but that’s okay. Exercises are designed to broaden creativity. Allowing that inner poet to enjoy poetry through the games of word play refreshes the mind while relieving the pressure of performance. But it’s possible to pen some of the best work while engaging in such frivolous writing exercises. Most poets eventually develop their own exercises specifically designed to flavor their own unique approaches to poetry.

Most experienced poets and authors agree that anything in this life has the capacity to become a source of inspiration. Virginia Wolfe once wrote a short story inspired from a spot on her bedroom wall. With the raw materials of an open mind and a playful heart, these simple exercises will at least get the party started either privately or with friends.

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Other poetry exercises:

STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS- I really love this exercise. Get a couple sheets of paper and set a fixed amount of time to write, usually ten or fifteen minutes is good for this (it may help to set a timer). You can do this in silence or with some background noise/music (instrumental is prefered) and if the tv is on either turn it off or turn the volume off (I mention music and tv as these both crept into the stream of consciousness poem I wrote (and was later published) that I mention later in this exercise description). Now pick up a pen and write (this could probably work on a computer, but I don't think it would be as effective), just write. Don't stop to think about what you are writing or what you have just written. Just write as things pop into you mind. It don't matter if the things make sense or are consistent, just write without pausing, without stopping the pen. Sometimes things going on around you at the moment may intrude, sometimes a long fargotten memory may appear. Write it down from margin to margin, don't write in poetic lines. When the time is up or you have a full page or two, stop. Look over what you have written. Circle or recopy any parts that interest you. Re-arrange these into lines of a poem. You may add a little bit if absolutely necessarry, but try not to. You may be able to string the lines together in a coherent poem or it may be an abstract piece. For a good example of this check out my own poem using this exercise called 'Reflections From The Living Room Floor' at http://www.poems-and-quotes.com/life/poems.php?id=501120 (I won't analyze it here, but you should be able to get the basic idea of how it came about).

here is another poet's take on the above exercise:
Free Writing

The exercise goes like this: You set your timer for fifteen minutes. Then you start free writing. It is considered better if you turn down the contrast on you screen so you can't see what you have written. It is considered obligatory to switch the subject if you find yourself writing a story or getting on your soap box. The idea is to get down into that level of your mind that nestles between the conscious and the dreaming mind. In theory it cannot write a cliché. (Want to bet? Mine writes in iambic pentameter and nothing but clichés.) When the timer rings, or maybe the next day, you sift through all the stuff you have written, pick out the lines that interest you and you will find that you have a theme. In theory the idea your sub conscious would like to bring to your attention. If nothing else it would be a good exercise in looking at each single line.
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LINE/TITLE POEM-Take a line or title from one of your already completed poems (usually the title or the first or last line works best, but any line will do) and construct a new poem from it.

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LUNE-a 3 line poem using a word count and not syllables(as opposed to the oriental forms). The word count is 3, 5, 3 (which makes the poem physically resemble it's name-the French word for moon).

LANTERN- a 5 line poem using a word count (again-not syllable count) of 1, 3, 5, 3, 1. Like the Lune, the form it takes on the page resembles the object it is named for. This form and the lune can also be considered what is known as concrete poetry (poetry in the shape of the subject of the poem, like a tree shape, etc.)
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CITY NAME poem-use the names of various cities or towns to create a poem. Use descriptive names like South Bend, Buffalo, Salt Lake, etc.
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Foregn language poem abstract translation

This may seem difficult, but it's actually fun. The purpose is to let yourself make sound associations. Take a poem in a language you don't know at all and "translate" it simply by making up a version from the way the poem sounds to you. Stick to the stanza form as it is in the original. Listen carefully to each word; what does it "say" to you? For example, sangre de pato: sand grates the patio, song of the parrot, some day in the ghetto, the angry potato; kindheit: kind heart, kind heights, Clondike.

Thoughts - This might be hard with Romance languages for me. I'd tend to take the bit of French and Latin I know and try to "translate" based on the meaning of roots and not sound as the exercise suggests. A good way to find a poem to translate is to do a Google advanced search on the keyword "poetry" and pick a language.

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Exercise : Poem from a Photograph

Choose a photograph that holds emotional significance for you. It might be the only school photo that you have of yourself; perhaps, a photo of your mother taken when she was young and glamorous. Your readers will not see what you see, so render the details with clarity. Let the reader know through the details you choose, the emotional significance of the photograph.

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Creative Exercises to Get the Juices Flowing

Stuck in a poet’s rut? Try these simple exercises to help get your creative juices flowing once more! This series of creativity exercises for poets and writers focuses on ways to help you observe the world around you with new eyes. Hopefully these exercises will help you express your thoughts and feelings more clearly by refocusing the way you express your physical impressions and feelings.

Become aware
Concentrate on every feeling your body is experiencing. The pressure of the chair beneath you, the feeling of the carpet fibers, the texture and resistance of the keyboard keys. . . . Concentrate on each individual feeling, allowing yourself to explore it. How long has it been since you noticed the pressure of your wrists on your keyboard or the thrill that pressing a pen to paper sends through your fingers.

Write down every word and phrase that comes to you to describe these sensations, without trying to make sense of them all or organize them or even write in complete sentences. You could give this sense poem a descriptive title like “Seated at My Computer” or something less descriptive like “Writing.”

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Experience something new
Try a new food. Try to identify as many different textures, smells, flavors, components or ingredients in the meal. Better yet, try a simple new food, like an exotic fruit you’ve never had before. Try to describe the food and the experience to someone who’s never eaten that food before. Determine which color is the most vibrant in the fruit or dish and find an appropriate name for that color—if it’s red, is it vermilion, scarlet or crimson?
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Visit a craft store. Explore each department thoroughly, experiencing the textures and smells of the unfinished woodworks, the scrapbooking papers and cardstocks, the clays, the yarns.

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Play games
Play word games by yourself or with friends. Keep a dictionary handy and take this opportunity to learn new words (I learned quay, zax and qat this way, for example). Let the new words roll off your tongue. Without knowing what they mean, write a definition of them (or just play Balderdash). Also record your impressions of the word and its connotations and try to identify what about that word makes you feel that way—its sounds, its resemblance to another word, or something else entirely?
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Focus on Metaphor

Definition of Terms:

Metaphor:
Language used imaginatively to carry ideas and feelings that otherwise might be difficult to put into words. A metaphor is a brief, compressed comparison that talks about one thing as if it were another. The comparison is implied. It comes to the poem unannounced, without the words like or as to signal that something is not literal.
Introduction to Metaphor:
Poets use striking imaginative comparisons to go beyond the resources of literal speech. They take us into a world of intense images, but often there is more to the image than what is apparent on the surface. When a poet says, "The bird of love is on the wing," the line is meant to call up a vivid image before the mind"s eye. But the poem is not literally talking about a bird. Instead, it compares the feeling of falling in love to the exhilaration a bird might experience in flight.

Personification:
Figurative language that endows something nonhuman with human qualities, as in "the tree whispered through the wind."

Extended or Sustained Metaphor:
A metaphor traced throughout a work. This follows the ramifications of the implied comparison, following up related similarities.

Controlling Metaphor:
When a single metaphor gives shape to a poem as a whole.

Conceits:
Fanciful extended metaphors. Elaborately developed, they often move along conventional or predictable lines.

Cliché:
A phrase which has lost its freshness due to overuse: tip of the iceberg, the bottom of the barrel, window of opportunity, hard as nails etc.

Figurative Language:
Metaphor is one kind of nonliteral language under the larger blanket of figurative language: language which means more than is what literally stated. Additional subcategories for figurative language are:

Metonymy:
a metaphor that does not rove far afield but lights on something closely related.

Synecdoche:
uses the part to stand for the whole: "give us a hand" (you actually need the whole person). Or the whole may be used to stand for only the part. "Mankind was forever altered today, when the President died." Actually, not all of mankind was altered.

Metaphor Exercise:
Basic:
Choose a color, write a 15-20 line poem, where the name of the color is often repeated. Begin by listing the images associated with that color, then consider the narrative and associative possibilities. Consider as you write the broader, symbolic associations of the color chosen. Also consider the personal associations that color has for you. Incorporate the color in the title is you can. Try to refrain from using "like" or "as" in this piece.
Advanced:
A. Describe an object or scene that really interests you without making any comparisons of one thing to another. Re-write it, if necessary, until it is as free of comparisons as possible.
B. Take the same object or scene and use it to describe a close family member, parent, sister, brother...In other words, indulge yourself in comparisons.

C. Write a poem(any form, 15-25 lines) which, though it is a description of the object or scene above, is really about your family member. Do not use like or as in this piece.

This exercise will help you to expand your use of language in reference to building comparisons, challenging you to see known things in new ways, and to communicate that new experience to your readers.

Simile:

Similar to metaphor, a brief , compressed imaginative comparison. Unlike the metaphor, a simile uses the words "like" "as" or "as if" to advertise that a comparison will follow.

Simile Exercises:

Finish The Sentence:
Fill in the blanks as rapidly as you can. Do not think. Write. If you have no reflex response, go on to the next sentence. Stop writing when you slow down.

1. A bird sitting in an old man's beard is like _________________

2. The sails on the ship moved as if ________________________

3. Everything was different, now that it was _________________

4. A woman in __________ is like a __________ in _________

5. Down is like up when ___________ is like _______________

6. Hate is to a closed fist, as love is like ____________________

7. A half empty glass is more like _________ than it is like ______

8. Blank pages are as wasted as ____________________________________

9. A man in ____________ is like a ______________ in _______

10. Truth is as hard to obtain as _____________ and as easy to lose as _____

Basic exercise:
Circle the sentence you like the best, and use it as a central image in a 15-25 line poem, any form or style. This exercise focuses on the development of similes in your poetry.
Advanced:
Circle three of the sentences you like the most, and weave them together, creating a poem 15-25 lines long, any form any style. This exercise focus on the development of simile in your poetry.
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Angel/Gargoyle exercise

This exercise is done with pencil and paper. Perhaps one day we will have an interactive version that you can do right here on this page. For now, you will need a pen or pencil and paper.

Part 1
Take a piece of paper and fold it in half side to side so you have a long thin rectangle.

On the one side you write a heading that says, Angel. On the other side you write Gargoyle.

Spend ten minutes writing under the angel heading from the part of you that is an angel.

Turn over the page and under the heading Gargoyle, write from the gargoyle aspect of your personality

Part 2
Now, unfold the paper. You are now looking at a page that is headed Angel . . . . Gargoyle.

All your lines start out angel, and then become gargoyle.

Edit and shape the material you have into a poem. Feel free to be wild and to augment liberally.
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Look Closely

Go wandering around your house. Your yard, too, if you like. Or a park or wooded area, even a mall. If you are lucky enough to live by the sea, go down by the beach and wander along. Wherever it is you are wandering, look carefully at everything you see.

Eventually something will call to you. We hope it is something small enough for you to pick up. A shell, say. A little flower. An interesting looking stick. An electronic circuit. Whatever.

Take that thing in your hand and turn it. Smell it. Feel it. Then sit with it a while.

Start making descriptive notes about it. It is small. In my hand it feels cool. It reminds me of something or someone. Write about that.

After a while, you may find that you have made connection with something you had forgotten that you love, or something that happened that needs your love to heal it. Something that needs attention at any rate. That little item called out to you for some reason. There is something interesting about it. Find that out and you have a poem.

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CAR NAME poem-use the names of cars (Jaguar, Saturn, Mustang, Gremlin, Charger, Equinox, Continental, Neon, Cougar, Sunbird, Barracuda, Rover, Firebird, Ranger, Intrepid, Cobra, Thunderbird, etc.) to create a poem.
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OVERHEARD poem-construct a poem from snippets of conversation (words, phrases, comments) you may have heard in a restaraunt or cafe, or at a party, or just in passing.
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Wrte a poem using alliteration. Write a poem using consanance. Write a poem using assonance.
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Poetry exercise sites;

http://anitraweb.org/kalliope/archive.html

http://www.eliteskills.com/poetry/poetry_exercises.php

or google/search Poetry Exercises.

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And if you wish to try traditional or other forms of poetry, you can find the definitions of different poetry forms styles under these two topics/threads (you'll find not only poetry terms/definitions but also a wealth of information from many notable P&Q members):

NOTES ON WRITING POETRY at http://www.poems-and-quotes.com/discussion/topic.html?topic_id=56674
(although locked, it can still be accessed)

and

NOTES ON WRITING POETRY (Part II) at http://www.poems-and-quotes.com/discussion/topic.html?topic_id=86274.

Wow there are lots there I didn't even think of some of these.. thanx for sharing.