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Megan Willome

Found Poetry

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In chapter 2 of L.L. Barkat’s “Inspired: 8 ways to write poems you can love,” one of the suggestions was, “Open any book and copy a few sentences, breaking them into lines as you copy.”

I’d already copied a couple of quotes from Hilary Mantel’s “Bring Up the Bodies,” which is great fun.

After you read mine, it’s your turn. Redo my line breaks, or do your own from a quote you like.

First quote: “Sometimes peace looks like war, you cannot tell them apart; sometimes these islands look very small.”

First poem:

Sometimes peace

looks like war

you cannot tell

them

apart; sometimes

these islands look very small.

Second quote: “There are no endings. If you think so you are deceived as to their nature. They are all beginnings. Here is one.”

Second poem:

There are no

endings. If you think

so you are deceived

as to their nature. They are all beginnings.

Here is

one.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  2. sometimes peace looks
    you cannot tell them like war
    apart these islands look very small

    there are no endings if you think
    so you are deceived
    as to their nature they are all
    beginnings here
    one is

  3. oh! Love seeing this 🙂 Okay, my line breaks…

    Sometimes peace

    looks like

    W
    A
    R.

    You cannot tell them apart.

    Sometimes

    these islands

    look
    very
    small.

    ____

    (I’m guessing it might not save all my nice spaces. If not, I’ll post a screen shot to Twitter later 🙂

  6. So, me —
    times peace —

    looks like war?

    You cannot
    tell them — apart!

    So, me —
    times these —

    look! — small
    islands.

    –spb 2013

  8. 1.
    It looked
    just
    like Charlotte.

    2.
    The Fair Grounds
    were soon
    deserted. The sheds and buildings were
    empty
    and forlorn. The infield was littered with bottles
    and trash. Nobody, of the hundreds
    of people that had
    visited the Fair, knew that
    a grey spider had played the most
    important part of all.
    No one was
    with her
    when she died.

    3.
    It is not often
    that someone comes
    along
    who is a true friend
    and a good writer.
    Charlotte was
    both.

Trackbacks

  2. […] One of the links I’ve had on my ‘to read’ list was How To Read A Poem (part of a series) and is well worth a look at, or at least worth adding to your ‘to read’ list!  The website looks like it has lots of interesting things on but there was a particular article which caught my eye.  It details three ways of creating poems from others’ words and links to a blog post with a lovely couple of examples of found poetry. […]