Shh…the Inklings are getting ready to whisper secrets to you. Our challenge this month came from Catherine, who borrowed a prompt from a list Molly shared with us. Unlike the Go-Gos, our lips are NOT sealed — we’ve written poems about secrets.
To help us write about secrets, we had this poem, “Family Secret” by Nancy Kuhl to use as a mentor text.
“When in Doubt” by Sandra Cisneros showed up mid-month in the Poetry Unbound podcast, and it seemed to be in conversation with my poem, which was written to answer the stem which became the title.
Here’s how the rest of the Inklings met Catherine’s challenge:
The photo above is a black swallowtail that was born in the fennel in our garden last summer, raised in the safety of our house, and released back into the garden when she (yes, that’s a female) emerged from her cocoon. Compare a real black swallowtail to the piñata version by Roberto Benavidez. Remarkable, isn’t it? Using “paper as the equivalent of paint” in a “fringe that flows,” Benavidez is able to capture the reality of a butterfly, the fantasy of mythical creatures, and nearly photographic landscapes.
If you want to know more about piñatas as well as about Roberto Benavidez and his art, you can watch this Craft In America episode on play. Piñatas are found at 12:16, and Roberto Benavidez is at 18:27.
Here’s how the other Poetry Sisters met this month’s challenge:
Heidi’s December challenge for the Inklings came to us in the form of this mobile (which is hanging beside our mail table and yes that’s the Christmas tree reflecting in the lace swan’s glass). The card from which hang the “12 Days of Yuletide Poetry Prompts” details the precepts for the season and each of its days.
I wrote to all twelve of the prompts. Here are a couple that I especially liked. First, the introduction to Yuletide:
“On these dark nights we celebrate light and the power of the human spirit to brighten and warm the season of cold and dark. As the wheel of the year begins another turn, we think on the old and prepare for the new, lighting a candle for each of these human gifts:
25 generosity: the urge to share what we have with others (prompt: ask what generosity really means)
27 laughter: the singular human ability to convert the unexpected into joy (prompt: capture the sound of laughter)
Thank you, Heidi, for generously (and creatively!) sharing your family’s Yuletide traditions with us, and for twelve days of thoughtful writing prompts. I can’t wait to see what the other Inklings did with your challenge, because for once, we haven’t had the chance to share any early drafts. We haven’t an INKLING what the others have written!
The Poetry Sisters’ December challenge was to write Elfchen, a type of cinquain that uses word count instead of syllable count, and links together the lines with these prompts:
Line one=A thought, an object, a color, a smell or the like Line two=What does the word from the first row do? Line three=Where or how is the word of row 1? Line four=What do you mean? Line five=Conclusion: What results from all this? What is the outcome? (This information via Wikipedia.)
Elfchen are German in origin, so for bonus points, I wrote one in German, using my limited vocabulary.
brot warm, frisch mit Schinken und Käse und natürlich viele Butter: lecker
Molly challenged the Inklings to write luc bats in November, and it’s a good thing I started playing with the form early on, because my November kind of evaporated starting with NCTE. Not only did I write a luc bat for the burr oak across the street and her “burr oak buffet” which feeds the neighborhood deer, squirrels, and groundhogs, I wrote one in response to the news
The Poetry Sisters’ challenge for November was to write in the style of Valerie Worth. Attempting to narrow my focus, I went from garden, to fennel, to the ladybug larva I found in the fennel last week. Liz commented that this could be an on-going practice — choosing small and/or ordinary things and writing without the restrictions of form or rhyme. I agree. It’s quite satisfying to find the extraordinary in the ordinary that surrounds us.
I have stumbled recently both in posting regularly and in commenting generously. Please know that I am thankful for each of you and for your words! This community is one of the bright spots in my world.
Ruth has this week’s Poetry Friday Roundup at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town. Since it will be December next week, we need to start thinking about January-June roundups. Watch for signups.
Here’s how the other Poetry Sisters met our challenge:
Write a prose piece–find a poem in it. Or, write a poem, expand it into a prose piece. Or, find a prose piece, transform it into a poem. Or, find a poem and transpose it into a prose piece.
Any interpretation of this prompt is perfect.
Sometimes a very narrow and constrained challenge is just right, and sometimes a wide open invitation is what a writer needs. Thanks, Linda!
Here’s how the other Inklings met Linda’s challenge:
What is a Bouts-Rimés poem? Part game, part puzzle, they are hard to get started, but once you do, the possibilities are myriad! Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about Bouts-Rimés.
The Poetry Sisters shared rhymes…and then MORE rhymes when we figured out we didn’t have enough to satisfy the requirements of most sonnet types. Because our poems WOULD be sonnets. Sonnets are apparently the origin story of the Poetry Sisters, but at the beginning I was only there as audience, so I’m a late-comer to the sonnet game. Or a new-comer, as the case may be. I haven’t written many sonnets. This poem is a Shakespearean sonnet, but I also tried Petrarchan and Terza Rima.
For me, the process of writing a Bouts-Rimés poem was similar to writing a golden shovel. I picked my sonnet type, then loaded the right side of my notebook page with the rhymes that fit the sonnet (for Shakespearean: ABAB CDCD EFEF GG). I completely ignored the iambic pentameter syllable count requirement. (Call me cheater, or call me beginner. I’m fine with either label.) I chose my topic, and then started writing (and rewriting, and crossing out, and starting over). Like I said, part game, part puzzle!
When I ran across the Visual Frameworks site, I immediately added it to my list of possible prompts for the Inklings. Not only are the visuals compelling, the text that follows each is thought-provoking.
My first drafts explored all the possible ways to use a framework. For Coordinates, I wrote a haiku based on the image, then an erasure poem from the text.
Matt has this week’s Poetry Friday Roundup at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme. And there’s been a change for next week. On October 13, Catherine will be hosting at Reading to the Core.
The Poetry Sisters wrote diminishing verse poems this month. Thank goodness I got started early fiddling with drafts and studying mentor texts because the last couple of weeks have been a lot. In all good ways.
A(nother) Year of Reading 