Sunday, January 15, 2012

Theme: Re-read

Elaborating on the theme of returns and branching out from our usual poetry assignments, I'd like to take time this week to rediscover our favorite poems, and perhaps discover some new ones. It's easy to get stuck in a stylistic rut when then only work you ever read is your own. I think it's important to keep reading poetry if one hopes to write it, but that can be difficult with school and work and then endless allure of novels and histories and all things prose.

This week, our assignment will be to revisit a favorite poem and write something about it. Notice its structure, its central theme - what is it that makes this particular work compelling? If you have the time, you might try to also find a new poem that strikes you in a different way and explore how it has been crafted. Happy reading!

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