Poetry Project #1 (16 pts.)
Your have a choice of four options for this project. In each
case, the emphasis is on clear, specific, vivid, concrete, sensory DETAIL.
Avoid clichés in this project like the plague.
Option 1: Doomed Republics
Write a free verse poem about some significant, puzzling, terrifying, or otherwise intriguing event, person, or place in your childhood.. Rely almost exclusively on concrete language and images, letting the details speak for themselves. Do not editorialize about your subject or explain it; simply describe or reenact it as accurately and as vividly as you can, using your senses.
Be sure especially to avoid sentimentality: writing which evokes predictable, obvious, and pre-digested emotion; writing which is trite, cheesey, or cute; writing in which emotion is "unearned" or "in excess of its object." Write a poem instead which discovers NEW feelings and surprises your reader (and yourself).
Option 2: The Luminous Object
At the risk of appearing foolish, a writer sometimes needs to be able to just stand and gape at this or that thing—a sunset or an old shoe—in absolute and simple amazement.
(Ray Carver, "On Writing.")
Write a free verse poem about an object. Describe it with as much specific, intense, concrete detail as possible, using all of your senses. Keep reflection and explanations to a minimum. Simply make the object vivid and present through language, respecting its thingness. Help your reader (and yourself) see this thing as never before. (Poems with a true surrealist bent will receive a Surrealist Award.)
It might be interesting (but isn't mandatory) to imagine your chosen object from some very unusual perspective—that of an animal, for instance, or someone from another country or planet. (An English 322 student once wrote about a rifle, for example, from the perspective of a deer, calling it "a branch that barks." )
Another tip: pick an object which intrigues you or puzzles you or even bugs you in some way. DO NOT pick something whose meanings to you are obvious.
Option 3: The Love Poem
Write a poem addressed to a person, place, or thing that you love. Detail. Detail. Detail.
Option 4: The Hate Poem
Write a poem addressed to a person, place, or thing that you hate. Detail. Detail. Detail.
Grading scale for all poetry projects:
Very
Good = A=15-16 pts.. Meets all of the stated criteria and instructions
exceptionally well. Excels in inventiveness, originality, and energy, relative
to work produced generally in 323. Well-edited and proofed. Possibly publishable.
Good =B =13-14 pts. Meets all of the stated criteria and instructions,
or meets several of them exceptionally well, despite a weak performance
with others.. May be especially striking in spots, despite noticeable flaws.
Very competent, but may lack originality or inventiveness, relative to
work produced generally in 323. Good attention to style and mechanics.
Clear attention to assignment.
Fair=C=11-12 pts.. Meets some of the stated criteria, or meets
all of them only partially. Uninspired but minimally competent; or very inspired
but lacking competence in key areas.. May show some inattention to, or misunderstanding
of, instructions. Weak proofreading and editing.
Poor= D=9-10 pts. Meets few of the criteria. May not not heed
or understand instructions. May be sloppy, unproofed,
unedited, and/or very perfunctory and uninspired.. An unsatisfying poem,
saved by at least minimal attention to at least one facet of the piece.
Unacceptable=F=0 pts. Poem either fails to meet any of the stated criteria, or demonstrates severe oversights or weaknesses in significant areas.