To celebrate the upcoming Meddling with Poetry course, I'm sharing 16 delicious forms of poetry I've discovered, each of them a delight to play with.
The elevenie's an absolute beauty and a very handy form to have up your sleeve when you want a quickie. The form is blissfully simple and creatively constrained, so you can launch in with just your noun (that's a thing word) and discover the rest as you go, through following its strict rules. You can also write double and triple elevenies if you want, or as many as you please. Here are some of my draft elevenies:
Single elevenie
Spiderwebs
catch petals
strung in midair
elf-veils suspended, decaying
uncertainty.
Elevenie series: Colour elevenies
Clouds
bulge lavender
over slate roofs
ragged with distant rain
privately.
Beech
brittles copper
against red brick
glowing in late sun
inviting.
Featherboards
slide creamily
around the courtyard
wrapping the edges in
calm.
Willow
curls greenly
in humid stillness
every twig twisting with
delight.
hover, untidily
up down everywhere
They dream of jungles
terrified
April is Poetry-Writing Month!
NaPoWriMo (National Poetry Writing Month, the April poem-a-day challenge) is an absolute joy to do. If you're taking part or want to join in, I'm sending out a few freebie Poem Writing Skills and extra titbits across April, to inspire and encourage you.
If you'd like to get that extra inspiration, join the newsletter here and click the Poetry-Writing Month link in your welcome email.
The Meddling with Poetry course explores a host of different poetry forms, as well as the musicality of language, poetic imagery, and other aspects of the poetic. Absolute beginners and experienced writers are equally welcome. You can read more details and book a place here.
