List 5 problems. Now list 5 possible solutions for each problem. Pick the 2 least appealing solutions for your least favorite problem and write a poem debating between those two solutions.
14/30
If you were an animal, what kind of animal would you be?
13/30
Think of someone/something you disagree with- an ex, a foe, a politics. Write a poem from their point of view. Write so that if they were to read it, they’d feel seen.
12/30
Apologies for the lateness of this prompt. My sister came into town! Sisters are great. If you have a sister, write a poem about her. If not, perhaps a brother or a cousin, or the sibling you have in an alternate universe.
11/30
Make a list of 20 causes and their effects, things that actually happened in your life. Now make a list of 5 causes and effects in some other system – nature, computers, space, politics, religion, etc. Now, pick an adverb to be used as a relative pronoun (e.g. – why, how, who, whom, which, whoever, when, etc). Write a poem with 5 stanzas whose structure is something like:
{ cause 1 from other system } happened
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 1 in my life }
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 2 in my life }
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 3 in my life }
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 4 in my life }
{ cause 2 from other system } happened
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 5 in my life }
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 6 in my life }
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 7 in my life }
this is { relative pronoun } { effect 8 in my life }
and so on. Play with the phrasing, make it your own, but see what this structure will give you.
10/30
Write an elegy for a place. It can be a place you loved, or a place you didn’t love. Try to stat small – no elegies for the world or a country.
9/30
Start with something banal: a clickbait headline. Visit a site like Buzzfeed and take a headline from one of their sillier articles as your poem title.
8/30
Where will you be when the world ends? For inspiration, here are some songs where different songwriters answered (or asked) this question:
“Where Will I Be?” by Emmylou Harris
“1999” by Prince
“The Earth Died Screaming” by Tom Waits
“Sky Is Falling” by Blackalicious
“Famous Last Words” by Tears For Fears
7/30
Write an ekphrastic poem, but using something that isn’t art. Maybe an animnated gif? Or an advertisement? Stock photography?
6/30
Lose your poem in translation. Take an old poem draft that never went anywhere and pick a favorite line or section from it. Run that line or section through Google Translate – translate it into another langauge. Copy the result and then run it through again, translating it into a third langauge. Do this a few times, then translate back into English. What do you get? Write a new poem using the result.
Below is the above paragraph after having been translated English -> Chinese -> Tamil -> Gaelic -> English:
Report your poem translation Take an old poem with no space, choose favorite lines or your favorite styles. Go through line or section via Google Translate – translate into another language. With results, re-run it as a third language. Translate to English many times. What did you get? Write a new poem as a result.