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| 2016 Poetry Poster from Poets.org |
Earlier this month, Jodi Webb posted about National Poetry Month and the 30 activities you can do to celebrate.
I’ve been participating in Writer’s Digest’s 2016 PAD Challenge to write a poem every day in April. Writer’s Digest writer, Robert Lee Brewer, provides a prompt every day, an example poem he wrote, and space for others to share their poems.
As a self-proclaimed non-poet, this is a challenge for me! I have participated for the past several years, never writing 30 poems in the month, yet it has been so rewarding.
Making the switch from prose to poetry allows me to:
- Concentrate on every single word choice
- Focus on word order by noticing the rhythm of word choices
- Enhance descriptions and emotion by using strong imagery
- Avoid telling rather than showing
And these benefits are in addition to the multiple benefits Jodi already listed!
Like Jodi, I am not suggesting that you need to become a poet. But for those of you who are not poets, I encourage you to dabble in a bit of poetry now and then because it allows you to take residence in a different part of your brain, to see language differently, to feel stories differently. A new perspective can give your writing the boost it needs.
You don’t need to wait until next April to practice writing poetry: the 2016 PAD Challenge prompts are available year round so you can take the challenge at your own pace at a time that’s convenient for you.
How has National Poetry Month been going for you? What have you learned from reading and/or writing poetry this month?
Written by Anne Greenawalt
Great tips, Anne! I see a lot of writers are sharing their poems in the comments over at the PAD challenge. Interesting to read through them. I will have to try this sometime, at least for a new perspective.
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