Tag: poetry

Golden Gloves to Wilder Soul

Jul 19, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fancy footwork, golden gloves, poetry, writing technique

Ok, the symbolism task was NOT EASY yesterday, but one writer took the challenge head on and did a great job–connotation, symbolism, and allusion to show depth. The trouble is, I don’t know the NAME of this person, or where she’s from, but her (his?) pseudonym is… WILDER SOUL It’s 15:23 and I am…
Poetry Week #005: Test Day!

Jul 18, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in headlock, poetry

Ok, it’s test day! The first task, if you haven’t done that already, is to read yesterday’s post about connotation, symbolism, and allusion in Lorna Crozier’s “Crossing Willow Bridge.” Your job today is to look at Karen Connelly’s “From My Father’s Hand,” and see what you can find. Objects and items and symbols abound. What…
Poetry week #004: Crozier and symbolism

Jul 17, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fancy footwork, poetry, writing technique

First, read this poem by Lorna Crozier quickly: CROSSING WILLOW BRIDGE On the farm a willow bridge though this is Saltspring Island not Japan. Sometimes it crosses water, sometimes not. This morning after rain the ground slides into mud. My mother and I tread our way to see the baby llama in the far…
Poetry week #003: How does that SOUND to you?

Jul 16, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fancy footwork, poetry, writing technique

Important tools in the toolkit of any poet are devices involving SOUND. There are many to choose from, but let’s focus on a few today. I’ll get some quick definitions out of the way, then demonstrate what I mean by them with a poem. Alliteration–repeating of beginning sounds: “buckets of baseballs; killer choir; ten…
Tarina from New Zealand and her Cascade Poem

Jul 16, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fancy footwork, golden gloves, poetry

Our first Golden Gloves award goes to Tarina from New Zealand, who, on www.fighttowrite.com TODAY checked out what cascade poems are all about and wrote a GOOD one…TODAY! Here’s her poem, and a link to her site: Golden Gloves Winner TARINA the web finding out everything you ever knew everything you’d been told it was all…
Poetry Week #002: Writing the Cascade Poem

Jul 15, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fancy footwork, knockout idea, poetry, power punch, writing technique

THE CASCADE First, in order for me to discuss what a cascade poem is, let me show you one. “Woman on a Swing: Lions Park” is one of three poems that helped me win the Pacific Northwest Writers Association (PNWA) poetry prize in 2012. It’s one I quickly showed poet Patricia Young over dinner…
Poetry Week #001: Poem within a poem!

Jul 14, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fancy footwork, knockout idea, poetry, writing technique

Time for some poetry! A poem can contain a great amount of meaning in a small space; it’s what separates us from the rest of the animals, someone once told me. And while I enjoy spoken word poetry, especially when it’s well done, there are some things you can do on a piece of…
A real-life Indiana Jones? Long starter from nonfiction…

Jul 5, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fiction, nonfiction, novels, poetry, short stories, starters

Talk about adventure! Here’s the beginning of a NONFICTION article, “The El Dorado Machine,” by Douglas Preston: The rainforests of Mosquitia, which span more than thirty-two thousand square miles of Honduras and Nicaragua, are among the densest and most inhospitable in the world. “It’s mountainous,” Chas Begley, an archaeologist and expert on Honduras, told me…
Starter from Margaret Talbot

Jul 3, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fiction, nonfiction, novels, poetry, short stories, starters

Today’s line to get you started comes from Margaret Talbot’s “Shots in the Dark,” in the April 15th, 2013 edition of The New Yorker : What’s the worst that could happen? Try this: Who’s thinking this and why? Once you decide that, go write the scene. Coming tomorrow: A fighting 8 count that…
Sara Dailey Week #001: Starter from a title

Jun 24, 2013

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by

Ace Baker

in fiction, nonfiction, novels, poetry, short stories, starters, writing technique

Welcome to Sara Dailey week! Over the next seven days, we’ll be learning technique and getting ideas from a single article of hers, “The Memory Train,” that was published in Creative Nonfiction magazine, the one edited by Lee Gutkind. First up is taking a look at that title: “The Memory Train.” Other people’s…