This poemlet is in response to a musical prompt, given us by Elizabeth, at Musical Notes. The shtick is that we may only use 15 words, or less. Talk about good practice for clarity.
Yep, no punctuation. I played a lot with line breaks and spacing. I would have liked to have the poem centered, but having tried the preformatting which is a bugger when you only want a part of the post preformatted, and not all, and having tried to centre with the WP thing, again having problems if I wanted only the poem and nothing else centered, I gave up.
If you haven’t tried this prompt, hurry over, listen to the song, and write… and post. Then read the others, which I am about to do. I look forward to similarities and diversity.
The bonus of this exercise is the music, where I am meeting old friends and making new, as in today’s offering: Natasha Bedingfield’s Unwritten.
beginning
undefined
unplanned
reaching outside the lines
arms wide open
for my life
unwritten still
vivinfrance
13/09/2012 at 5:21 pm
Beautiful poem. I love the 15 word restriction!
To centre part of a post in WP: Type/copy/paste the whole post as normal, left-justified. Highlight the bit you want centred and click on the “centre” box above. Sometimes you have to ferniggle with it a bit – specially at weekends, WP plays silly beggars with formatting. If when you preview not all of what you wanted centred is in the right place, go back to edit and repeat the process with the part that’s in the wrong place. Clear as mud?
margo roby
13/09/2012 at 5:36 pm
I love when you add new vocabulary to my bank. Ferniggle is gorgeous. My mother is going to love it, too.
I tried what you suggest… maybe I shall try more, maybe. I know you can’t tell this about me, but I have an impatient streak. Never guessed, did you?
Annette Mickelson
13/09/2012 at 11:11 pm
I get impatient/frustrated with formatting in WP as well. You aren’t alone, Margo.
And, I like this poem a lot — especially after popping over and listening to the music. Writing from art (paintings and music) has never grabbed me — but this prompt, and the music selection, had me thinking “maybe.”
margo roby
14/09/2012 at 9:41 am
Give art and music another go, Annette. But, the art piece and the music do have to grab you. I’m going to give you links to two old posts of mine as soon as I find them!
JulesPaige
13/09/2012 at 5:34 pm
Understated. Guess when you’ve only got 15 words to play with
Nice!
I tried this one…
http://julesgemsandstuff.blogspot.com/2012/09/musical-notes-6.html
margo roby
13/09/2012 at 5:37 pm
That does make it fun to play with, Jules.
1sojournal
13/09/2012 at 6:06 pm
I love this exercise. It brings you back to the basics: the words themselves. And it changes how you see them and use them. Makes one careful, maybe even a bit more honest, lol. Love what you did here Margo, you make you reader stop and hear the words. This song is quite special to me. My youngest daughter called me one day and said she finally heard my song, then sang it to me and made me cry. She said it makes her think of me and all the things I have taught her. Thanks for playing along,
Elizabeth
http://soulsmusic.wordpress.com/
margo roby
14/09/2012 at 9:44 am
Thank you, Elizabeth, both for the comment and the prompt, and, through your daughter, this song. I agree with you about the stringency we must apply. How wonderful to have to deal with words on such a scope.
margo
pmwanken
13/09/2012 at 10:09 pm
“reaching outside the lines” — makes me think of the line in the song about letting go of inhibitions…how succulent!
margo roby
14/09/2012 at 9:44 am
Succulent, indeed, my wild woman!
rosross
14/09/2012 at 3:34 am
So much said with so few words.
margo roby
14/09/2012 at 9:45 am
I like the challenge of it, Ros.
ladynimue
14/09/2012 at 3:42 am
beautiful
I love the “reaching outside the lines” part ..
margo roby
14/09/2012 at 9:46 am
Thank you, Lady N
PJF Sayers
14/09/2012 at 9:51 am
In a word, Beautiful! Nicely done, Margo.
Pamela
margo roby
14/09/2012 at 9:53 am
Thank you, Pamela. I’m excited about having this to tackle each week.
margo