Today we worked with the diamante form. You're supposed to start and end with a noun, but I gave us some leeway -- sometimes we went with an adjective. The line format is built on number of words. The form is 1,2,3,5,3,2,1 ~ sounds like a waltz, doesn't it? So the lines get successively longer at first, it's all balanced by a long beam of a line (like a rafter) in the middle, and then the lines decrease in the back half.
Sidman suggested using a picture to inspire the diamante. The sweet girl has been enjoying the gorgeous Child's Book of Art by Lucy Micklethwait again. She looked through and chose several pictures to work with. I was really tickled with all the results, but I especially liked this one she wrote based on Renoir's Girl With a Watering Can.
Girl:
watering plants,
picking white daisies.
She's just watered the garden.
Buttons on dress,
red bow,
peaceful.
(SBP, 5/28/12)
She really liked this way of poeming and I must say I do too. Setting word limits helped her to really focus on what she was seeing and what she wanted to say. That's an exercise that's good for all writers ~ no matter what our ages!
1 comment:
Great poem! And lovely painting too. I find that art can be a great catalyst to writing, and I also find particular constraints really helpful when I'm writing. Helps keep me focused... That's definitely one reason I like filking so much; you know exactly how much room you have to work with. Anyway, hooray for year-end poetry!
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