Whoa, boy. If there is a form of poetry that takes your hand and leads you off the garden path completely, it’s the Golden Shovel. In case you need a refresher, here’s how one works:
First, you choose a line from a poem you admire or want to tip your hat to. In this case, my poetry sisters and I agreed to pluck something from Elizabeth Bishop’s Letter to NY, which is such a fine, fine poem that basically begs to be read aloud. The line I chose was “and the meter glares like a moral owl” because of the owl, yes, but in particular the moral owl, because what a beautiful, curious, steamy little phrase to tuck into this conversational list of city comings and goings.
OK, next, you use each word in the borrowed line as the endpoints for the lines that will make up a new poem of your own. Practically, this just means writing the Elizabeth Bishop line vertically, one word at a time, down the right hand side of the paper, and writing to those words.
Now, see my note above regarding the garden path! There is something about having to write to what feel like random floating words on the outside edge of the paper that just removes control completely. It’s kind of a trip. Thanks for reading along to see where I landed.
Oh, PS — I used another partial line from Bishop’s poem as my title. Just for kicks.
Loud but Somehow Dim
A Golden Shovel after Elizabeth Bishop’s Letter to NY
Liz Garton Scanlon
I tick off my worst qualities, start with “lack of confidence” and
“wasting time”. (The list capitalizes on both of these.) The
list measures me against myself, operates as a meter
keeping count without context or clemency. The list glares
at me with ballpointed fury, like I should do better, like
my lack of imagination is the problem. Like a list (a
list like this) should have footnotes and moral
arguments, like I should play badger. Or snake. Or owl.
Read all the others here:
Sara
Laura
Tricia
Tanita
Mary Lee
And enjoy Poetry Friday at Karen Edmisten’s blog today!
