15 Words to Write a Poem

Threading words into verse…

In March, participants in the Shirlington Branch Library Poetry Workshop were asked to think of 15 words – words having no particular relevance to each other – and write them down in list form. Then the writers were then asked to pass their lists to the person on their left.

They then used the list to write a three stanza poem, using only 5 of the words per stanza.

Here is one of the results:

The Embroiderer, by Marcia Montenegro

She sat below walls
Covered with blessings –
Hope – Faith – Peace
Sewn into fine linen
Embroidered for life
Behind glassy frames.
But what of despair? Or grief?
She could not sew them,
She could not say them.

Her fervor was only to sew words
That would stay the dementia
That would cross stitch peace
Into a mind with frayed edges.
Harmony – Serenity – Tranquility.
She was creating walls to
Whisper tender intimacies
As her fingers worked faster and faster
Before the threads would break.

The walls became her private poem
Of solitude, a mirror
To her spirit as it faded
With the sun in the west.
Shadows crouched in corners
Ready to swell across the words
And down the walls,
A dark stain of death
Descending, unraveling all.

 

Learn more about the Poetry Workshop.