20 Comments

Zina, just beautifully done. Elegant, humane approach. Chris

Expand full comment

Excellent technique! I just read it out to my daughter and she loves the method. We will try this with our daily poems.

Expand full comment

Love this!

Expand full comment

Thank you, David!

Expand full comment

This could have really expedited some college essays 😅 Thank you, Zina!

Expand full comment

Well, you can pick up any poem now and use this! This has made my poetry studies significantly easier!

Expand full comment

I love it! What a very helpful mnemonic and technique. Definitely printing this out to share with my own students.

Expand full comment

Thank you! This was hastily written so I was thinking that I could elaborate on it a bit and use a poem or two (probably something in the public domain) to illustrate the points. I wonder what would be a good free verse poem that is open to the public?

Expand full comment

Probably any of Whitman’s short poems would work. For example, this one is like a very short story, with a gut punch at the end. Free verse, yet he goosed it with prosodic effects. I like the dramatic sense of inevitability in the trochaic stretch about the blankets. And how he changes the blankets’ color from brown to gray. But for the color, this could be snow he’s describing, like he’s alluding to a common metaphor rather than using it outright.

https://poets.org/poem/sight-camp-daybreak-gray-and-dim

Expand full comment

Oh, this is a great one. Thanks!

Expand full comment

Please do!!! I would love to see what you have been up to.

Expand full comment

I will see what I can do!

Expand full comment

Thank you for always being willing to teach and share :)

Expand full comment

I love this Zina!!! I will use every bit of this well stated advice (and well learned) when I read poetry. I miss reading yours. Hope school is going well!

Expand full comment

I was thinking of updating our WAG document. What do you think? I miss you and Emily!

Expand full comment

I think this is helpful! I read tonight’s poem once earlier today, and this helped bring a few things to the surface even just from that cursory reading.

Expand full comment

I am so glad you found this helpful. Wasn’t “Blackberry-Picking” delightful?

Expand full comment

I wasn’t able to join the conversation last night, but I’ve really enjoyed the few of Heaney’s poems that I’ve read (including the Beowulf translation) ❤️

Expand full comment

Thank you Zina! A very helpful technique!

Expand full comment

Thank you so much, Diane! (BTW - I need to hear your takeaways from the writers institute at UST!)

Expand full comment