Here’s something I’ve been thinking about lately. What do you think about this?
Let me know.

Poetry. Huh?

This morning, I took my To Do list and broke it into the form of a haiku:

Send contract to school.
Do laundry and grocery.
Author's Note. Write it.

Which just goes to show, you can't take any old words, break them into a 5/7/5 syllable pattern, and call it poetry. Why not? Because there's no imagery, no evocative sounds, no emotion. And that's what makes poetry, more than form. It might LOOK like poetry, but that doesn't make it so.

In contrast, consider the metaphor poem that the 5th-grade students at Willard Elementary School in Concord, MA, wrote when I visited them for a poetry-writing workshop:

Autumn leaves are hot air balloons in the sky.
Autumn leaves are Rice Krispies under my feet.
They are a painting by Van Gogh.
They are broken pieces of stained glass.
Autumn leaves are old people going home.

Imagery? It's there. Close your eyes and imagine "hot air balloons in the sky." Can you see them floating by?

Evocative sounds? Plenty of that. Listen to all those slippery "s" sounds in "pieces of stained glass." Or the way "Krispies" sounds just like leaves crunching underfoot.

Emotion? Are you kidding me—That line "old people going home" brings a tear to my eye every time I read it. It makes me feel lonely and nostalgic and like the sun is setting on another day. Just the way fall makes me feel, especially when autumn leavese are swirling around my feet.

So don't be fooled by words that LOOK like poetry. Ask yourself: Are these words painting pictures in my head? Is there a sound to this poem? And what am I feeling??

What do you think? Let me know.