Author: Danna Smith

Starting a Haiku Journal

| Danna Smith

Haiku is about “seeing”—about paying attention to a moment in nature and capturing that moment, like a snapshot, on paper with words (before it disappears). Famous Japanese poet, Matsuo Basho (1644-1694), said that to write haiku you need to have the eyes and heart of a child. Seeing the world one snapshot at a time will help you connect with nature and make your haiku stronger. Haiku is one of my favorite forms, but I’ve never had a journal dedicated to it until recently.

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Momeries: A Mother’s Day Poem

| Danna Smith

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there and to grandmothers, aunts, sisters, and friends who are helping to raise a child. Being a mom is the greatest joy in my life. My kids are adults and living their own lives now, but sometimes I find myself walking down memory (momery) lane, missing my littles. They (and their dad) always make Mother’s Day special for me, but this year I wanted to do something nice for them too. After reading it to my kids earlier today, I’m sharing the poem I wrote for them here.

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Book Spine Poetry: Earth Day

| Danna Smith

You can find poems anywhere! Even in a stack of books! Creating a spine poem is much like writing found poetry but instead of using the text from a page of a book or article, you use the titles printed on the spines of books. Simply arrange the books so the spines can be read like a sentence.

You don’t need a large number of books to create a spine poem, just an imagination. The children’s books in my poem below came from my small home library. Happy Earth Day!

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Found Poem: Where the Wild Things Are

| Danna Smith

Found poetry is the literary version of a collage. The poems are made up of words taken from a printed document like a newspaper article, a speech, or in this case, a book, Where the Wild Things Are. The poet selects words from the document and rearranges them to create a unique poem.

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Clipped Verse: Children’s Poetry for a Windy Day

| Danna Smith

I first learned of clipped verse (sometimes called fragmented rhyme) back in 2007 when I was introduced to children’s author Verla Kay’s powerful historical non-fiction children’s book, Rough, Tough Charley. The book is about Charley Parkhurst, one of the most respected stagecoach drivers in the old West: six-horse stagecoach / bounds along / Charley reins up / flicks a thong / Ladies gossip / “Charley’s odd / Don’t like people / then they nod. It wasn’t until his death that people discovered he was a she: Hold your horses / Huge surprise . . . / He’s a woman in disguise.

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Paint Chip Poetry: 9-11

| Danna Smith

A few weeks back, I posted a Paint Chip Poetry exercise. It was so much fun, I thought I’d give it another try this week. The rules for Paint Chip Poetry are simple:

  • Choose a random selection of color swatches from your local hardware store or online.
  • Give yourself a time limit of ten or fifteen minutes.
  • Write a free verse poem using as many of the paint colors as possible in the time allotted.
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#pandemicpoetry: Haiku the Happy Stuff

| Danna Smith

The pandemic has brought with it much hardship and loss. So today, I want us to try to look past the darkness and write about something, anything, positive or hopeful that has come out of this trying year. Did you reconnect with nature? Did you take up hiking? Did you have lunch in your garden? Let’s write about that! Let’s haiku the happy stuff! (haiku is now a verb ;))

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How to write a “Where I’m from” Poem (with template)

| Danna Smith

The poem, Where I’m From by George Ella Lyons is powerful! It is a literary snapshot of the poet’s most memorable images of her childhood. Through her text, she takes the reader on a journey to show them who she was as a child and who she is today. Educators, activists, psychologists, and others have used Ms. Lyons’ poem as a writing exercise for all ages. Let’s have some fun with it!

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