Picture Haiku: Chrysalis

Spring weather comes early here in Northern California so it’s a great time to venture out to my garden and prepare it for planting. While cleaning up last week, I found a curled leaf on my patio and snapped this picture:

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Found Poem: Look for Me Among the Flowers

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, the introduction of the coffee table book Seeing Flowers by Robert Llewellyn and Teri Dunn Chace. The poet selects words from the document and rearranges them to create a unique poem.

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How-To Poems: How to Be Star Jasmine

Have you ever written a How-to Poem? In this poetry form, the poet walks the reader through a process, teaching them how to do something new and entertaining them along the way. You can guide your readers on how to find a husband, how to race a turtle, how to share an ice cream cone, how to clean up the ocean, how to survive cancer or you could be abstract with instructions on how to dissolve in the rain, how to eat the planets, or how to be a storm. 

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Picture Haiku: Tomato Leaf Massacre

My garden has been kindly offering all kinds of veggies, zucchini, peppers and yes, fat juicy tomatoes for months. But as we near the end of summer, the snails have been enjoying the fruits of my labor as well! So today, I’m sharing a picture haiku inspired by the nibbled on (and apparently very tasty) tomato leaves I discovered this morning.

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How Do You Haiku? #4 Kuhi (Poem stone)

UPDATE 8.19.23: DUE TO POPULAR DEMAND, THIS HOW DO YOU HAIKU BLOG SERIES IS NOW A BOOK! AVAILABLE SEPT 1, 2023. 🙂

This is the fourth installment of our seven-post series on Haiku! Last week we wrote Haibun where we combined a story with haiku! Today, the way to help us find inspiration really rocks!

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How Do You Haiku? #3 haibun (story with haiku)

UPDATE 8.19.23: DUE TO POPULAR DEMAND, THIS HOW DO YOU HAIKU BLOG SERIES IS NOW A BOOK! AVAILABLE SEPT 1, 2023. 🙂

This is the third installment of our seven-post series on Haiku! Last week we wrote Picture Haiku where a picture of poppies by a mailbox provided colorful inspiration for my haiku. Today, we’re looking at another way to help us find inspiration — Haibun!

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Welcoming spring with a poem & new book!

In the United States, spring began March 21st but depending on where you live, the bulbs may still be sleeping beneath the ground. For me, spring begins the moment I see my neighbor’s apricot tree blooming white popcorn blossoms.

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Letters to Mother Goose: Poetry from Mary Quite Contrary Poetry

Welcome to week two of my Letters to Mother Goose poetry series! You know Mother Goose writes in rhyme, but did you know her characters are poets too? Join me today and all summer long as I share my series of poems (one each week) written to Mother Goose by the characters she created in response to her wish upon a star:

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