01.19.11: UPDATE

READING: The Poet's Companion, pages 94-101; Best American Poetry (2008), pages 20-29.

WRITING: The Poet's Companion, writing prompts 1 and 7 on pages 92 and 93.

Also, as a reminder, we will abide by the following strictures (for now) while we compose our daily writing assignments:

I. Poems are to be 8-12 lines in length.

II. Poems will not employ abstract language (i.e. words such as "love," "hate," "truth," "peace," etc.).

III. Nouns should not be modified by adjectives, unless the poem employs an adjective that normally does not describe a particular noun.

IV. Verbs should not be modified by adverbs, unless the poem employs an adverb that normally does not describe a particular verb.

III. Poems will employ proper capitalization.

IV. Poems will employ proper punctuation.

V. Poems will employ proper grammar and syntax.

VI. Poems, unless the reason for doing otherwise in the poem, will not be centered.

VII. Poems will not rhyme.

VIII. Adhere to dicta I-III from Pound's Imagist Manifesto, thinking about them critically and how they relate to your poems.

As I mentioned in class, one aspect of poetry is to undermine, explicitly, traditional use of capitalization, punctuation, grammar, syntax, and language usage. But, before we get to the point of working in contradistinction to these norms, I want you to work within these confines so as to demonstrate that you are able to do so (which is also rather important to poetry).