Poetry Trick or Treating '24

To help you this NaPo week, PCrew will be posting daily tips and tricks! Each day, in this thread, a member of the YWS Poetry Crew will post a Trick and a Treat. A Trick is a poetry tip and a Treat is a poetry prompt for the day. Feel free to incorporate these into your poetry for an extra challenge!

NaPo week officially begins tomorrow! It is not too late to make your own thread. Visit this page to learn how to make your own. And while you are at it, you might as well check out the badge thread, if you'd like.

Check back tomorrow for the first day of poetry Trick or Treating

Poetry Trick/ Tip: EllieMae
Today, my trick for you is to find inspiration for poetry by reading or watching what others have written. One of my favorite ways to get inspired when I feel like I am staring at a blank page with nothing to write is to listen to spoken word poetry on YouTube. If you search for "spoken word" plus a topic you are interested in, you can listen to them too! After listening to a couple of poems, I normally feel more certain of which direction to take my poem.

Poetry Treat/ Prompt: EllieMae
My treat for today, or my poetry prompt, is to write something about a creepy song or spoken poem. Perhaps hearing something creepy being sung in the distance, or a disturbing poem recited by a character. Whatever it is, I believe in you!

Thanks for checking back to read the first day of poetry Trick or Treating! Come back tomorrow to see a new set of ideas from another member of Poetry Crew see ya soon!

Poetry Trick/ Tip: Que

Do you ever start writing a poem about a friendly ghost wandering the neighborhood and then suddenly it turns into a serious poem about change and death? Ok, maybe not that. But, sometimes poems can be hard to pin down and we end up with a lot of ideas on a page. It can help to separate what you think is all going to be one poem and turn it into a couple of different poems – maybe you go back to writing about the cute ghost adventures and shelve the more serious aspect for a future autumn poem. Maybe some of those lines will creep back, or maybe not. But it can be helpful to remember that not everything needs to fit into one poem!

Poetry Treat/ Prompt: Que

One lovely aspect of fall is the scents – pumpkin spice candles, hot apple cider, crisp autumn days. Your prompt today is to write a poem based on or incorporating descriptions of smells!

Poetry Trick/Tip: Quillfeather
Read a lot of other poems from many other poets -
In some ways we are an amalgam of all we have seen and consumed. One of the most inspiring things for me is to read what others have written, and there are some amazing poets both YWS and beyond! This don't mean you shouldn't be creative and develop your own ideas by any means, nor should you copy what others have made. It just means that seeing the ideas that others have can inspire us to make new and even more amazing ideas. And it can help us develop our conceptions of what poetry can be. For instance, I as a little baby poet had no idea the many styles of poetry are out there. I had no idea about acrostics, that I now love, I didn't ever think about making spoken word poetry. But seeing what so many amazing artists came up with broadened my thinking on what poetry can be.
So go out! Read poetry! Get inspired!

Poetry Treat/Prompt: Quillfeather
Think about your senses. What are your favorite things you can sense in the fall - Can you smell the warm apple cider? Feel the chill? See the colors? Hear the leaves crunch beneath your feet? Write about the things you sense in the fall!

Poetry Trick/Tip: alliyah
If you're stuck, rather than starting from scratch grab an old poem and try to completely re-imagine it from the ground-up. Take the final line or a favorite line and write a new poem from that. Sometimes the hardest part about writing is just beginning - so don't be afraid to borrow a prompt, a line you've written previously, or a story that you know from your life or history! It might inspire something wonderful!

Poetry Treat/Prompt: alliyah
Today's prompt is memory personified! Think about some of your strongest memories, whether difficult, happy, scary, or lovely - what image would you describe them with? What animal or object? Try out personifying a particular memory and see where it takes you!

Poetry Trick/Tip: Quillfeather
Try new forms of poetry!
There's so many interesting forms of poetry. It can include different rhyme schemes, meter, formatting, and so much more! Say you always use an ABA rhyme scheme, Try free verse! Say you never rhyme, Try making a sonnet! Maybe you are tired of long poems, Try a Haiku! Just want something new, try writing an acrostic poem! It especially helps if you are a little burnt out on poetry. So go out - try something new!

If you want to find some different poetic forms you can find several in the Poetry Tutorials part of the Knowledge Base

Poetry Treat/prompt: Quillfeather

Write about a fear you or people in general may have. Write about how it might be perceived, Or how it might effect someone's life, or how it might feel for the person experiencing it.
As a bonus: if you want to try a new poetry form - Write an acrostic using an October/spooky word.

Poetry Trick/Tip: dissonance
If you’re feeling like you're moving in place with your writing, change the tense or point of view of your poem! For example, if you’re writing in the past tense, switch to the present to make it feel immediate and alive. You could also try second-person perspective for a more intimate, immersive feel. Adjusting these can totally reshape the mood and give you momentum by making the poem feel new again!

Poetry Treat/Prompt: dissonance
Write a poem that captures the feeling of a specific time of day! What does 3 a.m. feel like compared to noon, for example? Focus on the atmosphere, colours, and sounds that can change throughout the day or night. Let your poem explore the meanings on its own. Maybe it can reveal something completely unexpected!

Poetry Trick/Tip: dissonance
So, you're struggling with flow! Try reading your poem aloud and listening to how it sounds. Mark any spots that feel clunky or awkward, then adjust the rhythm by breaking lines or switching words. Sometimes even just shifting a single syllable can make the poem feel smoother! It's like hearing your poem as a performance, even if it’s just to yourself, can reveal patterns that might not be obvious at first.

Poetry Treat/Prompt: dissonance
Today's prompt is to describe the ending of a story without ever telling the beginning. Focus on the closing moments! For example, the last sights and feelings. Let the reader sense what came before through only the last lingering details. What mysteries does the ending hint at? There's so much potential!