Poetry Assignment 1
Due Wednesday, October 12
Typed, printed out, and stapled. Do not forget to type the interpretation of your poem.
This assignment has two parts. The first part is a poem of between 100 and 150 words (we will look at some of the poems from previous quarters to get a sense for an appropriate length for a poem). The second part is a few sentences that interpret the poem. In other words, restate what the poem means. Type your poem and interpretation and hand it in during class on the 12th.
The broad topic of your first poem is your experience with caregiving. Hopefully the feedback for your Telling Your Story assignment will give you an idea for the first poem.
Most likely you will be transforming a story into a poem. There are two key differences between stories and poems. First, there are fewer words in poems, and every word must be absolutely necessary. Second, images instead of ideas should be the focus of your poem. Images are accessible by the senses - taste, touch, smell, hearing, and seeing. Note also that good images seem appropriate and not random.
Do not use the word "caregiving" in your poem. The focus should be on an experience that is important for you. You can leave it up to your audience and the class to come up with the relationship between your poem and the broader topic of caregiving.
I will be expecting the poems to be similar with regard to aesthetics. Here are some aesthetic guidelines:
- Use ordinary language, not "poetic" language. In other words, you should aim for words that you have heard or used before in daily life. You can also use a small number of common words or phrases that are not in English as long as you give translation and romanization (if necessary) in parentheses.
- Although you should use ordinary and common language, you should aim to use the words to say things that have never been said before.
- Make your poem accessible to the senses. In other words, your poem should focus on things you can touch, taste, smell, hear, or see or on actions that involve the bodies of the characters. That is, your poem should focus on images and on the material world.
- Your poem should focus on images and not concepts. Do not use the words "filial piety." Instead, your poem might show actions that embody filial piety. Furthermore, do not use the words "Asian" or "Asian American."
- The poem should be told from your own perspective. In other words, the poem should be autobiographical. Because the poem is told from your perspective, you cannot put thoughts into the minds of other characters.
- Aim for disagreements and complications. It would be valuable for your poems to illustrate challenges that people face when they are providing care.
Be clear about your addressees. Your addressees might be parents/family, international students from your country, or students from your high school. Additionally, you should also think of Asian Americans like your classmates as your audience. However, make sure that you do not try to address everybody.
Several of you will be writing poems about other people. In that case you should use a frame. For example, the immediate scene for your poem might be your parents telling you a story, but the poem should be focused on the characters in the story your parents are telling. You should also avoid putting thoughts into the heads of your characters.
For some of you it will be helpful for you to use stanzas like paragraphs. A stanza break can show a turning point so that you can illustrate how a situation changed. You could also use the stanza break to show contrasts between points of view.