My “Capture that emotion” competition was addressed with gusto by you lovely lot and I’m still buzzing from judging some of the wonderful entries!
So we’re going again... but with a twist. I still would like you to pick an emotion and encapsulate it in six lines or less, but this time I want you to use props!
You can tell me how you’re feeling... but don’t OVER-tell. Instead, use descriptions of things around you to reflect your emotion. You can use as many things as you like, but at least one of them must not be touching you.
I’ve written you a slightly melodramatic example to show you what I mean.
IN CONTEMPLATION OF MORTALITY
Part-strangled by sheets and foetid half-dreams,
I swim through thick drifts of unease.
My doomed mouth babbles, and sucks
pointless morsels from the brackish air.
Outside, as a vixen unleashes a dry shriek,
the moonlight lies gasping on the patio.
Here, the only emotion that I’ve directly TOLD you I’m feeling is unease. Reinforcing this emotion are the part-strangling sheets, the brackish air (and to some extent the pointless morsels it contains), the shrieking vixen and the gasping moonlight. The moonlight and the vixen are of course not touching me. We also have my doomed mouth babbling and sucking (told you it was melodramatic) - you are welcome to use the actions of your own body in your poem but it won’t count as a prop!
Got it? Any questions please SoupMail me. Ooh, and don’t forget, just because I’ve gone dark with my example doesn’t mean I don’t welcome poems about positive emotions!!
Please read carefully:
NEW and DATED poems in English please, take your time (I will extend the number of entries if it fills very quickly so don’t panic), avoid clichés, and don’t forget the 6 line maximum! Keep your formatting neutral (left-aligned and not all in italics) and if you normally format your footer in a certain way (eg writing the contest name in capitals), please change it so I don’t recognise you! Go!