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Greetings Iwakuans!
Welcome to first edition of PIPS, the Public Iwaku Poetry Spotlight. This is not intended as a competition or contest, but rather (like the name states) a showcasing for poetry written by you.
Every four months (August, December, April) there will be themes that you can choose from to write a poem about, along with suggest poetry forms. This will give us the opportunity to talk about poetry, the messages in the submitted poems with discussion questions, and peer review that will help the participants hone their skills. There will be no awards or voting; instead, we will be showcasing the submitted poems in a pinned thread in the Showcasing section. The goal here is not to win or to be the best poet — but rather to share with the community a poem you wrote. You can decide if your entry is anonymous or not: that choice will always be respected.
Themes of this first month...
► Adversity
► Empowerment
► Man against nature
► Loss of innocence
► Perseverance
Write a poem centering around at least one, maximum three themes.
Make sure to read over all the rules about submission and upcoming discussion thread.
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You have three weeks to submit your entry. The submission deadline is August 20. Late entries will not be accepted. Date rollover is based on the site's local time (North American Central/GMT-6). Send your entry via a single Inbox Conversation to @Pahn Pizza.
There will not be any winners. The goal of this event is to encourage the community to write poetry, a genre that is often disregarded as being "edgy" or less encouraged than other forms of writing. This will be a place where you can submit a poem without negative judgment - the importance is to have fun while writing. Constructive criticism and open discussion (with the discussion questions) is highly suggested, but simply hating on things because you don't like it isn't the goal of this event.
Once the submission deadline arrives, the poems will be posted in a new thread along with discussion questions about the themes and the ideas conveyed by the entries.
You may choose to keep your submission anonymous or to have your name revealed once the discussions are over. Please do not say which one is yours until the event is over.
Everyone is encouraged to discuss even if you didn't send in a submission! A big part of this event is participation AFTER the poems have been submitted!
There will be a Showcase pinned thread with the writers' names (or not for those that prefer anonymity) and there will be a public reading of the poems on August 31. A specific time will be determined closer to that date.
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► No plagiarism. This is a creative event, therefore no submissions written by anyone but yourself are allowed. Collaborative entries are not allowed either.
► Send completed entries in a single private message to Pahn with a title that mentions it is for PIPS.
► Only one entry is allowed, you can send a replacement one if you feel like the first one wasn't to your liking. The most recent submission will be the one selected, and anything sent after the deadline will not make the cut.
► Entries have to fulfill the criteria (see form) along with following the prompt or themes.
► The entries have to be original works created specifically for this event. Past work is not accepted as the goal is not to showcase older content but to create something new with the specific guidelines in mind.
► Entries can't be posted elsewhere on Iwaku or off-site until after the discussion period ends to avoid unintentionally divulging which entry is yours , but after it's done feel free to post them anywhere you like.
► Your entry may contain sexual content, but it has to follow the normal Iwaku rule of no characters under 13 years old shown engaging in sexual conduct. Anything else is fair game, but it will be clearly marked in the discussion thread as a story containing NSFW content and some people may choose to skip your entry because of that.
► Giving your entry a title isn't required, but it's useful and encouraged. If you title your entry then it will be used for the title of the spoiler your entry will be contained in in the discussion thread.
► BBCode post formatting is allowed for use in your entry, but we reserve the right to change things (particularly colors) if they would make it hard for people to read. We have a few different background colors thanks to the different site themes, and some colors are very hard to read on some backgrounds. If you aren't sure which colors are safe then please take a look at this handy guide. Also, we do not allow pictures/music/videos/etc to be embedded in entries, any entries sent in containing these things will be edited or rejected.
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Title: (Optional)
Theme(s) selected:
Poetic Form: (Optional)
Anonymous: Yes [ ] No [ ]
Permission to read aloud: Yes [ ] No [ ]
Submission:
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In the next two tabs, you will have different poetic forms that you can use along with Resources. If you have additional resources to suggest, please feel free to mention them and I'll them in the tab!
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Poetic Forms:
ABC
In an ABC poem, each line of the poem begins with a letter in the alphabet, starting with A and moving in order through Z.
Acrostic
Where the first or last letters of each line create a name, word, or phrase.
Bio Poem
Used to reveal information to the reader about the poet.
Structure: [spoili]
Line 1: First name
Line 2: Who is... (descriptive words that describe you)
Line 3: Who is the brother/sister or son/daughter of...
Line 4: Who loves...(three ideas)
Line 5: Who feels...(three ideas)
Line 6: Who needs...(three ideas)
Line 7: Who gives...(three ideas)
Line 8: Who fears...(three ideas)
Line 9: Who would like to see...(three ideas)
Line 10: Who shares...(three ideas)
Line 11: Who is...(three ideas)
Line 12: Who is a resident of...(your town)
Line 13: Last name
[/spoili]
Cinquain
A 5 line poem that follows a specific format. There are various types of cinquains. Some are created with a number of words or syllables in mind. Another form is created using various parts of speech.
Concrete
Written in a way that the words create the shape of the subject of the poem.
Couplet
Two lines of verse which rhyme and form a unit alone or as part of a poem.
Diamante
A 7 line poem that looks like a diamond. It does not have to rhyme. It can be used to describe 1 topic or 2 opposite topics.
Structure: [spoili]
Line 1: 1 word (subject/noun)
Line 2: 2 adjectives that describe line 1
Line 3: 3 -ing words that relate to line 1
Line 4: 4 nouns (first 2 relate to line 1, last 2 relate to line 7--if you're writing about opposite topics)
Line 5: 3 -ing words that relate to line 7
Line 6: 2 adjectives that describe line 7
Line 7: 1 word (subject/noun)
[/spoili]
Emotion Poem
Is used to describe various emotions, good or bad, using descriptive language. There are a couple different emotion poem formats to follow, and you could always come up with your own.
Structure: [spoili]
Line 1: State the emotion
Line 2: Describe the emotion as a color
Line 3: It happens when...
Line 4: It sounds like...
Line 5: And smells like...
Line 6: Restate the emotion
[/spoili]
Epic
A lengthy narrative poem in grand language celebrating the adventures and accomplishments of a legendary or conventional hero.
Free Verse
A Free Verse Poem does not follow any rules. Their creation is completely in the hands of the author. Rhyming, syllable count, punctuation, number of lines, number of stanzas, and line formation can be done however the author wants in order to convey the idea. There is no right or wrong way to create a Free Verse poem.
Haiku
Haiku's are composed of 3 lines, each a phrase. The first line typically has 5 syllables, second line has 7 and the 3rd and last line repeats another 5. In addition there is a seasonal reference included.
more info
Limerick
A five-line witty poem with a distinctive rhythm. The first, second and fifth lines, the longer lines, rhyme. The third and fourth shorter lines rhyme. (A-A-B-B-A)
more info
Narrative
A narrative poem tells the story of an event in the form of a poem. There is a strong sense of narration, characters, and plot.
Pantoum
A poem that uses a lot of repetition. To create this poem, follow these steps.
Structure: [spoili]
- Write a quatrain (4 line stanza). Writing emotional lines usually works best.
- Take lines 2 and 4 of the first stanza and make them lines 1 and 3 of the second stanza.
- Take lines 2 and 4 of the second stanza and make them lines 1 and 3 of the third stanza.
- Continue your poem using this pattern.
- For your last stanza, go back to the first stanza of the poem. Make line 3 of the first stanza line 2 of your last. Make line 1 of the first stanza line 4 in your last.
Sonnet
A short rhyming poem with 14 lines. It uses iambic meter in each line and use line-ending rhymes.
more info
Tanka
Japanese form of poetry that follows a syllable format. This poem is composed of 5 lines. Lines 1 and 3 have 5 syllables. Lines 2, 4, and 5 contain 7 syllables each.
Structure: [spoili]
Line 1- 5 syllables
Line 2- 7 syllables
Line 3- 5 syllables
Line 4- 7 syllables
Line 5- 7 syllables
[/spoili]
Villanelle
5 tercets (3 line stanzas) with ABA rhyme scheme Followed by 1 quatrain (4 line stanza) with ABAA rhyme scheme The first and third lines of the tercet are alternately repeated as the last lines of the remaining stanzas.
Definitions of the poetic forms found on Family Friend Poems
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RESOURCES
Rhyming Dictionary
Syllables Dictionary
Happy writing!
