My Son Sets Me Writing Challenges
Why not have a go?
My son loves creative writing. He especially loves poetry. Knowing I sometimes write poems based on prompts and challenges from fellow writers, he has recently started setting challenges for us to complete. He writes something, and I write something, and if you feel like a challenge, you can too.
He isn’t one for convention and doing what’s expected. He often has big ideas and asks me to help him see them through, as exemplified by Stephen Dalton in his recent article about kindness, in which he mentioned my son’s poetry project to raise money for charity.
So, this morning he presented me with an unusual structure challenge for a poem. His rules are:
- three stanzas of four lines each, each with a unique structure.
- the first stanza should be structured as follows: the first line has two syllables, the second line has three syllables, the third line has four, and the fourth line has one; the first three lines should rhyme, the fourth line will rhyme with later lines.
- the second stanza: the first line has two syllables, the second line has three, the third line has four, the fourth line has two; the first three lines rhyme with each other, the fourth line rhymes with the fourth line of the previous stanza.
- the third stanza: the first line has two syllables, the second line has four, the third and fourth lines both have three syllables; the first and second line should rhyme with each other, the third and fourth lines should rhyme with the fourth lines of the previous stanzas.
This is the kind of challenge he sets me! Complicated!
Here is my attempt:
This Son of Mine!
Laughter Heard after Chitter Chatter Joy
The sound Heard around Folks talking with This boy
Fun times And crazy rhymes Unique boy Pride and joy
Okay, so I ended up writing a poem about him! But I am his mother, after all.
Here is his attempt:
Prodigium
Rampage The Dark Age Locked in a cage Tight
Be free You can see By the old tree Tonight
Power Yours to devour Set alight You just might
So, if you feel like a challenge, have a go and tag me so we can read yours.
Meanwhile, if you want to know more about his project — a poetry book, raising money for charity — check out Stephen’s article.
