Replacing Just A Few Words Changed My Entire Poem
My Takeaways From Writing A 50-Word Poem
Do you ever wonder if just replacing a few words can change the whole essence of the poem?
Yes, I wondered too! — until yesterday.
The idea of this article came to my mind yesterday after a short chat with my Mentor — Marcus.
I participated in a writing prompt challenge started by Author, D. Denise Dianaty for her publication WE PAW Bloggers.
Denise prompted and challenged us to create a micro-fiction horror story, either prose or poetry, in exactly 50 words. Contributors must include the terms “wolf” and “willow” in their writes, and make a recorded reading of the story or poem.
I found it interesting and gave both my first try, writing a 50-word poem and recording it.
You can read that poem here:
After it was published, I sent its link to Marcus, like I always do when I try something new, and as this came out under Denise’s authorship, he never would have seen it otherwise.
I eagerly await for him to read my work because I have a critic, mentor, beta reader, and faithful friend — all in one!
Yes, I know! I got lucky with him!
Upon reading my poem, he gave me a fantastic suggestion. I share it with you now in case you too are new to poetry
Here it goes:
When working with word or syllable limits, you can often omit words such as “the”, “a” etc., so you can add more meaningful words.
I will quickly share what I wrote:
A wolf, hungry and sly, Crept through the forest’s eye. Beneath a willow tree’s sway, Fled a rabbit, plump and gray. But as the wolf leaped to his prey, The willow’s branches rustled in display. The rabbit fled, the wolf went astray, Outsmarted by the willow, he left in dismay.
Now, see the version suggested by him:
Wolf, hungry and sly, Stalking with stealth yet sprites did eye Beneath willow tree’s sway, Sat a rabbit, plump and gray. But as the wolf leaped to his prey, The willow’s branches rustled to betray. The rabbit fled, the wolf went astray, Outsmarted by the willow, huffed off in dismay
Doesn’t it look way more professional after the edits that he made?
He just changed a few words, omitted a few, and added more meaningful ones. Holy moly!
I was so impressed by the result that I thought to share it with you!
I am going to use this advice for all of my future work.
Will you?
That’s all for this article. I hope it brought you some insights about writing a word-limited piece.
Thank you for reading..
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