Mattie's Pillow

This comes from a Creative Movement exercise today at the Effie Kokrine Science and Creative Expression class with Ruth Merriman from North Star Ballet. 

Negative space:

In art, this involves drawing what’s around the object, rather than the object itself; in dance, it’s using the shape of the space made by the movement or gesture of the body; in a poem, it’s writing about everything but the thing you’re focusing on–the objects, background, shadow, sounds, smells, textures, rather than the thing itself.  For examples see Gertrude Stein’s Tender Buttons.

So, choose an object.  Write about what’s all around the object or what it displaces.   Don’t mention the object.

Feb 3–

Here’s the poem I wrote today while working with the kids (we selected objects from a bag; mine was a horse bit):

Light glints on metal:
a bridge, a curve,
a circle of cold.
No leather attaches
but the soft gums
in the mare’s mouth
remember it even now.

The air chills
to its chill, light
bends to it;
a horse’s neck arches
and turns. Weight
and firm touch,
a bitter taste:
pennies, nickels
turned in the mouth,
a hard pebble
through which we
speak, then
trot on.

—————————-

Glow sent this:

Once,
making love under a ceiling fan,
my Beloved asked,
“what is that sound?”
A rattle, a misplaced hum,
a rasping breath,
an uneven gasp.
On the bed in the corner,
orange as a persimmon,
lay purring contentment.
Not a loose bearing after all.

Tags: horses, interrelation of arts, negative space, poetry, teaching, writing prompt

This entry was posted on January 30, 2009 at 8:19 am and is filed under Poetry Challenge. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.