Object Poems
Using personification, we are going to write poems about an object. The poem is presented as a riddle posed by the object itself, and based on the clues, the reader guesses what the object is.
"_______________" (What title do you think the author gave this poem?)
I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions. Whatever I see I swallow immediately Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike. I am not cruel, only truthful ‚ The eye of a little god, four-cornered. Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall. It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long I think it is part of my heart. But it flickers. Faces and darkness separate us over and over. Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me, Searching my reaches for what she really is. Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon. I see her back, and reflect it faithfully. She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands. I am important to her. She comes and goes. Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness. In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish. -by Sylvia Plath "______________________"
Loved by teachers and respected by doctors, I am crisp, sweet, and fresh. Ruddy, and oddly round-shaped, I have many uses. I am both a coveted fruit of the fall and the original fruit of downfall. -by Mrs. Falconer |
"_______________________ "
I am called a sea, but I am not. I am old, and I am Dead, but I maintain the youth of those who visit me. I am called a sea, and though I am not, I see and have seen the events of thousands of years. I am called Dead, but I still have use though I kill that which lives within me. -by Mrs. Falconer |
If you are stuck, use your "Where Does Poetry Hide" list, or think about using one of the following objects:
- cloud
-pebble
- clock
- book
- pencil
- computer
- key
- fire
- rain
- eraser
- lightning
- sun
- wind
-be as creative as you can! The author below wrote about a blowtorch :).
Notice that these poems have different forms and lengths--you can choose what your poem will look like. You could even try rhyming if you would like.
- cloud
-pebble
- clock
- book
- pencil
- computer
- key
- fire
- rain
- eraser
- lightning
- sun
- wind
-be as creative as you can! The author below wrote about a blowtorch :).
Notice that these poems have different forms and lengths--you can choose what your poem will look like. You could even try rhyming if you would like.
"_____________________"
Flame in a can can unsettle. It lights with a pop, rifles the air with its colors. A frayed and withering exhalation to melt apart and meld. To scarify, form a harsh repellent surface: ridges, pocks, tiny moonscapes, gullies for solder. To seal the conduit—gas line, water line-- one smooth jointed tube directing the flow. You can hold this conduit in your hand, feel its pressured hiss. If a tool is a limb extended, this one sets fire at your fingertips. Its promise is destruction focused. It mars to build or mend. Fit into your plans it waits on the workbench like a humming kettle. Tipped over it will sing. From the mouth, tongues flared and brilliant as the insides of lilies. Behind them a wafer of invisible gas. -by Don Bogan |