Written for:  Miz Quickly - Day 16 - Quilt

Poem on a Quilt

This is a three-parter.

Make  Cento

Deconstruct

Write Poem

(If you skip steps One and Two…well, don’t)

For our purpose today, a cento is a patchwork of whole lines. They can be lines from several works by one poet (please, for this exercise, do not use your own work) or from a number of  poets. Ten to twenty lines should do for the poem, but be sure to have plenty of extra lines–some of your choices, you can be certain, will not work well with others. Note the author and poem for each line as you copy.

Choosing the lines, each with its own meaning, is the beginning of your creation. Play with them. Move them around. Find new meanings with juxtapositions. Look for patterns. Listen for common sounds.  Find an order that pleases you.


morning glory at my window
comes to me at daylight.
I am a butterfly, not
a collector.  We have 
to get quiet.  Tonight
a new moon moves around
the barn.  Our life
is a faint tracing.  What
matters most is how well
you walk through the fire.
Remember, we are all mad
here.  

(Walt Whitman, Susan Dion, Jane Kenyon, William Stafford,
 Annie Dillard, Charles Bukowski, Lewis Carroll)

https://imprompt.wordpress.com/2021/11/16/qnv-16/