Make a Little Less Sense

or no sense at all

Today’s Creative Burst is a DISCO classic. Here’s what to do: Choose a short phrase and repeat it over and over.

That’s it. Students like this exercise because it’s so quick and it doesn’t have to make sense. But even when trying not to make sense, some truth usually appears. Here’s a 5th grader’s poem from a DISCO workshop last week. In Spanish she writes, “Katy is not here” and ends with “Katy was never here.”

This is one of the best surprises when teaching poetry to kids. So often when they are just having fun with their words, they end up writing something that speaks to the wrongness of their world. I love this poem so much.

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The Inspirations

This Ron Padgett poem is so fun to read all together and out loud. And, I never get tired of talking about the two sonnets below by Nate Marshall and Eve L. Ewing. How can the same line repeated drum up so many interpretations?! Who is speaking? Is it the same speaker in every line? What are these poems saying about searching, history, hunger, stereotypes, and ritual? Keep this conversation going by adding your own poem!

Nothing in That Drawer
by Ron Padgett

Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.
Nothing in that drawer.

African american literature
by Nate Marshall

i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
i like your poems because they seem so real.
f’sho, good look, this is also a sonnet.

from Finna

Sonnet
by Eve L. Ewing
after Terrance Hayes

I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.

I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.

I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.
I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.

I saved some cornbread for you in the skillet on the stove.

from Electric Arches

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Thank You For Reading!

I appreciate that you are making time for a little creativity in the chaos. I will never understand the clenched-teeth heartlessness of this administration and its followers. I am here with you trying to resist and make calls and make art and huddle up together to imagine our own new world that makes sense to us.

Liz