IBPC judge C.J. Sage issues a challenge: Surprise her!
Sunday June 20, 2004
Note to IBPC participants from C.J. Sage:
“I would like to issue a challenge to the IBPC poets: write some poems that not only are things of beauty in terms of sounds and images, but that also are things of discovery. Allow a poem’s story or situation to be undetermined when you begin writing it. Especially if you write in form—which I do not discourage—it is very important to leave room for surprise in your work. So, perhaps choose a starting line, stanza, or rhyme scheme, and then just let the poem take you where it will. (Hint: It may be difficult to achieve surprise in a first person, present tense narrative.) I am not suggesting, of course, that you don’t revise and polish the finished piece. I look forward to many surprises next month!”
--CJ Sage
A reminder: Poetry Guide Margy Snyder will select next month’s entries from our Poetry Forum on June 30, and she is relying on your eyes to spot the best of the many, many poems posted in our Forum. If you see one worthy to represent us in the competition, nominate it by posting it in the IBPC folder, and be sure to notify the poet whose work you have put forward, to give them a chance to supply the information & permissions we must have before we can include the poem among our entries.
Related resources:
About the IBPC
Requirements for IBPC nominees
Anthology of winning poems
Archive of poems entered from our Poetry Forum
“I would like to issue a challenge to the IBPC poets: write some poems that not only are things of beauty in terms of sounds and images, but that also are things of discovery. Allow a poem’s story or situation to be undetermined when you begin writing it. Especially if you write in form—which I do not discourage—it is very important to leave room for surprise in your work. So, perhaps choose a starting line, stanza, or rhyme scheme, and then just let the poem take you where it will. (Hint: It may be difficult to achieve surprise in a first person, present tense narrative.) I am not suggesting, of course, that you don’t revise and polish the finished piece. I look forward to many surprises next month!”
--CJ Sage
A reminder: Poetry Guide Margy Snyder will select next month’s entries from our Poetry Forum on June 30, and she is relying on your eyes to spot the best of the many, many poems posted in our Forum. If you see one worthy to represent us in the competition, nominate it by posting it in the IBPC folder, and be sure to notify the poet whose work you have put forward, to give them a chance to supply the information & permissions we must have before we can include the poem among our entries.
Related resources:
About the IBPC
Requirements for IBPC nominees
Anthology of winning poems
Archive of poems entered from our Poetry Forum
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