One of the hardest and most rewarding challenges given me as a poet was given by one of the most brilliant poets and spoken word artists I have been privileged to know and learn from. Write a Palindrome Poem. For those who don't know, these poems, like the phrases or words, read the same forward and backwards. The difference is that a palindrome spells the same, the poem just reads the same. (Though, bonus points if you can make it spell the same both ways too. I'm certainly not trying that!)
The trick to these is to write them both ways, backward and forward at the same time. And it gets very hard if you don't want it sounding wooden, garbled, or forced. I wrote two of these, one of them an interconnected series of 11 Haikus, and haven't touched it since. But because I learned the form, I have been able to drop Palindrome Poem phrases in several of my poems to great effect.
So the challenge is not simple, but it is straightforward and the results are rewarding. If you are up for it, write a Palindrome Poem. It may be 10 lines, it may be much longer. But try it and see if you haven't gained a new tool, a useful toy to use in your work.
Happy Wordsmithing!
The trick to these is to write them both ways, backward and forward at the same time. And it gets very hard if you don't want it sounding wooden, garbled, or forced. I wrote two of these, one of them an interconnected series of 11 Haikus, and haven't touched it since. But because I learned the form, I have been able to drop Palindrome Poem phrases in several of my poems to great effect.
So the challenge is not simple, but it is straightforward and the results are rewarding. If you are up for it, write a Palindrome Poem. It may be 10 lines, it may be much longer. But try it and see if you haven't gained a new tool, a useful toy to use in your work.
Happy Wordsmithing!
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