Solved: Prose Poem

1. 400-500 Words
2. End on an Image
3. Contain Metaphor and/or similes
4. Have a point
5. No Rhyming

• Cliches
• Cloying Alliterative
• Dated Diction
• Abstractions
• Orphaned Context

1. Cloyingly Alliterative—Whoever advanced this notion that the languid lapdog of desire looks with longing and lust should be shot in the head and left to rot.
2. Filled with Dated Diction-- The 19th century is over but you wouldn’t know it. Crap like “n’ere” and “alas” and fancy-pants words like “forsaken” and “unlearn’d” and “forsooth” and “thou” make everyone very sick.

3. Filled with Abstraction—reality, truth, love, dreams, certain forces, justice, death. We all attach specific images to each of these words because they are abstractions. Let’s just use the specific images instead. Go forth in fear of abstraction. Big words don’t make your poem any larger.
4. Of an Orphaned Context—Ever feel like saying, “I loved your poem, but I have no friggin’ idea what it was about. I mean it sounded great, but I didn’t really know where I was or what was going on”? Does the poem read like part of a deep and involved conversation that you partially overhear in the bathroom at a philosophy conference? If it is too deep for the entire class, then that might give you a certain satisfaction, but hardly ever a good poem.
5. Semantically Private—This is related to the above characteristic, but is vastly more personal. What does the word solipsistic mean to you? Consider the idea of an audience. Poetry is not your diary in verse form. Only your loving parents and your jealous and potentially violent boyfriend would ever read it with any real interest.
6. Cliché Filled—Clichés are old hat and a dime a dozen, so don’t beat a dead horse. I mean, that’s the way the cookie crumbles, so start thinking outside the box.