There was a photo, and the suggestion to take a book of poetry in hand. Take the last line of the first poem, the first line of the last poem and a random line of a random poem in between. Use phrases or words from those three lines* and the photo and write:
Going
From the bus
Through the rain
This prom queen, drag queen
pink float of a car.
The upside down
car droplets were
just as surreal as the distant
rain-blurred vision.We spoke in the rain
before I boarded.
“You come too” I asked.
The rising wind took the thought
and my tears were rain
as you turned to go.
I wish I’d not be gone long.
I wish you’d come too.
But, the bus is pulling away.
I’m going too.Mary Beth Frezon — 4 April 2011
* My starter lines from the Complete Works of Robert Frost:
“I shan’t be gone long — You come too.” The Pasture
“In winter in the woods alone” (apparently untitled poem)
“A sunny morning, or take the rising wind” A Servant to Servants
As an exercise, I did this with another book, Good Poems for Hard Times and found these:
“Gleams of the 40-watt ceiling bulb bobbing in blue milk” Break of Day – Galway Kinnell
“Into my empty head there come” Morning Swim — Maxine Kumin
“But in a poem we can do anything we want” Since You Asked — Lawrence Raab
