NaPoWriMo 2015: Day 5: Riffin' on Em

December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886

My teammates are going to hate me--today's a bit of a cheat! Here's the exercise from NaPoWriMo:

Today’s prompt (optional, as always) is a variation on a teaching exercise that the poet Anne Boyer uses with students studying the work of Emily Dickinson. As you may know, although Dickinson is now considered one of the most original and finest poets the United States has produced, she was not recognized in her own time. One reason her poems took a while to gain a favorable reception is their slippery, dash-filled lines. Those dashes baffled her readers so much that the 1924 edition of her complete poems replaced some with commas, and did away with others completely. Today’s exercise asks you to do something similar, but in the interests of creativity, rather than ill-conceived “correction.” Find an Emily Dickinson poem – preferably one you’ve never previously read – and take out all the dashes and line breaks. Make it just one big block of prose. Now, rebreak the lines. Add words where you want. Take out some words. Make your own poem out of it! (Not sure where to find some Dickinson poems? Here’s 59 Dickinson poems to select from).

Here's the original:

After great pain, a formal feeling comes – (372)

BY EMILY DICKINSON

After great pain, a formal feeling comes –

The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs –

The stiff Heart questions ‘was it He, that bore,’

And ‘Yesterday, or Centuries before’?

The Feet, mechanical, go round –

A Wooden way

Of Ground, or Air, or Ought –

Regardless grown,

A Quartz contentment, like a stone –

This is the Hour of Lead –

Remembered, if outlived,

As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow –

First – Chill – then Stupor – then the letting go –

Here is my revision:

After great pain, a formal feeling comes – (372)

BY EMILY DICKINSON

After great pain, a formal feeling comes 

The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs 

The stiff Heart questions was it He that bore

And Yesterday or Centuries before? 

The Feet mechanical go round 

A Wooden way Of Ground

or Air or Ought Regardless grown

A Quartz contentment like a stone 

This is the Hour of Lead Remembered if outlived 

As Freezing persons recollect the Snow 

First Chill then Stupor then the letting go 

A fun exercise. Still, I feel as if I had a bit of a cheat, being the one to take this prompt. Jessica, for instance, had a much more challenging go of it with her amazing Blitz poem!

~Wanda~