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List of contents
Contents • Introduction 7 • Preface for Instructors and Writer's Group Leaders 10
Section One: Warm-Up
Chapter One: Reading, Listening, and Responding
• The Writer's Notebook 16
• Spinning Clichés into Gold 17
• An Image Album 18
• The Memory Storehouse 19
• A Harvest Basket 21
• The Poem Purchase 22
• The Thing Itself (or Me, Myself, and I) 24
• Senses Wake Up 25
• How Do You Mean “Cleave”? 27
• The Texture of Words I 29
• The Texture of Words II 30
• The Texture of Words III 31
• Kill This Poem! 32
• Constructing an Anthology 33
Chapter Two: Group Exercises
• The Collaborative Poem 38
• The Cento 40
• The "Bad" Poem Exercise 41
• The Movie Maker 42
• The Prized Possession 45
• One-liners 46
• The Line Break as Pause 48
• Five Senses 50
• Writing Off the Music 52
• How Do You Mean "Cleave"? (Group Version) 53
• One-a-Day Poems (Teaching Variation) 55
• A Painting in Three Levels 57
Section Two: Writing Poems
Chapter Three: Generate a Poem
• Responding to Art 61
• Image Electricity 63
• The Prose Poem 64
• Who Will You Become? 65
• The "First" 67
• Writing a Portrait 68
• Eavesdropping on the Music 69
• The Epistle 70
• Mythology Forward 71
• Small Research Nature Poem 72
• The Poem You Can't Forget 74
• Poem in Three Levels 75
• The Thing Poem 76
• The Found Poem 77
• The Poem Buyout 79
• Writing “Off the Subject” 81
• Short-line Railroad 83
• The Cemetery Poem 84
• Conversation in a Long Line 85
• From the News 87
• Book/Cover 88
• Writing the Blues 89
• American Haiku 90
Chapter Four: Advanced Exercises
• Five Senses 94
• Notes on a Pillow 95
• Lining Up Surrealism 96
• Spin-offs 97
• Everybody Wants Something 99
• Chants 101
• The American Ghazal 102
• The Free Verse Villanelle 103
• Blooming Personae 104
• The Everyday Object Poem 105
• Bestiary 106
• Imitating a Translation 108
• Past-life Monologues 109
• Extended Cento 111
• Squinting at the Sun 113
• The Illustrated Manuscript 114
• The Free Verse Sonnet 116
• The Sensuous Orange 118
• The New Shaped Poem 120
Chapter Five: Revision
• Recognizing Warm Up & Explanation 126
• Finding the Fire 128
• The Second Version 130
• Ruin This Poem 131
• Finding the Seams 132
• Rewiring the Speaker 134
• Seven Ways from Somewhere 135
• The Double Bloom 136
• Stanza Regular, Stanza Interruptus 137
• Fifty Ways To Leave Your Poem 138
• The Blooming Book 140
• Appendix of Selected Student Poems Generated by Double Bloom
Summary
This slim, portable volume includes over 75 exercises to assist students at every step of the poetry writing process! From learning to read, listen, and respond, to generating poems and revising them, Double Bloom offers vivid, imaginative exercises that appeal to the writer in everyone. In addition, Double Bloom includes several activities designed specifically for groups-perfect for kicking off a poetry workshop or group lesson. The authors' warm and relaxed introduction invites students to become active participants in the writing process, and the exercises that follow provide clear and exciting ways to do so. In the authors' words, “We call this book Double Bloom because writing poetry-creating the ideas and language that constitute it-is often a surprising experience, much like a “double bloom” in the world of horticulture, where two flowers blossom on a single stem of camellias, marguerites or begonias…”
