NEW FORM EVERY WEEK
NEW PROMPT EVERY DAY
SUBMIT YOUR POEM IN COMMENTS
OUR FAVORITE POEMS WILL BE FEATURED
AT THE END OF THE WEEK
Sam Kilkenny and Corey Bryan started Poetry Is Pretentious to help others get into poetry by providing daily prompts that are interesting and easy to complete.
As the name suggests, the cinquain is a poem of five lines. The most common variation of this form is the American Cinquain. It is heavily inspired by haiku and tanka in Japanese poetry. The Cinquain is a poem of five lines that have specific syllable counts. (2,4,6,8,2)
Rules of the Cinquain
Use Google Earth to go somewhere you’ve never been before. Use your 22 syllables to describe this brand-new experience.
Example Cinquain:
Oh, whoops!
Sorry! Didn’t
mean to just drop in here
Google Earth has set me in your
Garden
Form of the week: Cinquain
You can decorate your room with only the items that you can fit in this poem. It’s just like decorating your house on a budget. What makes the cut? And what could you live without?
Example Cinquain:
A bed
Wait no, a door
Oh, I guess I get both
So a bed a door and I’m out
of words
Form of the week: Cinquain
You can be any animal you want. You can be the birds that fly or the house cat that lounges all day. You can even be a worm if you want. What does your new life look like?
Example Cinquain:
A bear
A polar bear
So I could enjoy cold
weather, and swim with the icebergs
Up north
Form of the week: Cinquain
Work is an inevitable part of life, but what if the commute could be fun? Instead of sitting in traffic, what if you could ski to work? Fly on your broomstick? Take a helicopter? Or maybe it’s as simple as just being able to walk there.
Example Tanaga:
Skiing down the mountain snow
With laptop in my backpack
Goldfish bag for mid-day snack
And it’s off to work I go
Form of the week: Tanaga
Remember when you were a kid even the little things seemed like big adventures? The slide could be Mt. Everest, the floor was always lava. Channel that train of thought and write about the little things.
Example Tanaga:
Longest couch you’ve ever seen
Made for the perfect island
I with for a submarine
The lava makes me frightened
Form of the week: Tanaga
Most writing takes place in your office, at your desk, at a coffee shop. Try and imagine (or do it, if you’re crazy enough) what it would be like to write from your laundry room or closet or bathroom. If you don’t have any spare rooms, imagine writing underneath your desk.
Example Tanaga:
It’s all legs and feet down here
I really need to vacuum
Lying on the floor is weird
But it sure beats the bathroom
Form of the week: Tanaga
Take some inspiration from a song and write a tanaga about it. Impromptu ekphrasis
Example Tanaga:
Dad always played Turn the Page
When Mom wasn’t in the car
It wasn’t right for my age
But oh, man that song went hard
Form of the week: Tanaga
Good advice always rhymes; otherwise, how would we remember it?
Example Tanaga:
When a person makes you mad
Instead of thinking they’re bad
Try and take a second look
See what life they’ve undertook
Form of the week: Tanaga
We are all so intertwined with time, it’s helpful to take a second to write about it. It can be about how fast it moves, how slow it’s going, there’s never enough, there’s way too much. Feel free to interpret it how you want!
Example Tanaga:
Time–could you hurry it up?
I can’t stand this glacial pace
I stand in line, face-to-face
With a man who smells like crud
Form of the week: Tanaga
It’s easy to think about rhyming poetry in terms of art. Let’s try and break from the normal and imagine ordering food or drinks or something with a tanaga.
Example Tanaga:
“I’ll drink deep–gin and tonic
Now, this might seem ironic
The drink is so iconic
If you can, hold the tonic”
Form of the week: Tanaga
Favorite Poems for the week of January 15 – 21
Favorite Poems for the week of January 22 – 28
Favorite Poems for the week of January 29 – February 4
Favorite Poems for the week of February 5 – 11
Favorite Poems for the week of February 12 – 18
