paint chip poetry – Susan Joy Clark

Creative Life, Poetry

For Love of My Characters #Paint Chip Terza Rima

Blank canvas is my laptop screen,

Where seedlings of ideas might grow,

Unfolding action to be seen.

My characters act out a show,

On a different sort of screen,

And to the cliff’s edge sometimes go.

Though they dangle close to danger

And sometimes they fall into it,

To complete demise, they’re strangers.

This, my love for them, won’t permit,

A happily ever after

Must resolve every conflict.

This was written for Linda Kruschke’s Paint Chip Poetry challenge where we were challenged to use three of the words or phrases below in a terza rima form poem. I found quite a few of these worked perfectly for a poem on storytelling.

Here is an explanation of the terza rima from Linda’s page and the poetry dictionary.

TERZA RIMA (tare’-tsuh ree’-muh; Italian, “third rhyme”) Tercets with an interwoven rhyme scheme, invented by Dante Alighieri for The Divine Comedy: aba bcb cdc ded efe fgf, etc. The poem (or individual section, called a canto by Dante) usually ends with a single line or a couplet, rhyming with the previous tercet’s middle line. But it may also end with a tercet, it’s middle line rhyming with the opening tercet’s first and third lines, making the form circular.

Creative Life, Poetry

Ice Cream Cone Romance, #Paint Chip Poetry Sixain

He gifted her an ice cream cone.

He gave it to her with a blush.

“I wish it were a precious stone,”

he told her in a quiet hush.

His hands were stuffed into his jeans

of faded denim, while he leaned

In for a kiss from his sweet girl.

Her lipstick marked him on the cheek,

Leaving his head then in a whirl,

As he felt awed and somewhat meek.

To him, she wore a halo bright,

An angel that mystical night.

Years later, his fortune increased

But his girl was still the same,

His romance then did not decrease,

Even after she took his name.

He thought a better gift he’d give,

To celebrate the love they lived.

He gifted her a polished stone,

She was then the one who blushed.

“I wish it were an ice cream cone,”

He told her in that quiet hush.

And, after this, that husband meek,

Still got a kiss upon his cheek.

This was written for Linda Kruschke’s paint chip poetry challenge. The challenge this week was to write a stanza or more of a sixain, using four or five of the paint chip words below and one as a rhyming word.

The poem was partially inspired by a story my mother told me that she had read about the actress Helen Hayes and her romance. At one point in her courtship, the man who became her husband gave her a bag of peanuts (maybe at the movies or some event) and told her he wished they were emeralds. Years later, he did give her emeralds and told her he wished they were peanuts. In my poem, peanuts and emeralds became ice cream cone and polished or precious stone. All other details were also fictionalized and, of course, created, to fit in the paint chip words.

Creative Life, Poetry

Cabin in the Woods, #Paint Chip Poetry Rondelet

Cabin in the Woods

Sweet cabin mine,

Hidden among the forest trees,

Sweet cabin mine,

Surrounded by divine design,

By day, I observe honeybees,

By night, a firefly’s light I see,

Sweet cabin mine.

The challenge from Linda Kruschke of Another Fearless Year this week is to write a rondelet, using one (or more) of the pictured paint chip colors, and using “cabin in the woods” as a title.

According to The Poetry Dictionary by John Drury, a rondelet is …

RONDELET (ron-deh-lay’; French, “little rondel”) A form consisting of seven lines, with a refrain and only two rhymes. The rhyme and refrain scheme is AbAabbA (capital A = refrain). The refrain lines (A) each contain four syllables; the other lines (a and b) each contain eight syllables.

Creative Life, Poetry

Into and Out of the Blue, #Paint Chip Poetry

So, here is another paint chip poetry challenge from Linda Kruschke. We were challenged to use 10 out of 15 of these paint chip colors from the picture below in a poem form of our choice. My last and only other time using this prompt, I only had to choose two. This seemed much more challenging, but it can’t be harder than magnetic poetry, can it?

I look in your eyes,

deep pools of blue,

reflecting clear skies

just before the rain,

and suddenly,

out of the blue,

my gray world

has turned technicolor,

and I’m on the

yellow brick road,

lined with sunflowers

and watermelon vines,

soaking in the sunshine;

my universe somersaulted —

a total eclipse.

Creative Life, Poetry

The Goldfish and the Robin

Paint Chip Quintilla or Two

This poem was inspired by Linda Kruschke’s Paint Chip Quintilla or Two Challenge. The idea was to use two of these color names in a poem in quintilla format.

A goldfish in his glass-bound pond,

Feels limitations of his space,

As he looks through window beyond,

He spies a nest among tree fronds,

A peaceful and unhampered place.

A robin’s egg of pastel blue,

Sits in that nest upon its perch,

A fish can’t fly – now that is true,

But it can wish for freedom too,

And a share in that robin’s mirth.

This was an interesting exercise. I’m not sure I would have come up with this particular poem outside of the challenge. Once I selected my two color words, I began to think about the contrasts between the two animals and how they live.