The lesson this week, is a very short one. It consists of only one prompt. Imagine yourself in someone else’s skin. If you are black, imagine yourself white or Asian or Native American. If you are white, imagine yourself black or any other ethnicity with a different color skin.
Now, write your poem from this new perspective. What does it feel like to be this new you? Examine all of the five senses and, of course, your emotional “sense” and write a poem, using all of the poetic techniques (imagery – metaphor and simile, onomatopoeia, enjambment, line break, alliteration, rhyme, slant rhyme) and bring this new you to life for your reader. Make us want to laugh with you or cry with you. Make us want to crawl into the skin you are living in and discover for ourselves how it feels.
Poetry is like a key to discovery, of self and of others, and, when it is written in a way that is both haunting and accessible, we can take others on a journey into our very hearts and soul.
Write with your heart. Write with your intellect. Write with your humanity. Write on….
Susan