Picking a Poetic Form (cont.)

Haiku: When I am writing about one tiny, crystal clear moment in nature, the haiku is my go-to form. Its microsize forces me to look closely and really narrow my topic. I can only say one thing in a haiku, and it must be one illuminating thing. A couple of my favorite haiku in the past few months described autumn leaves laced with frost and summer peapods.

Limerick: A limerick is funny. I think it’s a law. I’ve never seen a serious limerick, at least not one that didn’t feel odd or inappropriate. So when I’m writing a silly poem, and I have an idea for a mini-story, I try a limerick. If the ending to my mini-story is a twist or surprise, it works even better. One silly limerick I wrote for this series involved an astronaut searching the moon for his birthday balloon, which drifted away.

Diamante: A diamante contrasts two things, so obviously it works best when you want to write about two objects that oppose each other in some way. I’ve recently written diamantes that describe the moon blocking the sun for a solar eclipse and that describe the black and white keys on a piano.

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