Text Message Poetry: A New Poetic Form?
This morning, I was contemplating different poetry delivery methods, thinking of the obvious ones first: print books, chapbooks, journals, broadsides, websites, blogs, e-mail, PDFs, CDs, DVDs, etc. And finally, I…
This morning, I was contemplating different poetry delivery methods, thinking of the obvious ones first: print books, chapbooks, journals, broadsides, websites, blogs, e-mail, PDFs, CDs, DVDs, etc. And finally, I thought of text messaging.
On my cell, one page is defined as 160 characters, and I'm unable break my lines. So I started wondering if there might be a cool new poetic form to play with on a Tuesday morning. Of course, without line breaks, these would be miniature prose poems on any topic under the sun.
One additional rule that could be added (to help give these focus) is that they should deliver some message.
So to recap the rules: Poem must be 160 characters or less and deliver some message (and yes, a message could be delivered in one word).
Here's my quick attempt (at around 150 characters):
A boy and girl raced each other along the sidewalk this morning waiting for the school bus to pick them up. The days are growing short and shorter.
Robert Lee Brewer is Senior Editor of Writer's Digest, which includes managing the content on WritersDigest.com and programming virtual conferences. He's the author of 40 Plot Twist Prompts for Writers: Writing Ideas for Bending Stories in New Directions, The Complete Guide of Poetic Forms: 100+ Poetic Form Definitions and Examples for Poets, Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming, and more. Also, he's the editor of Writer's Market, Poet's Market, and Guide to Literary Agents. Follow him on Twitter @robertleebrewer.
