Your Walt Whitman assignment is to compose three free verse poems of at least ten lines each. Below is an explination for each:
(1) Describe a scene of your choosing, using Whitman as your model. You must use sensory imagery (sight, sound, smell, touch and taste) and parallel structure (repitition of verb forms, conjunctions, phrasing, etc.) to create your poem.
(2) Describe a scene (or song) using auditory images only. In other words, use images that capture the sound of a place (or song). The goal here is to transport the reader through images that he/she can connect to.
(3) Write from someone else's point of view. As Atticus Finch advises, "walk in another person's shoes" and you'll come to a new understanding of that person. This is, in essence, what Whitman is doing in "Song of Myself."
Remember that this is free verse; avoid conventional meter and rhyming patterns. Experiment with the sound of the language, as well. Whitman created cadence in his poems to approximate the "natural" rhythmic patterns of everyday sppech.
(1) Describe a scene of your choosing, using Whitman as your model. You must use sensory imagery (sight, sound, smell, touch and taste) and parallel structure (repitition of verb forms, conjunctions, phrasing, etc.) to create your poem.
(2) Describe a scene (or song) using auditory images only. In other words, use images that capture the sound of a place (or song). The goal here is to transport the reader through images that he/she can connect to.
(3) Write from someone else's point of view. As Atticus Finch advises, "walk in another person's shoes" and you'll come to a new understanding of that person. This is, in essence, what Whitman is doing in "Song of Myself."
Remember that this is free verse; avoid conventional meter and rhyming patterns. Experiment with the sound of the language, as well. Whitman created cadence in his poems to approximate the "natural" rhythmic patterns of everyday sppech.