Contemporary/Alternative Poetry

This category covers anything that doesn’t fit into the formally recognised classifications of poetry. Much of the modern poetry is free form and often doesn’t follow conventional formats. They often don’t use any capital letters etc. – Probably anything that you don’t think suits one of the other categories, put under this.
Here are some points about writing contemporary/ alternative poetry that you may find interesting:
  • Systematically derange the language, for example, write a work consisting only of prepositional phrases, or, add a gerundive to every line of an already existing piece of prose or poetry, etc.
  • Get a group of words (make a list or select at random); then form these words (only) into a piece of writing-whatever the words allow. Let them demand their own form, and/or: Use certain words in a set way, like, the same word in every line, or in a certain place in every paragraph, etc. Design words.
  • Write what cannot be written, for example, compose an index. (Read an index as a poem).
  • Attempt writing in a state of mind that seems least congenial.
  • Consider word & letter as forms-the concretistic distortion of a text, for example, too many o’s or a multiplicity of thin letters (illftiii, etc.)
  • Attempt to eliminate all connotation from a piece of writing & vice versa.

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