Below, authors from On Becoming a Poet offer additional reflection on their essays, including writing prompts they’ve used in the classroom to help their students generate new work. These links offer a valuable look behind the scenes at the backstory of each essay, and they give students an opportunity to apply their reading to the creation of new, original pieces of writing.
Philip F. Clark: On Breaking Your Heart
Alfred Corn: “A few online resources relative to Alfred Corn and his work”
Arthur Sze: Drafts of “The White Orchard”
Dennis Barone: “Ralph Waldo Emerson, `The Rhodora’”
Basil King: Links to Autobiography
Burt Kimmelman: “Writing suggestions to help students explore some of the ideas in my essay”
Denise Low: “Mentors and a Game”
Jane Hirshfield: “The processes and deep generative energies of poetry”
Mary Mackey: “Four Poetry Prompts”
Sheila Murphy: “Rules and Writing”
Eileen R. Tabios: “A Writing Prompt That Goes with the Flow” (marshhawkpress.org)
Eileen R. Tabios: “A Poet Markets a Novel”
Tony Trigilio: Expressing Things for What Else They Are
Gail Newman: If You Want to Write Poetry