Lillian here, hosting MTB at dVerse. I started kindergarten in 1952 and I still remember my teacher’s name (Miss Zivie) and my best chum, Junie Zitka. After many many years of being the student, I moved to the other side of the desk as a high school teacher, then a college teacher, and finally, as a university administrator. It wasn’t until I rejuvenated (never say retired) in December of 2012, that I quit hoping for snow days!

And through all those years, the end of August and beginning of September always meant shopping for new school supplies. Ah . . . I must also include the years raising my two children (now 42 and 44), taking the obligatory first day of school photos on our porch – all the way from pre-school to senior year in highschool….and then suitcases loaded, walking out the door for their college years!

So here we are, back to September. And in that same back-to-school spirit we’re going to go back to the basics: our ABCs and counting! In that vein, do you remember this song?

And this one?

So what is the prompt? I’d like you to write what I call an ALPHABET SESTET! The sestet part is easy: 1 poem of six lines.  But what do I mean by an “alphabet” sestet?  Easy again.  Choose a 6 letter sequence in the alphabet, for example A-B-C-D-E-F or perhaps  J-K-L-M-N-O. Those letters, in that sequence, are the first letters of the first words in each corresponding line — as in line 1 starts with a word that begins with J; line 2 starts with a word that begins with K; line 3 with L; line 4 with M; line 5 with N; line 6 with O. This is not an acrostic! An example, off the top of my head using the sequence A-B-C-D-E-F to make it more clear:

Annabelle was a silly girl
bent on being mischievous,
cat-like, always on the prowl
delighting in the devilish,
exasperating everyone
foolish as she could be! 

So easy as 1-2-3 and a-b-c!  We’re all going back to school today – with one alphabet sestet! 

And for those of you new to dVerse, here’s what we hope everyone does:

• Write a poem that adheres to the prompt and post to your blog.
• Click on Mr. Linky below to add your name and enter the direct URL to your poem
• On your blog, please provide a link back to dVerse. This enables others to enjoy our prompts, multiplies our readers and thus the responses to all of our poems.
• If you promote your poem on social media, use the tag #dverse poets
• And most importantly, please do read some of the other responses to the prompt and add a short comment or reaction. Everyone likes to be appreciated! The prompt is “live” for several days – as you’ll notice by the comments you’ll receive – so do stop by another day and read a few of the latecomers too!