Dinh Pham

Good afternoon, my lovely poetry conglomerate! Melissa here, from Mom With a Blog. I pray this lovely spring day finds you happy, healthy, and (of course) ready to write some poetry!

Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different from that from which it was torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion. A good poet will usually borrow from authors remote in time, or alien in language, or diverse in interest.

—T. S. Eliot

On poetryfoundation.org, Maggie Queeney says: “A cento is a poem formed from lines of poems written by other poets. Latin for ‘patchwork,’ the cento is composed like a collage or quilt, and honors others’ poems while presenting a unique work. For an example of a cento, read Linda Bierds‘ Lepidopteran: A Cento.” I have also written a cento for today’s prompt. See below.

Wolf-howled night / Microsoft Designer
From the wildest of winds, wolf-howled this night
And the carrion crow, with its coarse raucous voice
I was waking, walking, wasted like a daemon
A file of footsteps, furtive and slow
Hindsight’s such a hateful thing
Black velvet veiled, bright visitor alights
soon she enters, soon she exits,
the chill of winter’s choking arms
coal-black and burnished, in branches chattering.

The lines used for my cento are taken from the following poems, in order:
“Creature of the night” by Björn Rudberg
“Death in winter” by Jane Dougherty
“Like A Daemon” by Paul Vincent Cannon
“Who knows” by Punam Sharma
“Aftermath of an Affair” by Laura Bloomsbury
“Night’s Possessions” by Jade Li
“February” by Aishwarya (kittysverses)
“Spring Comes Again” by Merril D. Smith
“Just a Dint” Kim M. Russell

For today’s prompt, there are two options for you to select from, since Meeting the Bar is reserved for specific forms of poetry.

Option 1: choose any line from any poem in the links below and write a poem including the line or inspired by the line. You may use the line as an epigraph. Whether you include the line in its entirety or not, please credit the author in your post, including their name and the title of their poem. Include a link to the work.

Option 2: try your hand at writing a cento, taking lines from a selection of dVersian poetry from the month of April, as in my example above. If you choose this option, please choose at least two poets and a total of at least four lines. Your cento doesn’t need to make perfect sense! Enjoy the process.

Here are links directly to the lists of poems from these prompts. You may use any of them, or any combination of them, for your poem.

If you’re new, here is how to join us:

  • Write a poem in response to the prompt.
  • Enter your name and a link directly to the post containing your poem into Mr. Linky. Remember to check the box to accept use/privacy policy.
  • Read other poets’ work as they enter their links into Mr. Linky. Check back as more will be added.
  • Please link back to dVerse from your post.
  • Have a wonderful time!🎉

Mr. Linky will remain open until 3pm EST on Thursday, May 23, 2024.