April is National Poetry Writing Month, and many poets like to challenge themselves to write a poem a day. With that in mind, Wild Violet will be sharing poetry prompts each day: one geared towards adults and one for kids.
If you write a poem based on this prompt, feel free to share a link to your poem, or the poem itself, in the comments. Poems appearing in the comments are not considered published in Wild Violet, and you retain all rights to your work.
Acrostic
For adults:
During National Poetry Writing Month, it’s fun to try new challenges, especially ones you wouldn’t attempt at other times. While many of us are familiar with acrostic poems — where the first letter of each line spells out something, read downwards — I’d venture that many poets haven’t written an acrostic poem as an adult. Today, write your own acrostic, perhaps with the name of someone dear to you, as Edgar Allan Poe did with “Elizabeth” and Lewis Carroll did in “A Boat, Beneath a Sunny Sky.”
For children:
You can turn writing poetry into a game by adding a fun element for readers to discover. An example of this is the acrostic poem. In an acrostic poem, you use the letters of a word to begin each line of the poem. You can use your own name, or something that you like. Have fun!
Long-eared, with long neck, too.
Loud hornlike sounds, or hums or clicks.
As glamorous as a diva,
Muscular as a weightlifter,
Alpaca’s cousin.
About Alyce Wilson
