How to Write Blackout Poetry during a Pandemic
Each Word, Six or More Apart
Every night my fatigued brain tries to outmaneuver my daily writing challenge.
It’s not because I lack ideas…as a red-headed mermaid once said, “I’ve got plenty of ‘em!” My topic list simply overwhelms me when my body is preparing for sleep mode.
My signature writing ritual goes something like this: skip morning writing > feel tired later at night > panic about not writing > procrastinate until inspiration hits > start actually writing > end up with a post.
Tonight’s inspiration came from Daniel Burka’s tweet on a clever newspaper layout design.
Which led me to search for a fuller view of the page on Reddit:
The newspaper made me think about blackout poetry. Brilliant, brain! This would give my eyes a much needed screen break and would match my low word-making energy.
I grabbed a Sharpie and a magazine, knowing that I didn’t have a physical newspaper. As I flipped through the free-I-never-subscribed-to-these magazines, I came to a dead end. The pages weren’t ideal for poetic repurposing. I wasn’t ready to give up. I knew the internet would come to the rescue. A blackout poetry generator must exist!
Fortunately, I discovered this slick Blackout Poetry Maker, a rad Glitch app made by Emma Winston. I added an excerpt from the cleverly laid out “Wondering About Social Distancing?” article as the custom text.
With blackout poetry, you obscure parts of an existing text, revealing select words to create a poem. Social distancing recommends maintaining a distance of at least six feet between you and other people. I mashed up these two concepts by ensuring each word was at least six words apart.
Lyrical distancing is more fun than social distancing.
This post is part of my WriteMarch series, a commitment to write daily for a month.
