Ideas for expressive poetry activities using quotations or your own words, with examples.

Looking for something more than the artsy-craftsy stuff to spark thinking, I was inspired by some poetry on Ruhi Resources.   Found a great link which describes all kinds of poetry forms which I had no idea even existed.  

www.shadowpoetry.com  

Each of us in Book two took a couple of forms and were going to try it out on the quote on page 8,  first one.  

From the Shadow Poetry:

Nonet Line 1 = 9 syllables Line 2 = 8 syllables continue to line 1 of one syllable   This was my "creation"  

"O wayfarer in the path of God,

take thou thy portion of treasure

from God's life-giving ocean.

Sprinkle all creation.

Deprive not thyself,

and approach thou

this hallowed

Seat of

God."  

The second one was a Diamante: A 7 lined contrast poem set up in a diamond shape.  Line 1 begins with a noun/subject and 2nds line contains two adjectives that describe the beginning noun.  3rd line contains 3 words ending in  -ing relating to the noun/subject.  4th line contains 2 words that describe the noun/subject and 2 that describe the closing synonym/antonym.  (I would describe this as transitional line).  5th line there are 3 more -ing words describing the ending antonym/synonym, and the 7th are 2 more adjectives describing the ending antonym/synonym.  The last line ends with the firs noun's antonym or synonym.    Now this sounds terrible but see what it looks like when the first and last lines go from the metaphor of the word "ocean"  to  its meaning "revelation".   It forces one to really look into what is it Baha'u'llah means by "The ocean of My words..".    Same quote (do it in Word documents so you can center it easily).

                              OCEAN    

                         FATHOMLESS DROPS        

         UNENDING, ENRICHING, CLEANSING            

                 RESOURCE  WISDOM     

           RENOUNCING, TRANSFORMING, ENLIGHTENING              

                   RESPLENDENT WORDS               

                         REVELATION  

This was very much the same pattern as in one I already read in Ruhi Resources called Cinquain.