4 Poetry Prompts after Lawrence Ferlinghetti

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See the "I Am Waiting" session we wrote after Lawrence Ferlinghetti's poem of the same title.

First Mentor Poem

The World is a Beautiful Place
LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI

The world is a beautiful place
                                                           to be born into
if you don’t mind happiness
                                             not always being
                                                                        so very much fun
       if you don’t mind a touch of hell
                                                       now and then
                just when everything is fine
                                                             because even in heaven
                                they don’t sing
                                                        all the time
 
             The world is a beautiful place
                                                           to be born into
       if you don’t mind some people dying
                                                                  all the time
                        or maybe only starving
                                                           some of the time
                 which isn’t half so bad
                                                      if it isn’t you
 
      Oh the world is a beautiful place
                                                          to be born into
               if you don’t much mind
                                                   a few dead minds
                    in the higher places
                                                    or a bomb or two
                            now and then
                                                  in your upturned faces
         or such other improprieties
                                                    as our Name Brand society
                                  is prey to
                                              with its men of distinction
             and its men of extinction
                                                   and its priests
                         and other patrolmen
                                                         and its various segregations
         and congressional investigations
                                                             and other constipations
                        that our fool flesh
                                                     is heir to
 
Yes the world is the best place of all
                                                           for a lot of such things as
         making the fun scene
                                                and making the love scene
and making the sad scene
                                         and singing low songs of having
                                                                                      inspirations
and walking around
                                looking at everything
                                                                  and smelling flowers
and goosing statues
                              and even thinking
                                                         and kissing people and
     making babies and wearing pants
                                                         and waving hats and
                                     dancing
                                                and going swimming in rivers
                              on picnics
                                       in the middle of the summer
and just generally
                            ‘living it up’
 
Yes
   but then right in the middle of it
                                                    comes the smiling
                                                                                 mortician

​Source: poets.org

Poem Prompts

• ​Make a list of dichotomies.  Write a poem about one of them. Or make the list the poem.
• In a poem tell me about something else that is okay, if you don’t mind “___.”
• Choose a line from the poem that triggers you, and write a response.

Second Mentor Poem

Loud Prayer
LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI                          

Poem Prompt

Write a new poem with an often recited bit of something from your own life -- another prayer, a pledge, a mnemonic device, a nursery rhyme.  Write a new poem that plays with words and meaning as Ferlinghetti does in “Loud Prayer.”  (Pull up the text as a reminder, but then play--don’t study it too hard.)

For Discussion

Poetry as Insurgent Art [I am signaling you through the flames]
LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI    
 
I am signaling you through the flames.
The North Pole is not where it used to be.
Manifest Destiny is no longer manifest.
Civilization self-destructs.

Nemesis is knocking at the door.

What are poets for, in such an age?
What is the use of poetry?

The state of the world calls out for poetry to save it.

If you would be a poet, create works capable of answering the challenge of apocalyptic times, even if this meaning sounds apocalyptic.

You are Whitman, you are Poe, you are Mark Twain, you are Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay, you are Neruda and Mayakovsky and Pasolini, you are an American or a non-American, you can conquer the conquerors with words....

Source: poets.org
​

The Changing Light
​LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI