Words at Play

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The surprises yielded by this strategy has made it a favorite of teachers and writers over time.  While it may lend itself best to poetry writing, it can also serve flash fiction, short form, and song - and probably nonfiction and scripts as well with the right inventive mind behind it! It does have a “part 2” that depends on sharing what you did with the exercise.

Word Play: This is an eleven (11) line writing.

PART I
Step 1) Choose one of the two following sets of words to play with:

  • fugitive / photo / school / blaze / globe / restore / reel / seven / 1914 / flare / smallest

      OR

  • school / fire / memory / April / children / car /  running / father / beautiful / time / child


Step 2) Type/print the words on a sheet of paper, cut them into 11 pieces (one word on each piece of paper), fold the piece in half, put them in a hat/container, and mix them up.

Step 3) Draw your first word out of the hat; that word must appear in your first line (which does not have to be a complete sentence; it can be fun to leave the line open-ended for the next incoming word).

Step 4) Draw each succeeding word, one at a time; that word must appear in the next line (so you are writing one line at a time, not knowing what word is coming at you). The last (11th) word must appear in the last line, which ends the piece that you have written.

IMPORTANT PROVISOS: You may use any form of the word that you draw; you may NOT back up and make any changes in what you’ve written once you’ve drawn the next word!

Step 5) Having completed your 11th line, read your piece through from beginning to end, make any changes that you want, and then give the piece a title.

PART II
Optional Step 6) If you’re curious about where these words have come from and want to know, share what you’ve created with this word play exercise by sending it to us at ydubdub@gmail.com; we’ll respond with the origin of this group of words. And don’t worry, we won’t “publish” your work without your permission; so let us hear from you if that  tantalizes you enough to follow all the way through!