These prompts come from the Failed Romantics Dis/Course Meeting

Option #1: Write a sublime poem, based off whatever you think the sublime is, focused on quotidian events and details. Write a “egotistical sublime” poem (as Keats accused Coleridge of doing) using details from your own life/memory.

Option #2: Following the failed romantic, write a failed romantic nature poem

Option #3: Write an ode. Possible ode subjects: Bodega cats, pop music from your childhood, someone you don’t know very well (a distant relative or high school acquaintance perhaps?), an unhappy vacation or tourist trap.

Option #4: Write a line by line translation of “Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art”. Or write an ekphrastic poem for a Romantic painting (some options below).

Option #5: Pick a sensation or sense-perception, write a poem that without describing that sensation or sense-perception, attempts to transmit it.

Option #6: Write a poem that illuminates the beauty (truth?) of something you find beautiful but you worry others don’t perceive the beauty in.

Option #7: Write a love poem. Write a failed love poem