Q is for QUAINT
Photo by Amy LV
My MACMILLAN DICTIONARY FOR CHILDREN defines quaint this way:
Pleasant or attractive in an old-fashioned or amusing way: the narrow streets of a quaint old village.
This is a great-sounding word, and it may even be quaint, for we do not hear it so much in everyday speech. But I was happy to where my finger landed for today's poem as I love the sound and meaning of this word.
Students - This is a definition poem, or a poem that defines the word it is titled by. You will notice that in my poem, each stanza offers a bit more of a definition through example, the final two lines bringing it all to a close with an opinion. See how each stanza begins with the word QUAINT and then elaborates a wee bit more? I enjoyed writing this very much, thinking about the different images that would best help a reader picture my word.
If you want to try this, you might just open your dictionary like I did and see what word you get. Or you might think about a word that holds lots of meaning for you or a word you think is confusing or even a word with multiple meanings. Then you can play with defining it through word, image, and opinion. I would be very interested in reading any such poems should you give it a try!
Remember...it might get messy. (See part of my draft below.) Messy is good when it comes to writing!
Draft of QUAINT
by Amy LV
In case you are new to The Poem Farm, this month I am walking, letter-by-letter, through the dictionary, (closed-eyed) pointing to a letter each day, and writing from it. You can read poems A-Q by checking the sidebar, and you visit Lisa Vihos and read her accompanying daily haiku at
Lisa's Poem of the Week. You can also follow Christophe's haiku with each daily word in the comments for that post.
If you have not yet taken a peek into
Laura Shovan's notebook to see the evolution of her poem,
April, please go and read her post at my other blog, Sharing Our Notebooks. There is a giveaway on that post for her beautiful chapbook,
MOUNTAIN, LOG, SALT, AND STONE. Names will be drawn tomorrow!
Today, in another post, I am hosting the
2012 Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem. It's just like a dinner, but everyone contributes a line instead of a dish. Our 2012 poem is a grownup poem, but the idea of this project would be lots of fun to try with students. I spent hours working on my line!
Please share a comment below if you wish.
