Activity: Personification

Take a walk around the LAS building. Imagine that you are an object. Write from that object's perspective. Take a picture of your object to include with your response.

.clicking me harshly without any emotion . moving me from every side trying to control me. using me for your advantage. a plate so soft so gentle helping me move around. my tail annoys everyone but does not mean you have to drag it when its stuck. the grease  left behind by your palm makes the next person give up on me. 

I am an electronic gate guarding the library

You won't get past me
You little book thief
You want a book? Without a fee?
I know your mischief
It gives me grief

I'll shout and scream
I'll lock the door
Don't even dream
Of reading more

I guard all books
And won't let them go
You can't read them
They are here just for show.


I am a clock hanging on the wall in the library

Hang me up
Side down
In
Side out
Back to front
Let my re-cycling
Undo itself
And the forward arrow
Go in the opposite direction
Let my uphill trek
Down-turn itself
And let my struggle against time
End in my triumph


I am a CCTV camera

I see you right
And I see you left
I also see you come
And observe your side
And notice your turn
Why do you never
Look me in the eye?

Take Care Of Me

Come close

come closer and breath the air I give 

I have my arms open for your attention 

I need your attention 

your attention

I'm craving it  

quench my thirst

bring me back to life and breath me once again.

Plant

Appreciation of Love.

Something there doesn't let me down
Something there doesn't let me spill faults.

Something that keeps my gaps even
And always lifts me high when I need it.

I know I mistake paths
But I also know it will lead me right.

It's something that I can't control
Luckily, it's something that controls me.

Lock

,I am hiding everything I could

.Locking it up away from the world

Waiting for the perfect combination

.To open me up

,Set it all free

.Suddenly bursting

ABP Map

i am where you are
i am where you aren't
all day every day on the wall
i am always here
where you are and where you want to be right now
you want to go there

you are here

you want to be somewhere else
can i help you
can you find me
if you can't find me
i am hard to read if you are not oriented
i have a key
you think you know where you are
i am right here

The Essence of Life

Credit: UDN

The Essence of Life

So press your lips to mine,

Without me you cannot survive.

I have what you need.

My loves,

together we thrive.

So press your lips to mine.

When we are together we soar like doves.

Embrace me once, twice, three four or five.

I have what you need.

We were meant for eachother, like hands to a glove.

I give you that what you need, that drive.

So press your lips to mine.

I am born from above,

and a necessity in your lives

I have what you need.

All your idols, by me they were drove,

and life itself, by me it is contrived.

So press your lips to mine,

I have what you need.

- Dorian. C. Major

I see a lonely tree

standing alone

looking nowhere 

wondering why she's on her own

A whiteboard that can be filled with any color to form a white rainbow, or a black rainbow. The white rainbow brightens the spectrum. The black rainbow devours the spectrum. One's life can be a whiteboard waiting to be filled with either light, or darkness. Light is not blinding, it is glory. Darkness is not condemnation, it is release.

A Green spot in a Blue world

I always look bright.

But inside, I'm suffering.

Sometimes, i suffer for people.

Sometimes, i suffer from people.

I save the universe,

I make human live,

But its unappreciated.

Kind off....

Often, people buy me for their optimism,

but its not mutual for me.

Often, people don't safe me.

H2O..

I become dull.

I am struggling in hiding the battle I'm going through..

When I'm not saved.

But eventually,

Its visible.

Its uncontrollable .

I'm dull.

I'm not green anymore.

And,
I die..

Activity: What's on a Wall?

This week, we want to try and capture details that are all around us to see what they might turn into when we list them together. Try to write literally about what you see on a wall. Take a picture of the wall to include with your response.

queens den 

A wall that is clear, you can see the light reflects whats behind me.

A women sits on her thrown swarmed my the knowledge laying on shelves 

A queens den 

there is a poem on two glass panels

"i am from there, i am from here"

on one side there are red Arabic words

English on the other

"i have two languages"

i can see my reflection when i look at it

and the hallway behind me

i hear people walking

i see their outlines in the glass

"a harmony of speech and gesture"

there are small silver circles

around the outside of the panels

that are attached to the wall

something else used to be here

but it was removed

a faint outline still remains

"like the wings of a sparrow"

Wall of Art

A wall showing two leaders.
Leaders connected by one flag.

A wall that is overwhelmed by architecture.
And a silver manner covers it.

It's the unmissable path you take.
It's the wall that you can't miss.

Activity: hybrid Hay(na)ku & Exquisite Corpse with Word List

We combined the Hay(na)ku poetry form (six word tercets with no more than three words on a line) and an Exquisite Corpse (every participant adding one line to the poem, passing and repeating) with a word list to form the following poetrycicles (Oh! Look. I just invented another pwoermd!). Some of the words are pictured and some are lost for all time. Instead of just writing one line, each writer wrote a complete tercet, leaving only the last line of the previous tercet exposed, before passing the poem to the next person. All of the people who posted responses participated.

I.
She. He.
Strangers. Intertwined. Free.

Listen
Listen to freedom
Listen, stranger

listen to it
The sky,
Haunting

Hollow Soul
Cruel Endless Torment
Mirror

Mirrors
Refreshing us
Set in stone

a mirror
who made you
gold

a Mixture

The mirrors,

Perfect,

Yet so sad.

Feeling shame,

When I see

Myself.

I felt playing,

The guitar

Alone.

Walk far,

On this road,

Melancholic.

Sing, the pain

Shame,

Please do.

Intertwine

Words, words, words

Please stop!

Shame

On us

.The rebellious sinners

Black empty void

Heartless truth

.Shame

Playing a game

Not listening 

.Laughing

Intertwined

with heartbreak

?who loves you

My cat

She loves me

.Maybe

Our souls will

Intertwine

.Becoming one

Alwaleed Almarikhi

Shame

 intolerable shape

Shame in myself

The sky cracked 

Take me 

Hell

Twisted road

Burn to ash 

Firestorm

Burning 

The forest 

And the Sky 

With stars

Jingling 

To their constellation

Jingle bells!

Screamed the old Lady.

Okey?

Listen,

to the sounds

that resonate.

Pain behind it

the mirror,

listen

Trampoline

up and down

never right

Mirror, Mirror

do you see

me

A lonely road 

walk alone

isolation

Terrestrial fire

descending from skies

above

Unnamed

Credit: Cartoonstock

Unnamed

Trampoline

Over water

Cool deep blue

Singer

in the water

alone

Alone we talk

me and her

Siri

Children

Playing on trampolines

Getting sweaty

tearing up

people are listening

stop.

A Symphony

of wasted opportunity.

Shame.

-anon

Christmas
Hearing people
Singing jingle songs

Of merriment
Listen
It is heartwarming

Sing
The pain
It is heartwarming

To actions
Listen
Words do nothing

Sing out loud
Scream and
Shout

Shame on you
Shameful youth
Disgraceful

Mirrors

Clear, bright

But one sided

I asked,

Why don’t you

Listen.

Sky

Crying sky

Oh, melancholic sky.

I pray

To the cat

Above.

Sweet sorrow

Forlorn colossal sky

Lost.

Serendipity

Finding things

On the road. 

Destiny

No shame
in not understanding
still

Still, I listen
to myself
talk

His face forcasts
hopes and
dreams

Sky was blue
made me
tear

It was said
our destinies
interwined

let your soul,
sing and
fly

Activity: Write about doors.

This week's themed approach consisted of writing about doors.

The Final Door

Credit: Aly Zein Mohamed

The Final Door

"The most interesting things happen in doorways."

Your first kiss. Your last.

As one door shuts, another opens.

Always look for the light.

Alas your present is haunted by your past

"The most interesting things happen in doorways."

A veteran, sleeping for the night.

He is not unfamiliar to the words Karl Marx

As one door shuts, another opens.

Two men, hiding out of sight

attending to discreet business, fast fast fast.

"The most interesting things happen in doorways."

A gunshot. Now you see the light.

Take a deep breath. It is your last.

As one door shuts, another opens.

Now you elevate to a new height.

Your time here has forepassed.

"The most interesting things happen in doorways."

As one door shuts, another opens.

-Dorian. C. Major

Doors! oh,doors.

Suddenly, this door, in front of me.

Huge,

Can’t skip it,

I have to pass through it.

Out of the blue,

I’m in.

I’m shocked.

I’m terrified

No runaway.

Why did I got involved?

I have to get involved.

A lot of doors,

In front of me.

They are talking

They are judging

They are two faced.

But,

They are friendly

They are lovely.

I passed.

Happily, terrifying, frustrated,

The doors

Demanding, aggressive.

I’m involved with it anyway.

Path

Whether you pick left or right,

It is always better to go right.

For your soul, yes it is better to go right.

It is a chance to take.

Others might guide you to the left.

Perhaps you are  a bit wiser than they are.

Go right, do not follow your heart.

Open the door, go right.

Right people are always right.

Doors are surprisingly memorable.

When I was a kid, we used to play doorbell ditch.
One day, before I could ring Aaron's doorbell,
his father opened the door and yanked me into the house
and then closed the door. I thought he was going to destroy me.

My parents had a sliding-glass door that opened onto the backyard.
We could leave the front door of the house open
as long as the screen door was shut.

My brother was chasing me with a broom, once,
and shoved it through my bedroom door
to try and gouge me on the other side.

At Halloween, we went door-to-door in our costumes
collecting treats. When I was a little older, I had to go door-to-door
to collect money for delivering the newspaper.

The doors were different in other places.

My mother-in-law hung a bead curtain from the door
of her countryside house.

In China, we used to go to many temples.
There was usually a wall on the other side
of a door at a temple entrance. It wasn't a door, really,
but something to block evil spirits.

In Japan, Angela told me to step over a beam of wood
when we walked through the entrance,
but a lot of people didn't.

One time, when I had returned from a long vacation,
I could not open my door. I had to wait
three hours for the locksmith to drill a hole in the lock.

Doors

The first bloom was the best blossom…

Louis MacNeice, “Apple Blossom”

The first door is the last door

When it shuts – you will never again

But, then, one day

Another door opens

Slowly

Letting in a trembling ray of light

Or suddenly,

It flies wide open 

Blinding you with an epiphany of a new day

Either way

You rejoice and dance out of the room.

One night, the wind slams it shut again

In your face

Behind somebody’s back

As they walk out and board a plane.

You sit motionless

The key in the lock

On the inside

Not opening it again, ever

There is the oven door to consider – as a metaphor, of course

Remembering a poet who took the metaphor literally

There is the lid of a wooden box

Falling down with a bang

Life sealed.

But if you just wait long enough

The last door will be the first door

And you will, one day, one night

Open it for the last time

To take your first step out.

Activity: Write an ABACADABA

Write a poem that matches the following rhyme scheme:

_________________________ a

_________________________ b

_________________________ a

_________________________ c

_________________________ a

_________________________ d

_________________________ a

_________________________ b

_________________________ a

Reality

Once upon a time

There was a balloon

The color of ripe lime

And it wanted to do something different

Like sing with a mime

Or play cards with a panda

Like turn blood into slime

Or count the particles of a sand dune

But all it could do was get exchanged for a dime

Suomi mainittu, Torilla tavataan!

Credit: NAPILUS 

Suomi mainittu, Torilla tavataan!

Hulluuden;

that's Finnish for "insanity."

What is insanity then?

Its doing the same thing

again and again

expecting a different result. No matter how many times,

five or six or ten.

Welcome to Helsinki,

the home of hulluuden.

-Dorian. C. Major

"Suomi mainittu, Torilla tavataan!"[Finland mentioned, see you at the plaza!]- This is what Finnish usually say, sometimes as a joke but other times they mean it, when Finland is mentioned in news or comments or any media outside the borders. This means they go to the plaza, city square, market square whatever you want to call it (it’s just tori in Finnish) to celebrate! Which usually looks something like the image above. Beer in one hand is a must! Naked is optional but very common.

Source: https://turkubites.wordpress.com/2015/03/03/finland-mentioned-see-you-at-the-plaza-a-k-a-suomi-mainittu-torilla-tavataan/

Your Journey

You head you work each day

Rush to lectures so you don’t miss time

You can have lunch within your array

Many hours you spend on that

You drive yourself home and keep that pace

To find yourself busy marking outcomes

You go to bed nearby the bay

But before that, you have your lime

Without it, you cannot reach your cay.

it doesn't have to be the exact sound

it doesn't have to be the exact sound
put it on paper
is it square or round
can you eat it
can it leap tall buildings in a single bound
it's not superhuman
its feet are on the ground
but it has become a vapor
it is nowhere to be found

ABRACADABRA

Bob taught me this rhyming pattern: abacadaba

Abracadabra, he said with a smile

I’ve put a spell on you forever

You can’t run away, not even a mile

But must stay here to build us a heaven

Feathery, fragrant and utterly worthwhile

Where we will be happy, and always clever

And live free of worry in sweet exile

Eternally blissful, regretting never

With oysters, champagne, love diet in style.