Tweetspeak Poetry

Horizon Line: Poetry Prompt

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horizon-line-poetry-promptThere’s much to be said about what lies beyond the narrow strand of a horizon. What about the delineation that makes it so? The horizon line. In Billy Collins’ poem, he describes the potential and possibilities awakened by a simple narrow band:

Horizon

You can use the brush of a Japanese monk
or a pencil stub from a race track.

As long as you draw the line a third
the way up from the bottom of the page,

the effect is the same: the world suddenly
divided into its elemental realms.

A moment ago there was only a piece of paper.
Now there is earth and sky, sky and sea.

You were sitting alone in a small room.
Now you are walking into the heat of a vast desert

or standing on the ledge of a winter beach
watching the light on the water, light in the air.

—by Billy Collins

Try It: Horizon Line Poetry

Go find a sheet of paper. Any will do. Grab a pen, pencil, or a monk’s paintbrush and draw a line just as the Collins poem suggests. Look at the line you’ve drawn. Write a poem about this horizon. Where is it? Describe the landscape. What does this horizon represent?
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Featured Poem

Thanks to everyone who participated in last week’s form-themed poetry prompt. Here is a recent poem from Monica we enjoyed.

Global traveler, make the horizon
your aim, though mountains break the horizon.

Whether in eighty days or hours, see through it;
don’t make it opaque, the horizon.

Like Passepartout, keep your own time
whenever you overtake the horizon.

Like Aouda, remember the past,
the present, the future ache her eye’s on.

And I, like Phileas, walk with a posture
and attitude that can remake the horizon.

—by Monica Sharman

Photo by Patrick Jonas. Creative Commons via Flickr.

Browse more writing prompts
Browse poetry teaching resources

How to Write a Poem uses images like the buzz, the switch, the wave—from the Billy Collins poem “Introduction to Poetry”—to guide writers into new ways of writing poems. Excellent teaching tool. Anthology and prompts included.

“How to Write a Poem is a classroom must-have.”
—Callie Feyen, English Teacher, Maryland

Buy How to Write a Poem Now!

Heather Eure
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Comments

  1. Rick Maxson says

    Monica, I love your featured poem so much that I wish it were mine, but it is not. 🙂

    Heather, can you change the author, please. I will be content that it was virtually mine for a short while.

    I will try and come up with one this week.

    Reply

  3. Rick Maxson says

    On the Horizon

    Yesterday as the last light went
    over the tree-ragged line of mountain
    it was the color of Oleander,
    marching a familiar season
    across the sky. The ruled lines

    of a notebook—each another blue day
    set on a course—I crossed in a flight
    of letters, like the rolling of finches,
    to describe how the flowers rose
    once again in pink rows over the world.

    These were the petals set in gun barrels,
    flourishing in the Winter air, from a Summer
    fifty years ago, and flowers from a desert
    Spring of justice,—cacophonous cordons
    of color ascending from silence.

    There is no other line but this for now,
    standing on the brink of a mountain,
    in the bouquet of morning and evening.
    The past, the present, and the future,
    in one breath, assembled for a shout.

    Reply

  4. Monica Sharman says

    I did what you said, Mr. Collins, three times, the first
    on Mead Académie tracing paper with my best
    mechanical pencil, the lead peeking two clicks out.
    I kept the page in portrait orientation—
    no need to give all that nebulous translucence
    too much azimuth. This sheet is nine by twelve,
    so I measured four inches up and drew the line
    but didn’t stop there. I lifted the bottom corner,
    giving space for my fingers to sidle up the other
    side of the page. The lines on the insides
    of my knuckles and palms became branches,
    the fingers a tree.

    The second horizon: purple-infused black ink on white.
    This time, the sheet was opaque and I was okay
    with turning it landscape. And this time I guessed,
    didn’t measure the third with a ruler. The scene
    turned out to be the same sunset I drew
    over and over as a kid: on the left, some curves
    for the edge of an island. A single palm tree leaning.
    The standard three coconuts under its four
    coarsely serrated leaves. To the right, the sun,
    its upper curve balanced on water. Where each end
    of the curve meets the ocean: the sunset’s reflection,
    squiggly lines getting farther apart as they come
    to the viewer, enclosing a silhouette-sailboat.

    For the third one: a precut square origami sheet
    preprinted, no kidding, with overlapping waves.
    I meant to find the most vibrant Prismacolor
    marker. Instead, I made the horizon
    by folding a crease in the waves.

    Reply

  5. Prasanta says

    Horizon

    If you draw a line there
    and I draw a line here
    what do we draw beneath and above ourselves?

    Are we walking toward the same inimitable sunset?
    If you put a tree there, and I put one here
    can we rest under the same shade?

    We see one other, walking in parallel—
    is the chasm between us too wide
    for our hands to reach?

    When younger, the horizon is golden,
    untainted, glorious, magical, wondrous,
    the world not pinned down by lines.

    The future blooms with promises,
    an iridescent and resplendent hope,
    even the shadows of sunlight are brilliance.

    In the passage of time, walking onward,
    we wrinkle; wisdom teaches us
    the length of a flower’s breath.

    The journey is boisterous and silent,
    bounteous and deserted, brimming and solitary,
    bewildering and illuminating, beauteous and somber.

    Paradoxical, like rust requiring oxygen,
    treading at night reveals fullness of day;
    painful feet make us cognizant of joy.

    This pilgrimage toward the horizon,
    this sojourn toward a red and amber sky—
    it shapes, molds, burns, instructs.

    One thing is certain, only this I see—
    the mystery is staggering, overwhelming—
    will you walk with me?

    If I draw a line here, and you draw a line there,
    we still breathe the same air—
    can we meet on the road, somewhere?

    Reply

    • L.L. Barkat says

      You have grist for several poems here, Prasanta. 🙂 And, much language that feels wonderful in the mouth.

      If I were revising (and I realize I’m not ;-)), I would keep some of the first stantzas and the last stanza and change some of the question marks to periods—because there is incredible power in what is being said in parts of this, and I’d want to free that.

      Reply

      • Prasanta says

        Revisions and suggestions are most welcome! Thank you. 🙂

        You are right- too many ideas going on here! I’m glad you pointed out the question marks. I divided this up into three ideas, based on your suggestions:

        Horizon: Drawing Lines

        If you draw a line there
        And I draw a line here
        What do we draw beneath and above ourselves

        Are we walking toward the same inimitable sunset
        If you put a tree there, and I put a tree here
        Can we rest under the same shade

        We see one other, walking in parallel
        Is the chasm between us too wide
        For our hands to reach

        If I draw a line here, and you draw a line there,
        We still breathe the same air—
        I wonder, can we meet on the road, somewhere.

        Horizon: A Perspective

        When young, the horizon is golden
        untainted, glorious, magical, wondrous
        the world not pinned down by lines.

        Future blooms with promise
        an iridescent and resplendent hope—
        even the shadows of sunlight are brilliance.

        In the passage of time, walking onward,
        we wrinkle; wisdom teaches us
        the length of a flower’s breath.

        Horizon: A Paradox

        The journey is boisterous and silent,
        bounteous and deserted, brimming and solitary,
        bewildering and illuminating, beauteous and somber.

        Paradoxical, like rust requiring oxygen;
        treading at night reveals fullness of day—
        painful feet make us cognizant of joy.

        This pilgrimage toward the horizon,
        this sojourn toward a red and amber sky—
        it shapes, molds, burns, instructs.

        One thing is certain, only this I see,
        the mystery is staggering, overwhelming—
        I wonder, will you walk with me.

        Reply

  8. Elizabeth W. Marshall says

    Love Lost

    I waited on the other side of white
    Promises made forced my hand

    Lost on a black diamond slope
    Of vertical horizontals

    Tall timber tree lines
    Muted, made invisible

    Horizontal verticals
    Lay me down, love’s vertigo returns

    The way is short
    For the knowing

    Endless for the lost
    In white-out, quiet deafens

    All indicators are void
    On a monochromatic plane

    We stopped speaking in technicolor tones
    love, long ago

    The ice is melting now
    I see ecru and eggshell

    Color returning
    My cheeks blush with new love

    Reply

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