Write your own poem

To write your own poem you need to be relaxed so stand up stretch your arms up high above your head and take a deep breath. Now shake your hands out in front of you, wiggling your fingers. Touch your toes. Take another deep breath, sit down and you are ready to write.

Can you name the five senses that we use?

That’s right: TASTE, SMELL, TOUCH, SEE, HEAR.

On a piece of paper write these senses along the top as headings for different columns.

In addition to these five senses we also use a sixth sense when we are writing and that is ‘feeling’ and ‘emotion.’ People that read your poems experience your writing through their six senses and so when you are writing a poem you need to think about reaching your reader through these senses.

Brainstorm! Think of some ‘sense words.’ Think of words that you associate with each of the senses.
So under TOUCH write down all the words that you can think of to do with touch, for example hot,
cold, clammy, lumpy, smooth.

Repeat this for all of the senses. You might like to think about Joe and his Gran at the market.
Imagine that you are there with them. What would you see, smell, touch, taste, hear and feel?

Once you have filled in the columns you have your very own word bank which you can use to create your poem.

Now you are going to write ten lines using your sense words but not with the senses
with which they are usually associated.

This is the line you are going to use:

“I would like to (sense) the (sense word)

For example you can use touch words with the sense of smell but not with the sense of touch.

Once you have 10 lines you can start to shape them into your final poem. Play around with the words, take out any repetitions, and expand any images or rhymes that you like.

If you would like to share your poem with us and Valerie please do email it to katetull@hotmail.com
and we will publish the best ones on our website.