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I'm Sophy ~ your Host for the Comedy Newsletter this week, where we'll talk about the art of writing bad poetry, on purpose.  Really, it's fun! And funny! Check it out below .... |
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The Art of Writing "Good" Bad Poetry
As you may have noticed, there are many forums around the site that invite you to write intentially bad poetry or prose items. Whether it's a bad poetry SLAM, a "write the worst first sentence of a novel" competition, or a weekly forum where you are invited to spew your badness whenever you feel like it, one of the ways you can be sure to find a laugh is checking out the many offerings around the site of intentionally bad writing. I suspect some people find it odd to be promoting "bad" writing on a writing site, but it's all in good fun, AND can actually improve your own writing experience, especially in the realm of comedy writing.
I have participated in quite a few bad writing contests myself, and what I have discovered about them that surprised me is that in order to be "good" at writing poorly, you have to be a pretty decent writer in the first place. That may surprise you to hear me say that, but it's true. Some of the best poets on the site, for instance, are also the best at writing intentionally bad poetry. Because writing "good" bad poetry is not about mispelling words or making up lines of gibberish nonsense. Sure, that makes for bad poetry. But for it to be truly amusing and get other people interested in reading it at the same time takes some subtle talent. And an off-kilter sense of humor helps too!
But don't take it from me!  I've invited some of the best "bad" poets on the site to share with you how they make the magic happen. First up is Katya the Poet  -- my nominee for Queen of WDC Bad Poetry. Not coincidentally, Katya the Poet is also one of the best GOOD poets that I have the pleasure of reading. She hosts a weekly forum with regular prompts for folks to drop in and post their badness, and offers this advice to those of you who want to give it a try:
I suspect the art of writing bad poetry is similar to the art of writing good poetry. To be "bad," one probably has to know what is considered "good" in poetry, and then mock it or tweak it or do it to excess in some way. If a certain form contains meter and rhyme, for instance, a "bad" poem would be absolutely strict about the meter and rhyme, banging us over the head with it, and forcing some rhymes with awkward, overly poetic constructions.
A sonnet is supposed to rhyme in five
Iambic beats, a meter that is strict
As honeybees committed to the hive
And buzzing home with pollen they have picked.
That's very regular, very singsong, but has aspects of a real poem--such as comparison via simile or metaphor: strict meter compared to honeybee instincts--and alliteration. The next stanza uses gross and whimsical wordplay, word association, another simile, and a pun of sorts, inspired by "picked" above, inappropriate in good poetry:
Like noses of their boogers scoured clean
The daisies that the bees have left behind
Are aching from the pillage by the mean
Bad bees that came and were not very kind.
Where good poetry has depth of emotion, bad poetry overstates and sentimentalizes and claims more emotion than is really due. Plus, the stanza above maintains the strict rhyme and meter, with one forced iamb: "bad BEES."
And thus the evil bees have raped the flow'rs,
Depriving them of making people sneeze,
To make their honey all the sunny hours,
Those evil, evil, evil, evil bees!
Here we have forced archaic construction: "thus," and then "flow'rs," to fit the strict rhyme and meter; a ridiculous connection of pollen to human allergy to flowers' intent, etc.; resumed strict meter; and silly repetition. Not to mention, the use of an exclamation point, frowned upon in good poetry!!!!!
And thus a sonnet mutilates the brain
And scrapes the nasal passage, what a pain!
And the final couplet sums things up with inappropriate yet inevitable claims!
Sigh. You can do this with any form, or with free verse. You can mutilate a haiku by following its basic rules--nature imagery, season reference, brevity--to excess, and, again, by observing its syllable count religiously (though syllable count is only an English approximation of the Japanese brevity), and then tossing in some inappropriate content.
A yellow tulip
opens like a lady's mouth
full of yellow phlegm
And you can do anything in free verse. Inappropriate subject matter, whimsical leaps of thought, awkward or prosey uses of language, cliches, and outrageous images can go a long way toward making a poem bad...sometimes too far!
Winter was so long
it made me want to die,
to die!
I wanted to die!
I wanted to lose my leaves
like hairs that fall off in the shower while using a floral-scented conditioner
and let myself swirl down the drain
like spilled milk.
I wanted to wake up in the morning
asleep
and then go back to sleep
unable to face the day,
the way the sun was unable to shine its meager light through the pink curtain
and make things rosy again.
I wanted to die, to die, to die, to die,
to die, perchance to scream
my dying thoughts unto the world
the way the winter wind kept whistling through my window
like a construction worker.
But instead, the winter had to go on and on and on and on and on
like this poem
which has gone on much longer than it needed to to make its point.
I have written a lot of bad poetry here at Writing.com, enjoying the various Anti-SLAMs offered as antidotes to the various good poetry SLAMs and contests. I like it best when there's prompt or theme and a wonderful community of wacky people participating. We laugh until we pee!
If Katya the Poet is the Queen, then billwilcox is certainly in the running as one of the WDC "Kings of Bad Poetry" -- who offers this sage advice:
The key to writing 'bad' poetry is the topic. It must be utterly ridiculous.
Most good poetry is about 'love'. But to me, that can be the most ridiculous thing yet. Ah, love...
There are so many kinds of love, and therein lies the humor. Say, for example, you have a love for socks, as in my 'bad' haiku "A Thing For Socks" . I don't even think the French have a word for that type of love.
But there is more to it then that. Even the 'act of love' can be reduced to a hilarious account if you just look at it a different way.
When writing 'bad' poetry, I look at the topic like a rubics cube. I study all the sides, the top, the bottom. I twist it, and turn it, until it becomes something other than what it is. And what it is...is 'bad'....very, very 'bad'.
Joy  is another regular "good" bad poetry writer. Like Katya the Poet , she is also an excellent author of amazingly good poetry as well. Joy shares:
~~Ahhh! The well-kept secrets of writing bad poetry...okay.
First is very little thought.
Second is speed, and I mean light years speed.
Third has to be the words that don't fit. Remember how you toil when you are writing good poetry to find the right word? Forget about it. Also forget about blushing.
As to the feeling of it, remember, gushy, mushy, blushy. The sappier the better and the nastier the better.
The sound of your poem will need to drone. Cacophony is the word here. If you are a sound-conscious poet, jarring, discordant and endlessly repeated sounds should do it. Perfect end-rhyming that uses echoing sound words should make powerful statements, something like vroom, groom, broom. Then if you can't find the next perfect rhyme, nothing is wrong with kerplunk or anything you make up.
You can also drop names like Homer Simpson or Humpty Dumpty to show your intellectual prowess.
And the last, rhythm is totally optional. Better, if you dropped it. ~~
Have fun!
And my witty friend from across the pond, Roscoe  , offers these web sites as great resources for learning the knack of writing bad poetry:
This mildly amusing article might be of use http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A577118
And of course examples from the master at http://www.mcgonagall-online.org.uk/ may provide
a good approach.
In closing, I must add that we all have our friend and former WDC member, Pita, to thank (or blame, lol) for bringing bad poetry to the site. Her "Bad to the Bone" contest started the whole thing about six years ago, and it's snowballed from there. And finally, special thanks to my friends for sharing all of their excellent advice! Check out their ports for more examples of writing badly (and writing very well!) as well as the items below. And don't be afraid to give it a whirl -- remember, it's all in good fun! |
Here are some intentionally bad items from around the site, many from bad poetry contests -- remember, if you enjoy them, please let the author know by reviewing and rating the piece with a LOW star rating!
First a collection of baddies from Joy
Some poetic "how-to" advice from Katya the Poet -- follow at your own risk. And also check out her weekly bad poetry forum in her port once you get there! 
A couple from a Bad Poet Grand Master!
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And some individual offerings from a few Bad Poetry contests:
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Here are a couple of responses I got from my last newsletter about being technologically challenged, and one from my earlier "winter blues" newsletter.
From cnoto
I could so relate to this entry, Sophie. My son taught me to turn on a computer back when a 8086 was the latest rage and our company wouldn't install windows because it seemed too "new-fangled" and what was wrong with DOS batch files anyway? I don't own a cell phone and the entire text message thing eludes me. Yes, I'm a dinosaur but am grateful that my grandkids have a clue.
Wow, and I thought I was technologically challenged! Glad you found your way to WDC and thank you for sharing with us!
     
From lulubelle
Thanks for the great newsletter. Sarcasm is like my native tongue, and it's always fun to read it as well.
Ashton Rose
I wasn't sure if this response was to my newsletter being sarcastic about technology, or Melissa is fashionably late! 's earlier one about sarcasm -- but either way, thanks for the comment and your applause of the beauty of sarcasm!
From emma m
Brilliant newsletter!! Even though I live on the other side of the pond and we don't get a lot of snow I still hate the cold. Trouble is if we get a lot of snow everything grinds to a halt and that's with only a few inches of the white stuff! Like you I can't think of a nice thing to say about winter. And why is it that when it rains in the winter it's depressing but a shower of rain in the spring or summer is refreshing? Give me sunshine and a few showers anyday. Keep smiling and banish the blues.
Amen! And glad you liked the newsletter, thanks for writing in!
That's all for now! Until next time, and on behalf of your other brilliant Comedy Newsletter Editors Melissa is fashionably late!  katherine76 Robert Waltz  -- LAUGH ON!
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Comedy: April 23, 2008 Issue [#2352]
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