Everyone has someone or something to love, whether it’s your boyfriend or girlfriend, your best friend, your mom or dad, your dog, the teddy bear you sleep with every night, or your favorite slice from the local pizza shop.
This creative writing prompt is about writing a love poem.
Now, plenty of people hear the words “love poem” and start thinking of roses and violets and hearts and flowers. But love poetry can be anything and everything but the cliches. In fact, I hope that’s how you’ll choose to see it in this exercise.
The idea is to not try and capture the feeling of love as a whole. Love can be impossible to define. What will create a bigger impact, and enable you to target your poem’s driving force, is to choose one day or one experience or one moment and describe it lovingly in your own voice. Maybe your love is very sarcastic, perhaps you express love casually or in text message language (poetic license, rmbr?). Be authentic, be true to yourself. Don’t try to mimic how someone else expresses love.
With all this in mind…
- Choose one person or thing you love and write a love poem about them that is at least 10 lines long.
- You can even choose to write your love poem to someone, like a love letter poem.
- Write the poem without stopping or thinking very hard about it. Don’t try to nail it on the first try. (Get a refresher on revision.)
- Avoid using the following words: heart, love, tear, joy, Valentine, devotion.
- Sharpen your imagery: what colors, sounds, sights, shapes, and textures represent the words you’re being asked to omit in the preceding bullet point? Draw a picture for someone through words instead of just using a common word.
Do you have a favorite love poem?
Novel Novice 
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