When the Blue Bottles Writing Studio met last Sunday, I suggested an exercise about Found Poetry, which is a type of poetry created by using words and phrases selected from another text. This can be achieved by blocking the unnecessary text, cutting, tearing, and rearranging the left text to give new meaning, thus creating a Found Poem.
This form of poetry is not a new concept. It is the literary equivalent of an art collage. I got my idea for the group from the artist Austin Kleon in the Feedspot Blog, which arrives in my email every day.
I created my first found poem from a poem written by David Bridgewater in Images in Ink, a British collection of inspiring verse.
I found it a fascinating process. I photographed the poem, enlarged the print, scanned and printed, and blocked my first two ideas. The third Found Poem I cut and pasted. The one I liked best was ‘blocked’ using a silver Sharpie.