Brother Wolf

Cross-post from Jonah 365



Text reads:

Brother wolf, look!
Sister rabbit
studies shadows
in freshly fallen snow.

See full-size version of this card

I recently received a pack of blank note cards from Defenders of Wildlife which had various wolf pictures on the front. I sent this card, with the original version of the poem written inside, to Brother Dave.

Jack Kerouac would have called something like this poetic form an "American Haiku". I call it "automatic poetry" (as in, "automatic writing", cf. Wm B. Yeats) or a "postcard poem". I see this as an application of William Stafford's "poem a day" discipline.

According to Reverend Mother, "It is reported that when William Stafford was asked how he was able to write a poem every day, he said, 'I lowered my standards.'"

So, I write a postcard poem as if the words cannot be changed. No previous draft, no edits. Scribble away, then send it off to your wondering (or wonderful) correspondent.

I have "cheated", in that the version of the poem above is slightly altered from the original. OTOH, how can I cheat when I'm the one making the rules?