Day 89: Shakespeare's High School Poetry... On Scrapping Poetry

When I've had to tolerate a coffee table in my home, I've always made sure that my "Found" books were prominently displayed mostly because they're awesome. These are books entirely made up of notes, pictures, doodles, and other scraps of paper that people have found in random places that give a glimpse into other people's lives.

A Found Poem is similar to the Found book in that it uses language from non-poetic contexts and turns it into poetry. It's like a collage put together with scraps.

Inspiration can come from anywhere, including horoscopes, bulletin boards, instruction books, graffiti, dictionaries, grocery lists, spam e-mails, etc.

For this poem, I walked in every room of my apartment and jotted down whatever words my eye happened to spot. The words came from a coupon for Starbucks, an empty can of Dr. Pepper, a box of spoons, the description for The Hamptons Diet Cookbook and the recipe I had it open to, a letter from an insurance company, a picture frame, a bottle of mouthwash, the covers of Fortune and Glamour magazines, a financial book, and a pair of shoes I just bought, and was surprised at how easy it was to come up with a great poem.