Yesterday, I posted two words here, "I Believe". The Lounge did the rest.

Back in 1968 and 1969, poet Kenneth Koch spent the spring and fall of two school years working with children at P.S. 61 in New York City. His goal was to get them more interested in writing and reading poetry. He stumbled on the idea of having the class produce a collaborative "I wish" poem. Each student would write one line independently of the others. Each line started with the words, "I wish." Punctuation was not important here. Also, ridiculousness, tenderness, imagination, seriousness, and profundity were all allowed and not throttled. Koch built on the original assignment and tried other combinations like "I dream" and "If I were." The students loved these exercises and began fiercely writing. Koch turned their work into the first of his two best selling books, "Wishes, Lies, and Dreams."

That book was the foundational piece of my writing instruction during most of my teaching career. Times have changed. I've long ago retired. Kids at school must learn on a schedule. There's precious little time left in the school day for wishes, lies, or dreams.

Anyway, I took the Lounge responses to my two-word post and created the first Lounge collaborative "believe" poem. I'm disappointed that there was no mention of Macs or hookers or blow. But, overall, I believe that this was a fine first effort.

(Base poem published here. More refined pdf version behind the link)
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I Believe
A Lounge Lizard Collaboration

I believe I still believe. (chumly)
I believe it’s beer time. (Ho Ki)
I believe that someone in the great somewhere hears every word. (AZHokie59)
I believe that we will win. (Hokie CPA)
I believe, I believe I’m falling in love. (KCHokie2)
I believe if only you believe like I believe like you believe. (Ichoro)
I believe everybody’s got to believe in something. (HokieDevil)
I believe I want to believe. (HokieDevil)
I believe looks very familiar. (EDGEMAN)
I believe in Bigfoot. (MP4VT2004)
I believe the children are the future.
Teach them well and let them lead the way.
Show them them [sic] all the beauty they possess inside.
Give them a sense of pride. (Stork, GreenvilleHokie, KCHokie2, HokieCPA- Masser & Creed)
I believe for example. (EDGEMAN)
I believe I can fly; I believe I can touch the sky. (1MetroHokie-R.Kelly)
I believe that the lady’s gonna bring me luck. (astrohokie)
I believe in coyotes and times as an abstract. (astrohokie)
I believe for every drop of rain that falls. (PhotoHokieNC)





[Post edited by Newt at 06/28/2020 5:21PM]