A Story Across 3 Forms

For the year of 2026 in “Poetic Discussions,” we will focus on different activities that focus on creating a storyline from various topics with various forms of poetry and writing.  Those who participate in these activities, their poems will be posted here at the Creative Inspirations website’s “Activity Poems” page.
 
Please note that when submitting for this activity:

• poems will only be accepted by email at: [email protected].  Please put in the subject line of the email: “Poetic Discussions Poetry Activity Submission”
• poems must follow submission instructions
• poems should not be offensive, derogatory, vulgar, sexual, or the like
• poems must be submitted on or before the deadline; no poems will be accepted once the deadline has expired

A Story Across 3 Forms
 
To get 2026 off to a great start, I would like to present a activity that will both challenge our minds and creativity.  Think of this activity as a story that you write in the form of a poem.  Stories vary, right?  We can write stories about good things and stories about not-so-good things.  For this activity, we will focus on the good things.  Stories can be about something good that happened in our life when we were younger, middle-aged, or in our golden years.  Stories can originate from memories of a first date, family gathering, special relationship, beautiful vacation, a certain accomplishment in life, a precious moment in life or nature, and so forth.
 
The goal of this activity is to tell a story that is special to you; a good story that you can share with others, and to do it across 3 forms of poetry: Haiku, Tanka, and Free Verse, in that order.
 
Let’s say you want to write about an event that is special to you that happened at an earlier time in your life.  This story would start with a Haiku, continue with a Tanka, and end with a Free Verse. 
 
With the Haiku, it is traditionally written about nature, but for this activity, we will use the more contemporary form of Haiku that can be written about personal experiences, emotions, etc.  Also, for this activity, I won’t be a stickler about my favorite form (5-7-5).  You can use that form or whatever form you would like, as long as it is an acceptable Haiku form.
 
For the Tanka part of the story, we will go with the traditional 5-7-5-7-7 form.
 
And, for the last section of the story, Free Verse, it is as it says, free verse, but please limit the line length to no more than 8 lines.
 
So, to wrap up, this is a poetic activity that will utilize 3 forms of poetry to create a story.  Further guidelines are below.
 
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For this activity:

• create a story-poem from the 3 forms of poetry: haiku, tanka, and free verse
• please add a title to this poem and a very brief definition of the meaning of the poem   
• poem must be individual; no collaboration poems (the next activity I am thinking about a collaboration theme, but not for this one)
• poem must be original…no previously published poems for this activity 
• this activity may require some time to and thought to put together, so don’t worry, you have an adequate amount of time to compose and complete this activity, as the poems won’t be published until April…so, please, take your time to create the best poem that you can for this activity…email reminders will be sent out
• the deadline for submission of this poem is: Monday March 16, 2026
• poems will be published on this site, at the “Activity Poems” page, on or before April 10, 2026.
• please let me know if you have any questions or concerns…hope to get lots of poems