16/03/2014

Yellow Shoes

I posted a new poem at AnnaSadhorse the other day. Well, it's not new. I wrote it in 1988 for Lawson Inada, Oregon's poet laureate from 2006 to 2010. I was taking a writing for publication class from him at the time. One day I was wearing yellow shoes, ankle boots actually, and had my feet up on the chair in front of me. Lawson was talking, walking back and forth in front of the blackboard, when suddenly he grabbed one of my feet, held it up and told me to write a poem about yellow shoes and bring it to class the next day. So I did and here it is.


5 comments:

Roy said...

Wow. I really like that.

asha said...

Great. Glad to hear it. :)

Paula said...

Fun pome! Thanks for sharing. :)

Roy said...

I think it's interesting how a lot of creativity is sparked by a set of well defined limitations--like "yellow shoes." Remember the little story I wrote for your magazine was what I wrote in response to Wiggy's telling me to write a post about "peanut brittle and ruby slippers," which I took as a challenge to figure out how to put two random things together. Otherwise--I never know what to write about.

asha said...

Thanks, Paula. Glad you like it.

Roy, right. Sometimes random is a great place to start. No expectations. :)