List poems can be as straightforward as the name suggests and in this form they are often used as a teaching tool.
There is an entire book devoted to the list poem, or catalog verse as it is sometimes called. The book is The List
Poem: A Guide to Teaching & Writing Catalog Verse by Larry Fagin.
At its simplest a list poem is simply that – a list. An example from Fagin’s book:
Things That Go Away & Come Back Again
by Anne Waldman
Thoughts
Airplanes
Boats
Trains
People
Dreams
Animals
Songs
Husbands
Boomerangs
Lightning
The sun, the moon, the stars
Bad weather
The seasons
Soldiers
Good luck
Health
Depression
Joy
Laundry
List poems can get more complex and there are even sub-genres.
The blazon comes from sixteenth-century France. Sometimes short and satiric, most are longer catalogs of similes
that celebrate and praise some part or parts of the female body. This excerpt is from the Elizabethan poet Lord
Herbert of Cherbery.
A Description
I sing her worth and praises high
Of whom a poet cannot lie,
The little world the great shall blaze;
Sea, earth, her body; heaven, her face;
Her hair, sunbeams; whose every part
Lightens, enflames, each lover’s heart”
That thus you prove the axiom true.
A modern blazon comes from Gershwin.
They Can’t Take That Away From Me (excerpt)
The way you wear your hat
The way you sip your tea
The way your smile just beams
The way you sing off-key
The way you haunt my dreams.
A variation of the blazon comes from Frank R. Maloney as he describes himself in a sort of personal ad.
Advertisement—“caveat emptor”
Take my feet, the skin lightly streaked with blue, not sinewy
or varicose. Narrow, high-arched, stronger than shoe-trees.
More elegant than these, my ankles rise slender as two columns
Of Persepolis. They deserve a chain of temple bells.
My calves will lure you upward. You will want the feel of these
Muscles, like a shanty Irishwoman testing tomatoes in a market.
And my thighs- -may all men and women hunger for such splendor- -
thick as the trunks of twin lodgepole pines. rejoice with me in my thighs.
Tell me the hidden beauty of my buttocks: two purposeful
and altogether useful lumps. We watch them carve themselves. You must be my chisel and my mirror.
Do not neglect the navel tunneling my belly. It will rise
to the suface like a lotus or a rooting ancient koi
Another contemporary use of the list poem is Leonard Cohen.
I’m Your Man (excerpt)
If you want a lover
I’ll do anything you ask me to.
If you want another
Kind of love well I’ll wear a mask for you.
And if you want a partner take my hand
Or if you want to strike me down in anger
Well here I stand, I’m your man.
And if you want a boxer
I would step into the ring for you.
And if you want a doctor
I’ll examine every inch of you.
And if you wanna drive a car inside
Or if you wanna take me for a ride.
Well you know you can,
Because I’m your man.
A list poem will often use a word or phrase repeatedly at the beginning of most lines. For example; I like, I hate, I
see, If you want, The face of, With your eyes like. This excerpt from a class project is a chimera, an imaginary
monster compounded of incongruous parts.
Arnold
The legs of a turkey
The eyes of a snake
The stomach of a turtle
The ears of a goose
The toes of a lion
The heart of a goat
From another first grade class project comes a form using the idea of I Used To/But Now.
I used to be a police dog but now I am a policeman
I used to be a married girl but now I am a farmer
I used to be a garbage can but now I am cookies
I used to be snow but now I am ice
………….
I used to be Abraham Lincoln but now I am the Lincoln Tunnel
I used to be a good computer man but now I am a good typewriter man
I used to be a baby but now I am a writer
Your list can be very specific, working on a single topic like ingredients, body parts, women, men, etc.
For those of you more structured it can take the form of rhyming couplets as in this sixth grade glass project.
I Hear America Singing
I hear America singing
I hear bells ringing
I hear glasses clinking
I hear teachers drinking
I hear drivers driving
I hear nurses arriving
It can be random as in this poem of an I Like list by Patricia Wilson.
Spiced Almonds
I like Gore Vidal because he’s got a great first name.
I like Barbra Streisand because she’s Jewish.
I like Shirley MacLaine because she’s got those little teeny eyes.
I like Adolf Hitler and Richard Nixon because they are the only people I know who have more enemies than I do.
I like Ernest Hemingway because he could drink and write at the same time.
I like my friend Bruce because he died once.
I like Farrah Fawcett-Majors because she finally went away.
I like Joan Crawford because she left her eyebrows to Andy Rooney.
I like Yoko Ono because nobody else does.
I like Tolouse LaTrac because he lived in Paris and died crazy.
I like Paul Simon because he looks so little in the back of his Rolls Royce.
I like cancer patients because they get all those drugs.
I like Joe DiMaggio because he used to be married to Marilyn Monroe.
I like Tony Randal because he doesn’t yet know that he’s gay
I like James Joyce because he had a childhood.
I like Ronald McDonald because he’s got guts.
I like God because he kept going even after Gracie died.
I like Sophia Loren when she’s wet.
There is an entire book devoted to the list poem, or catalog verse as it is sometimes called. The book is The List
Poem: A Guide to Teaching & Writing Catalog Verse by Larry Fagin.
At its simplest a list poem is simply that – a list. An example from Fagin’s book:
Things That Go Away & Come Back Again
by Anne Waldman
Thoughts
Airplanes
Boats
Trains
People
Dreams
Animals
Songs
Husbands
Boomerangs
Lightning
The sun, the moon, the stars
Bad weather
The seasons
Soldiers
Good luck
Health
Depression
Joy
Laundry
List poems can get more complex and there are even sub-genres.
The blazon comes from sixteenth-century France. Sometimes short and satiric, most are longer catalogs of similes
that celebrate and praise some part or parts of the female body. This excerpt is from the Elizabethan poet Lord
Herbert of Cherbery.
A Description
I sing her worth and praises high
Of whom a poet cannot lie,
The little world the great shall blaze;
Sea, earth, her body; heaven, her face;
Her hair, sunbeams; whose every part
Lightens, enflames, each lover’s heart”
That thus you prove the axiom true.
A modern blazon comes from Gershwin.
They Can’t Take That Away From Me (excerpt)
The way you wear your hat
The way you sip your tea
The way your smile just beams
The way you sing off-key
The way you haunt my dreams.
A variation of the blazon comes from Frank R. Maloney as he describes himself in a sort of personal ad.
Advertisement—“caveat emptor”
Take my feet, the skin lightly streaked with blue, not sinewy
or varicose. Narrow, high-arched, stronger than shoe-trees.
More elegant than these, my ankles rise slender as two columns
Of Persepolis. They deserve a chain of temple bells.
My calves will lure you upward. You will want the feel of these
Muscles, like a shanty Irishwoman testing tomatoes in a market.
And my thighs- -may all men and women hunger for such splendor- -
thick as the trunks of twin lodgepole pines. rejoice with me in my thighs.
Tell me the hidden beauty of my buttocks: two purposeful
and altogether useful lumps. We watch them carve themselves. You must be my chisel and my mirror.
Do not neglect the navel tunneling my belly. It will rise
to the suface like a lotus or a rooting ancient koi
Another contemporary use of the list poem is Leonard Cohen.
I’m Your Man (excerpt)
If you want a lover
I’ll do anything you ask me to.
If you want another
Kind of love well I’ll wear a mask for you.
And if you want a partner take my hand
Or if you want to strike me down in anger
Well here I stand, I’m your man.
And if you want a boxer
I would step into the ring for you.
And if you want a doctor
I’ll examine every inch of you.
And if you wanna drive a car inside
Or if you wanna take me for a ride.
Well you know you can,
Because I’m your man.
A list poem will often use a word or phrase repeatedly at the beginning of most lines. For example; I like, I hate, I
see, If you want, The face of, With your eyes like. This excerpt from a class project is a chimera, an imaginary
monster compounded of incongruous parts.
Arnold
The legs of a turkey
The eyes of a snake
The stomach of a turtle
The ears of a goose
The toes of a lion
The heart of a goat
From another first grade class project comes a form using the idea of I Used To/But Now.
I used to be a police dog but now I am a policeman
I used to be a married girl but now I am a farmer
I used to be a garbage can but now I am cookies
I used to be snow but now I am ice
………….
I used to be Abraham Lincoln but now I am the Lincoln Tunnel
I used to be a good computer man but now I am a good typewriter man
I used to be a baby but now I am a writer
Your list can be very specific, working on a single topic like ingredients, body parts, women, men, etc.
For those of you more structured it can take the form of rhyming couplets as in this sixth grade glass project.
I Hear America Singing
I hear America singing
I hear bells ringing
I hear glasses clinking
I hear teachers drinking
I hear drivers driving
I hear nurses arriving
It can be random as in this poem of an I Like list by Patricia Wilson.
Spiced Almonds
I like Gore Vidal because he’s got a great first name.
I like Barbra Streisand because she’s Jewish.
I like Shirley MacLaine because she’s got those little teeny eyes.
I like Adolf Hitler and Richard Nixon because they are the only people I know who have more enemies than I do.
I like Ernest Hemingway because he could drink and write at the same time.
I like my friend Bruce because he died once.
I like Farrah Fawcett-Majors because she finally went away.
I like Joan Crawford because she left her eyebrows to Andy Rooney.
I like Yoko Ono because nobody else does.
I like Tolouse LaTrac because he lived in Paris and died crazy.
I like Paul Simon because he looks so little in the back of his Rolls Royce.
I like cancer patients because they get all those drugs.
I like Joe DiMaggio because he used to be married to Marilyn Monroe.
I like Tony Randal because he doesn’t yet know that he’s gay
I like James Joyce because he had a childhood.
I like Ronald McDonald because he’s got guts.
I like God because he kept going even after Gracie died.
I like Sophia Loren when she’s wet.
| List poetry |
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