Imitating Shel Silverstein's Dialogue Poem

It's Summer 2013 in the Philippines. April and May are spring time elsewhere, but it's scorching summer in the Philippines! Some kids go to the beach, some kids go to the malls, and some kids take summer classes.

For the second summer, I'm offering speech and writing classes in my hometown, Nasugbu, Batangas. My host school is Adelaido A. Bayot Memorial School, Inc.

Alyssa Jamela Dadayan, an accomplished 12-year old swimmer with many medals won from many competitions, decided to stick to her Creative Writing Class even if she's the only student. Her would-be classmates had transferred to Academic Writing for practical reasons.

And so I decided to keep the Creative Writing Class even if I have only one student.

Our first session was on writing a dialogue poem. I don't lecture. I let my writing students dive into the pool immediately. And that's what I did with Alyssa. She's a be-medalled swimmer, after all.

However, Alyssa came right up gasping for air. Ooops, I'm getting ahead of my story.

How did I proceed? First, Alyssa and I did a dramatic reading of Shel Silverstein's dialogue poem, "The Little Boy and the Old Man."

Said the little boy, "Sometimes I drop my spoon."
Said the old man, "I do that too."
The little boy whispered, "I wet my pants."
"I do that too," laughed the little old man.
Said the little boy, "I often cry."
The old man nodded, "So do I."
"But worst of all," said the boy, "it seems
Grown-ups don't pay attention to me."
And he felt the warmth of a wrinkled old hand.
"I know what you mean," said the little old man.   

After reading the poem, I told Alyssa to write her own dialogue poem between two persons or two objects. She said she'd write a conversation between a table and a chair. "Okay, you've got 15 minutes to write," I said.

In a manner of speaking, I threw her into the pool. And she came right up gasping for air. "I cannot think of what to write," she said. Her draft 1 was two lines long.

So I showed her how to do a mind map of the chair's uses and the table's uses. Then I gave her 20 minutes to work on her second draft. Afterwards, she said it was too long and sort of rambled. It was prosaic, not poetic.

I told her to choose only the more important ideas which means excluding the less important ones. I told her to work on draft 3. When she finished draft 3, she said she didn't know how to end it.

I asked her which one she wanted to win the argument between the table and the chair. Let the winner have the last say.

Her draft 4 was a pleasant surprise!  She said she didn't think she could finish a dialogue poem in one session. And she's very happy with the result. Alyssa's draft 4 is far from perfect, but already has the making of an original poem with an original message.

As soon as Alyssa's ready with her draft 5, I'll publish it in this blog. I'm sure you'll love it!