Author: Avril Meallem

Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform

Published: 2013-11-04

Total Pages: 114

ISBN-13: 9781985694767

Experimental and innovative, 'Tapestry' is a genre of poetry composition in partnership. When the variegated threads of our two distinctly individual poems are woven together the result is a word-scape that stands by itself. The theme of the resulting 'Tapestry' can follow that of just one of the individual poems, can be a mix of the two or even branch off entirely into a new one.We chose the term 'Tapestry' as it beautifully captures the sentiment and essence of this form. It developed following our having become acquainted with each other's poetry on 'Your Space' of the Muse India literary e-journal. We met in Mumbai, India in February 2010 and decided to work together on a style of collaborative poetry writing whereby each writer composes a nine line poem on a title chosen by one of us. Then the two poems are interlaced line by line with minimal changes. (Avril had once worked with this form in Israel). After a few tries at this via email, we decided to form our own rules whereby far greater editing and mixing of lines is undertaken. Thus we embarked on what has turned out to be a most challenging and exciting poetic journey and our hope is that others will become inspired to try out this innovative genre of collaborative poetry writing. How 'Tapestry' Works Each poet composes a poem on a title chosen by one of them. The poems are then exchanged and have to be woven into one seamless, flowing piece that can stand on its own. Being a collaborative effort the editing becomes a to and fro process until both writers are satisfied with the resulting 'Tapestry'. The basic rules are: - Each individual poem has to be of 9 lines. - Only the person who gives the title has the option of actually using it in the poem. This is to avoid repetition. - The majority of words of the original poems should be kept but grammatical changes can be incorporated e.g. singular to plural, verb tense changes, etc. Adjectives and adverbs can be replaced with others more befitting the Tapestry but retaining the original flavor. - All 9 lines of each poem are to be used in the Tapestry, which effectively makes it an 18 line