The document provides examples of different poetry exercises for a teen poetry night, including couplet examples, writing autobiographical poems without pronouns, writing poems made of excuses, writing "identity poems" focusing on a strong part of one's identity, and a fill-in-the-blank "I used to be/now I am" poem format. It also includes brief biographies of 13 famous poets and their most notable poems to use in a poetry matching quiz.

1. Teen Poetry Night at the Bartlesville Public Library Rythm, Rhyme and Beat Night

2. Couplet Examples True wit is nature to advantage dressed, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed. -- Alexander Pope Whether or not we find what we are seeking is idle, biologically speaking. -- Edna St. Vincent Millay (at the end of a sonnet)

3. Autobiographical Write an autobiographical poem without using any pronouns. If you get stuck, think about the objects that are important to you and how you use them, the people around you and how they influence you, the particular details of the routine of your days and the objects that inhabit those details

4. Excuses Write a poem made up entirely of excuses said to parents, teachers, coaches, siblings, friends, by you, by people you know, by famous people, etc.

5. Poetry Slam: Identity Poem One of slam poet Patricia Smith's more famous poems is called "What It's Like to be a Black Girl (for those of you who aren't)." The poem builds in rhythm because each sentence starts with the contraction "It's... ." For example: "it's being 9 years old and feeling like you're not finished, like your edges are wild, ... ." Create your own "What it's like" poem for a particular part of your identity you identify strongly with (be it race, culture, a sport, religion, a school group, etc.). Try to get ten or more lines starting with "it's."

6. Now I am.. Write a poem with each line filling in the blanks of "I used to be _____ but now I am ______." ("I used to write poems, but now I just do experiments"; "I used to make sense, but now I just make poems;" "I used to be a tree-climber, but now I am a star-watcher;" etc.).

7. Poet quiz Match faces to names

8. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; 1.

9. This Is My Letter To The World This is my letter to the world, That never wrote to me,-- The simple news that Nature told, With tender majesty. Her message is committed To hands I cannot see; For love of her, sweet countrymen, Judge tenderly of me! 2.

10. I Live, I Die, I Burn, I Drown I live, I die, I burn, I drown I endure at once chill and cold Life is at once too soft and too hard I have sore troubles mingled with joys Suddenly I laugh and at the same time cry And in pleasure many a grief endure My happiness wanes and yet it lasts unchanged All at once I dry up and grow green 3.

11. Jilted Tonight the caustic wind, love, Gossips late and soon, And I wear the wry-faced pucker of The sour lemon moon 4.

12. The Raven Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. "'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door- Only this, and nothing more." 5.

13. Dreams Hold fast to dreams For if dreams die Life is a broken-winged bird That cannot fly. Hold fast to dreams For when dreams go Life is a barren field Frozen with snow. 6.

14. I am not from here I am not from here, my hair smells of the wind and is full of constellations, and I move about this world with a healthy disbelief. And I approach my days and my work with vaporous consequence a touch that is translucent, but can violate stone. 7.

15. Still I Rise You may write me down in history With your bitter, twisted lies, You may trod me in the very dirt But still, like dust, I'll rise. 8.

16. Justice Denied in Massachussettes Let us sit here, sit still, Here in the sitting-room until we die; At the step of Death on the walk, rise and go; Leaving to our children’s children this beautiful doorway, And this elm, And a blighted earth to till With a broken hoe 9.

17. if you like my poems let them if you like my poems let them walk in the evening,a little behind you then people will say "Along this road i saw a princess pass on her way to meet her lover(it was toward nightfall)with tall and ignorant servants." 10.

18. All That is Gold Does Not Glitter All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost. From the ashes a fire shall be woken, A light from the shadows shall spring; Renewed shall be blade that was broken, The crownless again shall be king. 11.

19. Autumn Day Lord, it is time. The summer was too long. Lay your shadow on the sundials now, and through the meadow let the winds throng. Ask the last fruits to ripen on the vine; give them further two more summer days to bring about perfection and to raise the final sweetness in the heavy wine. Whoever has no house now will establish none, whoever lives alone now will live on long alone, will waken, read, and write long letters, wander up and down the barren paths the parks expose when the leaves are blown. 12.

20. Messy Room Whosever room this is should be ashamed! His underwear is hanging on the lamp. His raincoat is there in the overstuffed chair, And the chair is becoming quite mucky and damp. His workbook is wedged in the window, His sweater's been thrown on the floor. His scarf and one ski are beneath the TV, And his pants have been carelessly hung on the door. His books are all jammed in the closet, His vest has been left in the hall. A lizard named Ed is asleep in his bed, And his smelly old sock has been stuck to the wall. Whosever room this is should be ashamed! Donald or Robert or Willie or-- Huh? You say it's mine? Oh, dear, I knew it looked familiar! 13.