Sometimes you’ll share a post you feel is really important, and almost no one reads it. Other times, you’ll share a simple little writing prompt…and suddenly everyone is jumping in, trying their hand at it.
This post, for your information, is about the latter.
You see, I shared author/poet Phillip Larrea‘s tricube form a few weeks ago as an example of how one can stretch their brain muscles with exercises such writing in a specific form (i.e., haiku, sonnet, etc.).
(You can read that post HERE) The tricube form is based on the mathematical concept of “cubes”: the poem has 3 stanzas, with 3 lines per stanza, and 3 syllables per line.
I had no idea how inspirational that post would be! Folks were emailing me, sharing on Twitter, posting tricubes on their own blogs…and as I discovered yesterday, sharing them on Instagram!
That’s right – my friend Paul Strikwerda, a fellow voiceover artist who hails from the Netherlands but calls the U.S his home these days (hence, his business name, Nethervoice), was so taken with the challenge that he wrote his own, which I shared last week, along with tricubes of many others.
Little did I know he would challenge his Instagram followers to write their own – and boy, did they! You can scan through them all HERE and read the many ways his followers responded – with subjects from tenacity and peace to music and reptiles. I loved reading through them all, and I’m sure you will, too.
After reading all these tricubes, there was only one thing I could do: write another! This was in response to Paul’s Instagram posts, as I thought about not just his kindness but also our similar backgrounds: two voiceover guys who both grew up recording stories onto our father’s old cassette decks (character voices, sound effects, and all), who both eventually worked in radio, who both left radio to work for ourselves doing voicework, and who both love writing – he as one of the top voiceover bloggers in the country and me as a children’s author.
.
Friendship’s voice
supportive,
true, rises
up, reaches
across miles
and months, so
readily
heard by those
who listen.
.
– © 2021 Matt Forrest Esenwine, all rights reserved
.
It’s been nice seeing so many others tackling this form, too, like Christie Wyman and her students. Christie shows how she used this form along with Amy Ludwig VanDerwater’s Every Day Birds (Orchard Books) as part of a science/poetry/art lesson…brilliant! Blogger Denise Krebs also tried her hand at one, using a rather “unusual” subject…check it out here!
As I’ve stated before, should you decide to try writing a tricube of your own, I hope you’ll share it with me so I can post here for all to see! (If you share it on Instagram, be sure to include the hastag #tricube) I’ll likely be doing something completely different next week, but for all of today’s poetry links, please visit Bridget at wee words for wee ones, where she’s hosting the complete Poetry Friday roundup!
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I’m now a part of the BOOKROO family!
Create an account to add books to wishlists and be notified of special deals and dates…create custom collections…and discover and follow your favorite authors & illustrators!
Find out more about BOOKROO here!
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I continue adding to my “Wit & Wordplay” videos ! These videos were created for parents and educators (along with their kids) to learn how to write poetry, appreciate it, and have fun with it. From alliteration and iambs to free verse and spine poetry, I’m pretty sure there’s something in these videos you’ll find surprising! You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and if you have young kids looking for something to keep busy with, I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website.
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Ordering personalized signed copies online? Oh, yes, you can!
You can purchase personally-signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly EVERY book or anthology I’ve been part of!
Click any of the following covers to order!
Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send a comment to the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH requesting my signature and to whom I should make it out. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)
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Thank you to everyone for your support!
FLASHLIGHT NIGHT:
- NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
- KIRKUS Starred review!
- Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
- “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
- Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
- Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
DON’T ASK A DINOSAUR:
- “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
- “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
- “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars” – Tulsa Book Review
- “Rhythmic…funny and informative” – Unleashing Readers
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Ekster’s 
yesterday that it’s now listed listed as one of Amazon’s editors’ 
Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme 