First, the students in my poetry and songwriting class did seven minutes of automatic writing (nonstop writing, no editing). Then they went through the automatic text to find nouns and verbs and write sentences with them (either realistic or surrealistic). They then emailed me one of their sentences, and I copied them into a Word file. I put the list of sentences into the list randomizer at random.org, and the resulting numbered list became the class's co-authored poem. I chose its title based on another issue we had discussed in the course of the morning, in which I turned a stock phrase into something new by exchanging the adjectives in it. (Andrew Shields, #111words, 28 October 2022)

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Bloodshot Nights and Sleepless Eyes

The door that has no story, is mine to write upon.
And I clear my head from worries.
It takes hard work and fortitude to get out of bed.
A fountain pen filled with coffee, black it would be.
I hike to see the sunrise but I am not a morning person.
I enjoy my freshly brewed cappuccino covered under a huge cozy blanket.
Whose potato mush got slapped.
Snot bubbles and oozes over my fingers, onto my chin I'm running out of tissues.
I fucking hate coffee, she is my nemesis.
I wrote these words on the wall of a dirty bathroom stall, praying God will take my damned soul tonight.
Day by day by day I sit on the floor and talk to the wall like I've never talked to anyone before.
Daylight hills like a crown and I'm alright for the first time in a long time.
I relax with strangers on the morning train to university.
The Latin teacher's job is to take up as much space in your brain as possible.
Jackets are for wet bodies.

Songs and Poems class, 20221028

Bloodshot Nights and Sleepless Eyes: From automatic writing to a class's co-authored poem