Poetry & wordplay21 categories
Twenty titles for a finished poem
The poem is done and "Untitled" is not going to cut it.
Give me 20 candidate titles for the poem below, grouped by strategy: - **Lifted**: a phrase taken straight from the poem - **Off-stage**: names something the poem never mentions but implies - **Flat and factual**: a place, a date, an object, a plain noun - **Framing**: tells the reader how to read the poem, or misdirects them usefully - **Long**: a full clause or sentence that does work the first line no longer has to Rules: - Do not use abstractions the poem does not already earn. - Avoid titles that simply restate the poem's subject. - Mark any title that would give away the ending. Then pick three, rank them, and say what each one changes about the reading. Poem:
Making it yours
- Paste your own material where the prompt asks for it. Everything above that line is instruction, not content.
- Delete any rule that does not apply to you. A shorter prompt that fits beats a thorough one that does not.
- If the answer comes back vague, add a line saying what you do not want. Constraints work better than encouragement.
Finishing a poem. Cutting, ending, titling, and the last decisions before you call a draft done.
Related prompts
Cut this poem to half its lengthYou suspect the poem is buried inside a longer draft.Break this form on purpose, in one placeA formal poem feels too neat and you want a deliberate fracture.Stop the poem tying itself into a bowThe last two lines explain the poem instead of ending it.Ten titles for this poemThe poem is finished and Untitled will not do.Cut this poem in halfYou suspect a shorter poem is buried in the draft.Does this ending earn itself?The last few lines might be explaining the poem instead of ending it.
Keep this one
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