Snoopycember 3.1: Some More Prompts and Poems
Hello, all! I hope you’ve enjoyed another week of Snoopycember, and have made your offerings to the Beagle God.
It seems that something very weird and/or horrible happens the day immediately before I’m doing one of these things. Once again, the news sucks today in a way that feels weird to fully sidestep. So, a very sincere Rest in Piece to Rob and Michele Reiner. I don’t have much to say you haven’t heard about the circumstances. But I do want to say that that whole insane run of his (if you’re on the internet today, you know the one) covers so much ground in the many disparate, but connected, core elements of my personality and taste. People who can create something other people care about out of whatever pieces they are given, or whatever pieces their intrigue draws them to, are important. It reminds you that you can tell any story you want to tell well, as long as a belief in the humanity of those around you is always at the center of it.
And well, I don’t know how to transition to that to this week’s Snoopycember poetry prompts, but here we are. I hope you get to find some time to write this week if that’s a thing you do. I hope you find some time to do whatever the thing you do is. I’ll be back on Thursday with a regular post. Poems following the prompts.
- Did you know Snoopy is claustrophobic? Imagine Snoopy in your childhood bedroom, and the items on the wall are closing in on him.
- Snoopy is a man of the people. he’s beloved by the whole peanuts crew, but he a hard time with some of them, like Pig Pen, whose dirt disgusts him. write a poem where Snoopy is trying to be more empathetic towards Pig Pen.
- Snoopy loves to play fetch with soap bubbles. Use Snoopy fetching bubbles as metaphor for an unattainable goal you may have.
- Snoopy loves to dance to all his favorite songs. Which of your favorite songs would you want to share with Snoopy. Hype the song up to him.
- Snoopy loves to imagine and dream himself in countless jobs and as many different heroes. Write a poem where Snoopy is doing your dream job.
- Now, write a poem where Snoopy is doing your real job.
- In A Charlie Brown Christmas, Snoopy wins the blue ribbon for a Christmas House Decorating Contest, slightly to Charlie’s dismay at the commercialism of Christmas. Write a poem as Snoopy grappling with the ethics of commercialism while making the case for his Christmas lights.
Letter from a Dog Formerly Known as “Ugly Olaf”
snoopy, i must thank you
for unnaming me ‘ugly
olaf’ but im having a hard time
with forgiveness. when i won
the ugliest dog contest i stopped
drinking from puddles, but i ate mud
and i found my own teeth broken
around the fur of my neck, matted.
i’ve made you laugh, snoopy. and i’ve
wanted to. brother, i could share
the sky with you but my wings
are what you made them. ugly
cracks in ugly bone, i saw the bluebirds songs every morning i roamed paths in the notes they left hanging in the air, the family farm held
daisies and mirrors in its pasture,
and i waited to see you in the reflections
i stared into the daisy stamens and ate
the petals. snoopy i’m so happy to just be
‘olaf’ to have a home in my name to have
a name in your home, i only sometimes
doubted your love snoopy i’ve seen
myself in the stained veneer you
covered me in with your gaze
i’ve burned fur to become
something more bare
One Small Step for Snoopy, One Giant Absence for Home
my ears barely fit
in my helmet, the oxygen
i’ve smuggled into this barrenness
is the air charlie kicks, pitches through
it tastes like root beer,
it smells like pine
my ears barely fit
and i don’t need them
right now i don’t need
the piano keys litter
the surface i watch bass strings
slither into the infinite i count
every crack in this new ground
Snoopy as the Unwrapped Paper on a Floor I Don’t Remember Well
snoopy sometimes i don’t know
who you belong to. charlie, of course
but you are not owned snoopy i see you
alone inside your home and some days
i assume home makes you sad. but
sometimes in my mind you’re glowing
on a box tv in a house i’ll never be in
again, expired blood pacts, christmas lights
twinkle snoopy sometimes you are
gift wrap around the emotional distance
and sometimes you are the hands
too busy wrapping, unwrapping, to be held
