A New Project Idea

I was listening to an NPR story this morning (big surprise) about a visual artist and I was struck with an idea for a new poetry project.

It struck me that everyone's handwriting could be seen as an artistic expression.  While we have a generally recognized alphabet that makes up our language, each of us has a personalized rendition of each letter. While our handwriting may follow a generally recognized formula we, like any artist have our own flair that distinguishes our writing.

In this age when letter writing is almost a lost art, and we see written communications mostly in printed text format, I thought it would be interesting to collect a number of samples of handwriting from different individuals and treat them as though they were each individual pieces of artwork. I would then select four or five of these and write a poetic expression of what the artwork speaks to me.  I don't mean the words but rather the lines on the page. This would not be really any different then writing a poem inspired by a painting or a picture.

Anyway, if anyone is interested it contributing a few paragraphs of handwriting sample for the cause, e-mail me at poet@michaelawells.com

 

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