Poetic Storytelling

Get some idea from these slam poets

• explore, as a basis for your poem, personal observations and understandings of a specific (real) person's character which might include exploits, action(s), mannerisms and personality
• successfully present these interpretations by writing a poem in "brief" poetical format that "tells a story" about the observed person. The "character" should NOT be one's own self!)
• become more attentive to particular human quirks and personalities
• demonstrate the ability to utilize specific words and short phrases in place of long descriptive sentences and paragraphs in presenting a story.

Hint: This poem might be described as a "snapshot" of words that quickly, yet effectively tells a "story" about a single, select character.  Perhaps the story focuses on an event or the cumulative results of a personality trait related to the character's life.  Good subjects could include: a grandparent or other relative or, a peculiar neighbor or acquaintance.

Write a poem which satisfies the following criteria:

1. The poem is in the past tense.
2. The poem is no more than thirty lines in length
3. The poem is in the third person, about somebody (a protagonist) "other" than yourself, somebody colorful and vivid enough to make for interesting reading. The protagonist should be non­fictional (You might select one of the more eccentric people you remember from high school) unless you can, as Louis Simpson does in the poem “Caviar At the Funeral," create a convincing fictional character.
4. The poem should not be end-rhymed.
5. The title of the poem should be the name of the protagonist.
6. The main body of the poem should present a scene (as in a movie) dramatizing a telling incident in the life of the protagonist. The scene might well center around some kind of initiation experience, certainly around some experience from which the protagonist learned something important about himself/herself, about the people around him/her or about both. (Experiences which resulted in disillusionment are often particularly suitable for such ultra-short stories.) .
7. The background of the main character or characters should be sketched in by means of digressions.
8. The scene should show the protagonist faced with a situation in which he/she must make a decision.
9. From the decision which the protagonist makes, the reader should gain some insight into the protagonist.
10. From the way in which the author presents the scene, the reader should get a sense of the author's judgment of the character. 
11. This judgment should be very tactfully suggested, by innuendo, through hints and through the author's tone of voice, not blatantly stated.
12. Though told with, great economy, the story should contain enough physical details and images to enable the reader to vividly picture the story's central scene.