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This week, while fine-tuning a couple manuscripts, I distracted myself by consolidating my various editing checklists into one comprehensive mega-list.

After a few hours of that, I was ready to rip my hair out, and of course, when hair is ripping, a poem is ripening.

Editing

My poem
contains, really and truly, just very, very few crutch words, 
EXPLODES with active verbs!!!!
does not overuse exclamation points
      OR CAPITALIZATION!!!!!!
carefully, meticulously, and precisely minimizes adverbs
maintains a catchy refrain,

uses it’s apostrophes correctly when its time,
let’s you here the creek of the creak,
shows the second hand ticking (rather than telling time),
is hysterical,
is knot full of linking verbs,
is cursedly age appropriate,
does not add filler just to rhyme –
      this, I’ll tell you every time,
throws in a dash of emdash –
or two –
resists reiteration, repetition, and redundancy,
maintains a catchy refrain,

leverages
line
breaks
for
emphasis,
is devoid of typoes,
is POW! SWOOSH! CRACKING with onomatopoeia,
actively alliterates, undulates with assonance, and spills its consonance,
takes a hero on a journey to save the cat,
incorporates some
enjambment,
maintains a catchy refrain,

employs lusciously lyrical language,
sparce,
makes appropriate uses of ellipses, etc. …
has more layers than lasagna,
uses similes like an English teacher,
avoids cliches like the plague,
avoids mixing metaphors by getting its ducks on the same page,
maintains a catchy refrain,

and
has a Twist ending –
Oliver.

© Tracey Kiff-Judson, Draft 2024

For some well-edited poetry, visit this week’s Poetry Friday host, the amazingly artistic Michelle Kogan at MoreArt4All with this week's roundup and May birthday wishes.