Take some time to think intentionally about the place of love in the world — in

Take some time to think intentionally about the place of love in the world — in your world. What types of love feel most meaningful to you at the moment –- platonic, romantic, familial, or spiritual? Admiration, crushes, or warm respect and friendship? Think about how the concept of love informs the multiverse texts we’ve studied: for Whitman, the very idea of American democracy is tied to a radical and divine self-love that also insists on natural wonder and a special concern for vulnerable populations. In Everything, Everywhere All at Once, unconditional love saves us from the nihilism that’s unique to our cultural moment.
Before you begin to write, reflect: What is the place of love in your life? How do you use your understanding of love to create meaning when life becomes difficult? When do you invite love into your life wholeheartedly? When do you resist it? What sort of actions do you take to cultivate love? Do you find it harder to love yourself or harder to love others? When do you feel loved? Who or what offers you a feeling of love that you can rest in, fully and wholly, as your complete self? When, in other words, do you experience unconditional love? What is it that prevents you from accessing this feeling full-time — what forces, emotional or social, internal or external? Give yourself time to sit with your thoughts. If you close your eyes and concentrate, can you channel a feeling of love? What does that experience feel like? What makes it hard to sustain that feeling?
Form: When you finally sit down to write, you are going to write an extended love letter, and it’s going to take some work. You’re going to use your letter to examine that which frightens or disturbs or unsettles you. Like Evelyn in Everything, Everywhere, All at Once, you’re going to use love as a magic weapon against the forces that threaten to undo you. You’re going to write your way into expressing a love that is bigger than your fear — a love that saves you, as we see in both of the multiverse texts. Like Whitman, you’re going to do so in the form of a poem, but this poem will not rhyme.
In the end, you may or not defeat the thing that you fear. Sometimes, that’s hard to do. But I want to see you use the tension between your love and your fear in order to create a piece of writing that’s meaningful to you.
Think broadly about what counts as a poem. Do lists count as poems? Do single words count as lines of poems? How about quoted dialog? How about lines from films? Bible verses? What will find its way into your work?
Audience: You might address any audience in your work. You might address yourself (past, present, or future, unborn or after death). You might address family members, friends, significant others, or pets. You might address people whom you know or don’t know, individuals or communities. You might address historical figures, generations, specific demographics, or celebrities. You might address abstract ideas (like love itself, or history, or human error) or mythological entities, fictional characters, or God. You might need to define your idea of God if you address God. You might address humanity as a whole. You might keep a single audience in mind consistently throughout your poem, or you might address multiple audiences. You’ll determine your audience based on what you find you need to say. You can use first, second, and/or third person in your writing.
As you write, think about what love looks like when it’s most expansive. What does it look like when it’s shriveled up and unable to take shape? Which version(s) of love will you express?
In short, you can write to anyone — but you absolutely must know who it is that you are writing to.
Setting: Following Whitman, you might write passages of your work from different sites, mirroring his inclusiveness of places and peoples. You might write one passage from a grassy spot on or near campus, for instance, or write another from a busy street. You might write one while listening to your favorite (or least favorite) love song. It might be a fun idea to write from a place where different ideas or voices or historical eras collide –- perhaps from an antique store or a streetcar, a shopping center or a city bus.
There are many options for thinking about setting, but do be sure to make your choice of setting intentional. Where will you be writing from?
Voice: The voice you channel is yours to choose. You may write from an authentic first person perspective, or you may channel a voice that is not your own — or you may do both. You may write your love letters from the perspective of your dog, or from favorite fictional or media-based character. You may write from multiple perspectives. Any tone is okay – humorous, tragic, ironic, earnest, or a combination of different tones. You could even write from the point of view of Sponge Bob — especially if you believe that there’s value in absurdity.
Again — the most important thing is to have a plan, or at least to become aware of your plan before you finalize and submit your work.
Aim for a few pages of writing. This should be a long letter, both meaningful and complex — like love itself. You won’t be able to develop the necessary complexity unless you give yourself the space to do so. You will likely need to separate your work into numbered sections, as Whitman does.
Also submit a one-page analytical reflection: an explanation of/ reflection on your project. In this page, you can reflect on what you’ve discovered in doing the work, or you can explain your artistic process, identifying the main ideas that hold your work together and the reasoning behind your choices.
I provided a pdf file of Whitman you dont have house this its for reference or you can look up a summary