Dancing in the field 5 versions Original version: I prance around the prairie, swaying my head from left to right.

Watching the sky-blue butterfly glide through the cool bree e. !umping my fist in the air, stomping my foot on dark, rich, soil. !unting the blades of bluestem and Indian grasses. Out from behind the lone oak, a goat named "illy says, #$ello.% I grab his hooves and we twirl and twirl and twirl and twirl. We toppled over into the sedges, staining my white shirt with streaks of grassy green tints. We laughed at our clumsiness.

&st revision: I pump my fist to the sky. I stomp my feet on the dark, rich soil. I pluck blades of bluestem and Indian grasses and flail them into the wind. I'm letting my body, possessed by the beautiful beats of the birds, guide me. Watching the wings of the golden eagle, (lapping up and down, )onducting all of the blue *ays. +aking the beats with their beaks. , goat strolls shyly up to me,

and asks, #+ay I have this dance-% with a hoof offered outward. "o further words were spoken. I grab her hoof and we twirl and twirl and we twirl and twirl and twirl We toppled over into the sedges, staining my white shirt with streaks of grassy green tints. We laughed at our clumsiness.

.nd revision: I pump my clenched fist to the cobalt sky. I stomp my an/ious feet on the dark, rich soil. I pluck stiff blades of bluestem and Indian grasses, flailing them into the persistent wind. I'm letting my fren ied body, possessed by beautiful beats of the lovely birds, guide me. Watching the whipping wings of the golden eagle, (lapping up and down, )onducting all of the blue *ays. +aking the beats with their beaks. , goat strolls shyly up to me, and asks, #+ay I have this dance-% with her hoof offered outward. "o further words were spoken. I grab her inviting hoof and we twirl and twirl and we twirl and twirl and twirl. We toppled over into sedges, staining my new white shirt with violent streaks of grassy green tints. We laughed at our clumsiness.

0rd revision: I pump my clenched fist to cobalt sky. I stomp my an/ious feet on dark, rich soil. I pluck stiff blades of bluestem and Indian grasses, flailing them into persistent wind. I'm letting fren ied body, possessed by beautiful beats of lovely birds, guide me. Watching whipping wings of golden eagle, (lapping up and down, )onducting all the blue *ays. +aking beats with their beaks. , goat strolls shyly up to me, and asks, #+ay I have this dance-% with hoof offered outward. "o further words spoken. I grab her inviting hoof. We twirl and twirl and we twirl and twirl and twirl. We toppled over into sedges, staining my new white shirt with violent streaks of grassy green tints. We laughed at clumsiness.

1th revision: I pump my clenched fist to cobalt sky. I stomp my an/ious feet on dark, rich soil. I pluck stiff blades of bluestem and Indian grasses, flailing them into persistent wind. Inhaling deeply sweet aroma of lilacs, I'm letting fren ied body, possessed by beautiful chanting chirps of lovely birds, guide me. Watching whipping wings of golden eagle, (lapping up and down, )onducting all the blue *ays. +aking beats with their beaks. , goat takes a respite from nibbling bitter mulberries, strolls shyly up to me,

and asks, #+ay I have this dance-% with hoof offered outward. "o further words spoken. I grab her inviting hoof. We twirl and twirl and we twirl and twirl and twirl. We toppled over into sedges, poking me and staining my new white shirt with violent streaks of grassy green tints. We laughed at clumsiness. 2his is a poem that was written in syllabics. I figured I would revise this one starting off by not worrying about maintaining the syllabic measure and seeing where that takes it, especially wanting to have a more active voice. I decided to start with some strong actions by taking the second stan a and making that the first stan a. I changed the verbs from pumping and stomping to #I pump% and #I stomp% to make them more aggressive. I also changed punting to I pluck the grasses and flail them into the wind. In the ne/t stan a, I re-worded the original first stan a. 3ince I was mostly concerned with the syllables rather than the sound in the original version, I also wanted to add some sound devices to the revision. I added alliteration at a significant time when I was mentioning musical beats when it says #by the beautiful beats of the birds.% I really liked the image I created of the golden eagle flapping its wings up and down and relating that to a music conductor that is conducting the blue *ays who are making the musical beats. I added a slant rhyme here with beats and beaks. I wanted to match the form with the content more also. I changed the spacing of the twirling on the page to illustrate how we twirled. It started out close together and then with each twirl we got a little wider and wider until our arms were fully outstretched. (or the second revision, even though I liked the concrete imagery I already established, I felt there were opportunities to be more descriptive still. I chose to accomplish this by adding modifiers to any of the nouns I could. I went through and added twelve modifiers to nouns. I read through to see if it sounded like too much. I liked how it sounded. 2he images were very specific instead of general and this made the images a lot stronger. (or the third revision, I wanted to see what effect it would have to take out the small, unimportant words. I remembered doing this for an assignment before and I liked the effect it had that other time. I removed some prepositions and #the% several times. I was still surprised at the large effect I noticed by doing this. It sounded more #poetic% is how I would describe it. It says things such as #to cobalt sky% or #into persistent wind% instead of #the cobalt sky% or #the persistent wind.% I considered this revision a victory. (or the fourth revision I felt this outdoor scene could be e/perienced better if I added synesthesia. I did it to another poem recently and liked the effect it had on that poem. I added senses such as hearing the chanting chirps, the bitter taste of the mulberries, and the sweet aroma of lilacs. 2hese all contributed to the overall synesthesia of the poem and it helped to top off all of the specific descriptions of the scenery of the prairie.