How to Make Book Spine Poems

Travis here with your annual reminder that April is National Poetry Month. So it’s the perfect time for book spine centos. Give one a try. Or try it with your students/patrons.

Here are my tips for creating a book spine cento:

1. Check out the book spine poem gallery for inspiration.
2. Get to a place with plenty of books. A library works nicely. Or a large home collection.
3. Start looking at titles, and see what strikes you. Arrange and rearrange in your head. The best part of this type of poetry is the fact that you don’t know where you’ll end up.
4. Have a pencil and paper with you to write down titles that stand out – you can refer back to them later.
5. Don’t be afraid to use the library catalog (if available) to look up titles with specific words or phrases that fit.

Additional Resources:

What is a cento?

Sorted Books by Nina Katchadourian

National Poetry Month website

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