non-sentences

less of the gloom
            a sunny afternoon
no relentless windy roar
              no torrential downpour
random non-sentences unwhole
                     elevations of the soul
re-arrangement of the mind’s furniture
                      fragmented but pure
peacefully ferment
           a magical moment
conjuration of verse 
               poetic conjures
small comforts in lyrical spaces
                  phrasal interfaces

Kim M. Russell, 3rd March 2026
Image by Bill Muganda on Unsplash

Melissa is hosting the dVerse Poets Pub Tuesday Poetics this week, and we are constructing poems from phrases, small groups of words “standing together as a conceptual unit, typically forming a component of a clause,” not complete sentences: they don’t contain a subject and a verb together.

Melissa gives us an overview of the different kinds of phrases and shares a poem by Andrew Joron which contain only phrases. It has a great title: ‘The Phrases of the Moon’.

The style and format of poem is up to us. The only rule is that we may not use complete sentences.

32 thoughts on “non-sentences”

  1. I really like this, Kim. It reads as an ad lib, stream of consciousness. I am especially fond of “re-arrangement of the mind’s furniture
    fragmented but pure.”

    Also, Mr. Linky is there now. I just got it set up in the nick of time.🙃

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  5. Stylistically a marvel, in this form the emotion, or feeling — and setting is elevated. I like it very, very much. There are openings left for interpretation, or “mood” of the reader also. The form works better than many others on fact. To be studied (by me) because I tried but could not get what appears on this page to be so easy, natural, flowing.

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  12. I love these lines “random non-sentences unwhole elevations of the soul” (who needs sentences? Nobody! Especially not the Soul!). And “peacefully ferment a magical moment” (I hope to bottle all my magic moments).

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