Golden Shovel Poetry Prompts
Quick answer: Golden shovel poetry prompts: 14 original source lines and exercises for the form Terrance Hayes invented, plus advice on end words, credit and revision.
The golden shovel is the newest form on most prompt lists, invented by Terrance Hayes in 2010 in homage to Gwendolyn Brooks. The rule: take a line from an existing poem, then write a new poem in which each word of that borrowed line becomes, in order, the final word of one of your lines. Read your end words vertically and the source line reappears, hidden in plain sight like a watermark.
The form's secret difficulty is not the mechanics but the gravity. Your poem keeps getting pulled toward the source poem's subject, and the best golden shovels resist that pull, travelling somewhere the original never went while the borrowed words tug quietly at the margins. Choose lines with plain, flexible words; a line full of rare nouns will steer you like a rail.
The Prompts
For copyright safety, these prompts use public domain lines or your own words as sources. Always name the source line and poet beneath your title, whatever you use.
How to Use These
Set the end words down the right margin first, one per line, before writing anything else. Then draft toward each fixed word as if it were a stepping stone, letting enjambment carry sentences across several line endings so the borrowed words sit naturally inside your syntax rather than clanging at the ends. If a word jams you, small function words like 'the' and 'with' are gifts, since almost any sentence can pass through them.
Revise by covering the right margin and reading your poem as if the constraint did not exist. It must stand alone. Then uncover the margin and check the vertical line still reads cleanly. Credit the source under your title, 'after' followed by the poet's name is the convention Hayes established. If you submit a golden shovel to a contest, use a public domain source line and include the credit; originality rules stay satisfied and judges enjoy watching a form handled well.
What poets can take from this
- Choose source lines full of small flexible words rather than rare nouns.
- Write the borrowed words down the right margin before drafting anything.
- Use enjambment so sentences flow across the fixed end words instead of stopping at each.
- Let your poem leave the source poem's subject; the pull back is the form's trap.
- Always credit the source line and poet beneath your title.
Try it yourself
Take the public domain line 'The fog comes on little cat feet' and write a golden shovel about the morning a diagnosis arrived, letting the weather do the talking your family could not.
Questions
What is a golden shovel poem?
It is a form invented by Terrance Hayes in which every word of a borrowed line becomes an end word in your new poem, in original order. Reading your line endings top to bottom reveals the source line. Hayes named it after Gwendolyn Brooks's poem 'We Real Cool', set at the Golden Shovel pool hall.
Do I need permission to write a golden shovel?
Writing one for practice needs no permission. For publication or contests, using a public domain line is safest, since the whole borrowed line appears within your poem. Whatever the source, credit the poet and poem beneath your title.
Can the source line come from prose or song?
Yes, poets shovel sentences from novels, letters, speeches and songs. The same cautions apply: credit the source, and prefer public domain or your own material when the poem will be published.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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