Workshop: The American Sentence

The American Sentence:

A 17‑syllable American poetic form created by Allen Ginsberg
Live meeting via Zoom on January 28 at 7 PM.
Register by Noon on January 25th to receive the link.
Send work to share by 4 PM on the day of the workshop meeting.

Origins:

The American Sentence was invented by Allen Ginsberg in the early 1980s as a deliberate response to the way English-language poets had been imitating Japanese **haiku**. Ginsberg believed that the traditional 5–7–5syllable structure of haiku, when transplanted into English, became rigid and artificial. Instead, he proposed a form that preserved haiku’s 17-syllable total but adapted it to American speech and syntax.

What Ginsberg Wanted—Ginsberg’s goals included:

A haiku for American prosody— linear, left-to-right, like American writing habits.

A single grammatical sentence— not three lines, but one breath, one thought, one moment.

Compression and clarity— he encouraged cutting filler words like “a” and “the”.

Mindfulness — he saw the form as a way to capture fleeting, vivid moments of perception, influenced by his Buddhist practice.

First Publications:

Ginsberg published a small set of American Sentences in his 1994 book Cosmopolitan Greetings, where he offered examples drawn from daily life, often with brief scene-setting notes followed by a single 17‑syllable sentence capturing the moment. (examples below).

Philosophical Roots

The form reflects:

Beat aesthetics — immediacy, spontaneity, attention to the present.

Buddhist insight — awareness of transience and the sacredness of ordinary moments.

American vernacular — the rhythms of everyday speech rather than the inherited metrics of Japanese poetry.

How the Form Works:

– Exactly 17 syllables

– One sentence*(though it can be grammatically loose)

– No required seasonal word, juxtaposition, or nature theme

– Can be used singly or as a sequence of discrete, non-narrative stanzas

Immediate sensory details:
Capturing sights, sounds, and feelings in real-time.

Juxtaposition:
Placing ordinary scenes next to deeper reflections or cultural observations.


“Show, don’t tell”:
Use precise imagery to evoke emotion rather than stating it directly.

Examples From Ginsberg Himself:

“Four skinheads stand in the streetlight rain chatting under an umbrella.”
“Put on my tie in a taxi, short of breath, rushing to meditate.”
“Crescent moon, girls chatter at twilight on the bus ride to Ankara.”
“That gray-haired man in business suit and black turtleneck thinks he’s still young.”

Suggested Exercises:

Write several American Sentences of your own until you feel you‘ve got the hang of it.

Try adapting an old poem into American Sentences.

Write three or more American Sentences that, together, form a single poem.


If you journal, add an American Sentence to your journal each day. Use them as raw material for later poems.

Learning to write American Sentences can sharpen a writer’s craft in ways that are surprisingly deep for such a small form.

✨ Creative and Cognitive Benefits

  • Precision and concision
    Ginsberg emphasized “condense, condense, condense,” stripping away unnecessary words like a, an, the to create immediacy ThoughtCo. Practicing this teaches you to cut filler and sharpen your language.
  • Heightened attention to moments
    The form is rooted in noticing—“poets are people who notice what they notice” Poetry Magnum Opus. Because you only have 17 syllables, you become more attuned to small, vivid details in daily life.
  • Improved sentence-level craft
    Unlike haiku, American Sentences are sentences, not lineated poems. This forces you to think about syntax, rhythm, and pacing inside a single breath.
  • A built‑in “turn”
    Many descriptions of the form emphasize capturing a moment with a pivot or shift Poetry Magnum Opus. Practicing this teaches you how to create emotional or imagistic movement in miniature.

🧠 Skill-Building for Larger Writing Projects

  • Better editing instincts
    Because the form demands ruthless compression, it strengthens your ability to revise longer work—poems, essays, fiction—with more confidence and clarity.
  • Micro-worldbuilding
    Writers note that American Sentences can “build a world” in just 17 syllables actsofrevision.com. This is a powerful training ground for flash fiction, poetry, or even crafting compelling lines in a novel.
  • Daily writing habit
    The form is small enough to sustain a consistent practice. Many writers use it as a warm-up or journaling technique.

🎨 Creative Freedom Compared to Haiku

  • No line constraints
    Ginsberg created the form partly because he felt English haiku’s 5–7–5 structure was too rigid ThoughtCo. American Sentences keep the syllabic discipline but allow more natural English phrasing.
  • More flexible subject matter
    Haiku traditionally leans toward nature and seasonal cues. American Sentences can be gritty, urban, surreal, political—whatever the moment demands.