Yeah, I’m a mega-nerd, as mega-nerdy as they come.

Text alignment isn’t just for right-aligning headers and center-aligning titles and tabbing over for paragraphs and such. You, the creator, can utilize it as a stylistic tool in your writing.

Take a look at the following text, meant to be a free form poem:

 

Six. I’ll uncover your flaws and love you because of them,

not despite them.

Seven. I’ll show you a side no one knows and I won’t hold back,

because I won’t want to.

Eight. I’ll pick out odd fruits at the farmer’s market with you, so we can try new things together.

Nine. I’ll memorize your drink order, soon enough.

At best, mild, right? Now, take a look at the text when you rearrange the alignment creatively:

Six. I’ll uncover your flaws and love you because of them,

not despite them.

Seven. I’ll show you a side no one knows and I won’t hold back,

because I won’t want to.

Eight. I’ll pick out odd fruits at the farmer’s market with you, so we can try new things together.

Nine. I’ll memorize your drink order, soon enough.

– 13 Ways To Say I Love You

Pretty cool, right?

The alignment forces your eyes to jump around, creating chaos and randomness that reveals a frazzled sentiment in the writing itself. It’s whimsical, it’s amusing, and the different starting places for a thought almost allude to a different point in development of said thought.

Next time you approach free form, interpret it a little more literally. FREE FORM. The words do not have to abide by the same left justification to which they are always confined. Let them wiggle around freely!

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