A Writer's Notebook, Day One-Thousand-Three-Hundred-And-Eighty-Three

I want to get more playful in my poetry again, want to push myself in terms of sound and image and syntax.  That was the mode I was in for a bit a few weeks ago, and I really feel that the poems were cooking.  I know it is just a matter of pushing myself in that direction, and maybe I just need to do a bit more reading of some poets whose work explores those elements in ways that reverberate for me.  I know that I want to read more Gertrude Stein right now, for example.  I want to get into that place again and she is a poet who often helps me find my way there.  I also want to get into some more contemporary works.  I can think of many poets whose work I love and who inspire me.  I have David Baker's new book, for example, and a collection of Wanda Coleman's that I just picked up.  I am in the mood to absorb other poet's words right now, and I think that is something that comes and goes for me.  I am often so into my own writing that it can be hard to want that influence at times.  I mean, I know how alluring the sounds and experiments can be, how easily I can be pushed in one way or another, and when I am in a zone, I don't always want to be redirected in those ways, but I should also remember that, even if I am pushed towards writing something by another poet's work, it will still remain filtered through my own mind and language.  It is inevitable that whatever I write is written by me.

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