A Writer's notebook, Day One-Hundred-Forty-Seven
I did write another list poem. It is hard to do them repeatedly and feel that they are moving forwards, but that is part of the challenge, I think. In some ways, it feels like something becomes more meaningful as it continues. Each one I have written is somewhat the same, and yet they are all quite unique, I think, though they do gain resonance when I look at them together.
I am not really sure where that is going. I'm certain that some of them will be good, but I do want to write more than this. It feels that the desire to write more varied kinds of poetry will pick up and kick me into action, so I am not worrying about it, as long as I keep working. Indeed, it feels that the best thing to do is to allow myself to indulge in this one form, and see how far I can take that. In doing so, ironically, I am stirring up ideas for other poems, though none are fully in focus as of yet.
It is, at least for me, much harder to investigate and analyze the process of poetic inspiration than that for writing fiction. Fiction draws on a more intellectualized set of skills, and feels more like putting pieces together. I can see the elements that make an idea work for me in fiction, and I have a sense of what it is that might be needed or missing.
In writing a poem, I find that is not the nature of my experience. By contrast, it is a much more urgent and less coherent thing. In essence, the idea seems to come almost entirely formed. That is not to say that honing it into a poem can't take work, but that the essential image at the center, the thing the poem seeks to manifest, has to be coherent first. In fiction, I am writing, often, to find that thing, but in poetry, it must exist already.
Where the idea comes from is not clear. Or, rather, it is not the issue of where it comes from, but what makes a particular thing strike the right chord. It might be anything, some small detail that would be unnoticed most often, but for some reason sticks out and becomes a poem. I've gotten ideas for poems watching Antiques Roadshow, or reading, or standing out in the rain without an umbrella. It can be anything, and it does not need to be major.
So, while I can't analyze effectively where the inspiration comes from, I can recognize that the most important thing for me to do is to be open to that inspiration. In the end, I may not fully understand why a particularly observation becomes the source for poetry, but I can recognize that the key is in being available when inspiration does strike. My mind has to be open to the possibilities, and I think that in the past few days, I've begun the process of shifting my thinking to open up that form of expression once more.
I am not really sure where that is going. I'm certain that some of them will be good, but I do want to write more than this. It feels that the desire to write more varied kinds of poetry will pick up and kick me into action, so I am not worrying about it, as long as I keep working. Indeed, it feels that the best thing to do is to allow myself to indulge in this one form, and see how far I can take that. In doing so, ironically, I am stirring up ideas for other poems, though none are fully in focus as of yet.
It is, at least for me, much harder to investigate and analyze the process of poetic inspiration than that for writing fiction. Fiction draws on a more intellectualized set of skills, and feels more like putting pieces together. I can see the elements that make an idea work for me in fiction, and I have a sense of what it is that might be needed or missing.
In writing a poem, I find that is not the nature of my experience. By contrast, it is a much more urgent and less coherent thing. In essence, the idea seems to come almost entirely formed. That is not to say that honing it into a poem can't take work, but that the essential image at the center, the thing the poem seeks to manifest, has to be coherent first. In fiction, I am writing, often, to find that thing, but in poetry, it must exist already.
Where the idea comes from is not clear. Or, rather, it is not the issue of where it comes from, but what makes a particular thing strike the right chord. It might be anything, some small detail that would be unnoticed most often, but for some reason sticks out and becomes a poem. I've gotten ideas for poems watching Antiques Roadshow, or reading, or standing out in the rain without an umbrella. It can be anything, and it does not need to be major.
So, while I can't analyze effectively where the inspiration comes from, I can recognize that the most important thing for me to do is to be open to that inspiration. In the end, I may not fully understand why a particularly observation becomes the source for poetry, but I can recognize that the key is in being available when inspiration does strike. My mind has to be open to the possibilities, and I think that in the past few days, I've begun the process of shifting my thinking to open up that form of expression once more.
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