For a long long time (and sometimes even now) I didn't consider myself a poet. I thought that giving myself that title would somehow seem prideful or like I was aspiring to a realm I didn't belong in. My poems are awkward, sometimes trite sounding, often there is some cheesy line in there that ruins the whole thing. But .. well, I write down about a tenth of the poems that tumble inside my head and since one or two people in the whole universe reads them I thought I should at least explain my writing style.
When I come across an interesting thought I play with it and chew on it. I might handle it for a few days and then all at once the poem just comes to me and I write the whole thing out in one or two drafts but usually with few alterations.
Most of my poems have a few short stanzas or short lines followed by longer stanzas and a more regular rhythm until I sum things up with a two line stanza.
This is an exact representation of how I think. There's that moment of inspiration, a word, a phrase, a spark, followed by deeper more organized thought and when I've thought through an idea straight to the end I usually summarized for myself an answer to the question, "So what?" or "where does this idea get me?" "what is the point?"
It's not elegant, it's not smooth. But it's me, and if you are reading - I thought you might want to understand.
(note: We just read "Love that Dog" as a family and if you hate poetry you'll identify with the main character. I highly recommend it.)
2 comments:
Still have the poem on Wisdom you wrote. Still love it!
Brooke, I would love to have you email it to me! I don't keep track of anything I write. (This is also a sneaky way to get your email address ;)
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