[stylist] the secret to writing poems

[Angela fowler]

Lori, I'm with you. Prose writing comes naturally to me, while poetry
(though I wax poetic once in a blue moon) leaves me baffled and in awe of
those who can grasps its intricacies. I guess waxing poetic and actually
writing poetry are two totally different things. 

-----Original Message-----
From: stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of LoriStay at aol.com
Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 9:50 AM
To: stylist at nfbnet.org
Subject: Re: [stylist] the secret to writing poems

I'm supposed to write a poem for my class, but so far I've only been able to
do it while half in the dream state in the middle of the night, and in the 
morning it doesn't look like much.   Haven't really written poetry in a long

time.   I used to write it after unhappy romances, but haven't had those
since my 
marriage.

i like what you've written here, Cindy, though I don't know if I'm adequate
to follow the suggestions! Give me prose anytime!
Lori

In a message dated 4/5/09 9:26:38 PM, slerythema at insightbb.com writes:


> Punctuation is important, but it is more important to see how lines 
> begin and end, what lines are they next to, how are they grouped 
> together, is there correlation between how the groups are formed (i.e. 
> line one of every grouping ends in 'ly', every second line talks about 
> nature), the line breaks can change the meaning of certain phrases or 
> add emphasis simply breaking it in the middle.
> 
> There are a lot of elements to poetry that need to be broken down when 
> learning to write. It isn't all about following specific rules for 
> certain forms. The author must take all of the things into 
> consideration. Once the words are down on the paper from the emotion 
> flowing out of the writer, the real work begins.
> 
> For example, a friend of mine had to put down his retired guide dog 
> after a stroke. I am not a strong poet but I knew I wanted share my 
> sympathy for his grief but still encourage him to seek a new guide. He 
> had talked to me many times about not being sure that he could get 
> another one after retiring his first dog.
> 
> I found a lovely poem on a grief writing site that was for the passing 
> of a pet. After contacting the author for permission to tweak a little 
> to make it relevant to a guide dog, I began putting down the elements 
> that I had wanted to express. After the words were on the page, I had 
> to really look at each line of the original poem and how thoughts were 
> broken down. Then I had to make changes to my word choices, where the 
> lines would break, and alter some of my actual thought to make it fit 
> with the original poem. This was not something that could readily be
understood from just listening to the poem.
> If one only had the use of a screenreader, they would have to be 
> extremely meticulous with selecting words to hear them read and moving 
> around the poem carefully with a super critical ear. It would be far 
> easier to see the connections in written form.
> 
> Okay, just some things to really think about when writing poetry. This 
> is a really interesting discussion and hopefully the occasional poem I 
> write will benefit.
> 
> Cindy
> 




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