30 Poems in 30 Days: Finding New Ways To Stay Inspired
September 30, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 10 Comments
This is Day 27 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
The Search for Inspiration
Sometimes I get stuck for ideas to write about. It is easy to get stuck in a rut as a poet. Staring at a blank page or a blank screen can be intimidating. Here are a few ways, presented in the tried and true list style, which can help you get started.
Call a friend and talk about old times
Collaborate with another poet
Exercise
Give yourself a deadline
Give yourself permission to write badly
Go someplace new
Interview yourself
Just start writing anything that comes to mind as fast as you can
Listen to your favorite music
Look at old photographs
Meditate
Read a magazine or a newspaper
Read someone else’s poetry
Read your own poetry
Review your old work
Start with a title
Take a swim, bath or a shower
Take a walk
Try another medium such as drawing or painting
Try something new
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Use one of the methods from the list above as inspiration for your poem. if you post your poem, be sure to write down which method you chose.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
If you truly want to get the poetry world all riled up, write a book of prose poems. If you don’t believe me, just read some of the reviews of Karen Volkman’s work. Better yet, go read the work yourself and see if YOU get riled up.
Interview with Karen Volkman
Karen Volkman: Poetry’s Latest Punchline
Karen Volkman – Vacancy’s Ambassador
Poems
[I have a friend. My friend is a sky.]
There Was a Stare
When Kiss Spells Contradiction
Books
Spar
Crash’s Law
30 Poems in 30 Days: Free Verse
September 29, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 18 Comments
This is Day 26 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
Trading Safety for Freedom
I’ve touched on the subject of free verse before, most notably in the article about the pros and cons of meter. Free verse is poetry that does not use a regular meter or rhyme. While poetry without rhyme dates back many centuries, the practice of using neither meter nor rhyme was a poetic movement that began in French and Europe during the 1800s. The first popular American poet to write in free verse was Walt Whitman.
Free verse does not mean that there are no patterns or rhythms at all. Instead, the rhyme is determined, sometimes subconsciously, by the poet. The lines come in the form of thought patterns, breath patterns, visual patterns, and syntactic patterns. More to the point, the form tends to mirror the voice of the poet.
While in some ways, free verse does not require the discipline of metered and rhymed poetry, it creates new requirements. The poet must determine, without the crutch of form, when the line ends and what makes for the best line. They must find a way to make the poem still feel poetic without relying on some of the most accepted tools. With free verse, you cannot defend the use of a word or phrase simply because it fits the meter. You must determine where to end the line because there is no set length to fall back on. Even the length of the poem is now completely up to you. So, while you have less limitations and restrictions, you have more responsibility.
While free verse is ultimately freeing, it is not for the lazy of for those who think it will be easier than writing metered or rhymed poetry. There is no safety net without form. There is no literary excuse for a mistake, because you have all the power. If you choose to write in free verse, you sill have to learn to be confident in your own voice, because that is what you will be relying on.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Write the first draft of your poem in paragraph form and then change it into a free verse poem. Don’t be surprised if you have to change lines, words and phrases. That will probably be a part of the process.
Today’s Recommended Poet
Bruce Bond is a highly respected poet, teacher and the poetry editor for the American Literary Review. In this interview, he explains part of his poetic philosophy. “white space is one way of suggesting a kind of silent listening, an openness to the strange and what the language longs to accommodate, how words are taken to their limits. I like poems with silence in them, both the formal resonance of literal silence, and silence as a metaphor for the unknowable, the erotic, the sublime.”
Poems on the Web
Books of Poetry
- The Anteroom of Paradise 2006
- Cinder 2003
- The Throats of Narcissus 2001
30 Poems in 30 Days: Poetry Contests
September 28, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 8 Comments
This is Day 25 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
You May Already be a Winner
There is nothing wrong with entering poetry contests. It is one way of taking part in the larger world of poetry. It also gives you the motivation to write well and to keep writing. If you win a legitimate contest, it is a great honor. Unfortunately, many contests are not legitimate.
I’ve said it before and I will say it again. There is no quick or easy route to get rich as a poet. Even making a living as a poet is a difficult task. The masses do not buy books of poetry. Exceptions to this rule are rare, and generally involve someone who is famous for something other than poetry. Keep this in mind at all times, because there are people out there looking to take advantage of you.
Poetry contests are one of the methods that unscrupulous people use to take advantage of poets. They offer a substantial prize, $5,000, $10,000, $25,000, $100,000 to the winners of their poetry contests. All you have to do is submit your poems – along with a fee. Even if they don’t ask for an upfront fee, they still have ways of making you pay. In fact, if someone is offering you $100,000 for a contest you pay nothing to enter, you’d better be extra careful about entering.
Be prepared to become a finalist. An unscrupulous contest promoter’s goal will be to get you to attend a convention at which the winner will be named. The convention will probably be at some pretty locale that is easy to get so, such as Las Vegas or Miami. The fee for the convention won’t be too unreasonable, because they want you to come, but make no mistake; you are paying for a trip along with many, many other people they named as finalists. It may be a nice vacation, but you didn’t get there on talent. I don’t mean to say that you aren’t talented, just that talent is irrelevant to the contest promoters.
As a finalist, they will also publish you. Your poem will appear in a nice thick book along with a bunch of other poems. The book will be attractive, possibly leather-bound, but the poems will just be a collection of whoever sent something in. The book will cost you at least twenty dollars, maybe more. They’ll be counting on you to buy several so that your family and friends can see your “accomplishment”. They’ll probably also offer to sell you a nice plaque, perhaps one with your poem engraved on it. Whatever the case, they’ll keep trying to find a way to get your money.
There is nothing wrong with entering contests, but it pays to do a little research before you enter. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and don’t enter contests if the sponsors seem unwilling to share the details of how the contest works. Look for contests that are sponsored by schools, newspapers, magazines, major corporations and reputable publishers. Understand that any fee you pay to enter is going to be used to fund the prizes. If the fee seems excessive, don’t enter. Five dollars is one thing, but as the price grows so do the chances that you are getting ripped off. It is better to make a five dollar mistake than a hundred dollar mistake.
Never pay an additional fee once you have entered a contest. Don’t pay to have the poem published. Don’t pay for a plaque. Don’t pay for a trip. If you are the one paying them, then you are not a winner.
Sorry for this fairly cynical post, but people need to be warned.
Today’s Assignment
Write a poem that begins and ends with the same word.
Today’s Featured Poet
I wanted to take this chance today to formally promote Rosemary Nissen-Wade’s recommended Australian poets. I have already discussed John Kinsella, who I found much to my liking. I haven’t had time to delve as deeply into these three poets, and I would appreciate hearing other people’s opinions about them.
30 Poems in 30 Days: Say What You Want to Say
September 27, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 20 Comments
This is Day 24 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
Let the Reader Decide
On October 15th, 1995, when the Internet was first getting noticed, I sat down and wrote a list of tips for poets. This was long before poewar.com, when I had a little spot on a newspaper’s server and dial up access that went out whenever it rained. I don’t quite know what made me think I was qualified to give advice. I was five years out of college with a degree in Creative Writing and I guess I thought I knew a thing or two.
The funny thing was how popular that article got. It was soon after I wrote that little article that my site started getting noticed. When I transferred my pages to poewar.com, the article stayed popular. Just going by today’s stats, it is the fourth most popular page on my site, and that includes my homepage. It gets between one and two hundred hits a day, consistently. Every once in a while, StumbleUpon remembers that its there and I get about a thousand hits in a day. The shysters over at poetryamerica.com even went and published most of it as if it was their own.
Twelve years later, I still pretty much stand by my advice. I was young and a little too sure of myself, but I was on target for the most part. I may have been a little too strident about unnamed poems (I still get angry comments about that) but overall I think the tips were helpful and I have reinterpreted a few of them for this project. One of the best pieces of advice that I gave was this:
Say what you want to say and let your readers decide what it means.
The advice was so good that I eventually turned it into a whole article. The essential point though, is that you can’t spend all of your time worrying about what the audience will think of your poem. They may love it or they may hate it. They may understand what you are saying or they may interpret it in an entirely different way. You need to accept that and let it happen.
You also need to respect your audience. Don’t waste precious lines by trying to make things obvious. Don’t be purposely vague, but don’t try to tell people what to think about what you write. If you do, be ready for them to disagree or worse, wonder why you thought they wouldn’t get it. A poem isn’t an essay or a manual; it is an attempt to capture a piece of the universe and save it on paper. That piece of the universe may be beautiful or ugly, amazing or mundane, but chances are it can’t be explained. If that sounds too philosophical, so be it.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Include a verb in every line of your poem.
Today’s Recommended Poet
I was out wandering today (which is why today’s article is so late) and I came across a book of poems by Ginny MacKenzie called Skipstone. I’ve finished the first half of the book and I love her voice. She has a real gift for setting small scenes that echo with meaning.
Poems by Ginny MacKenzie
Skipstone
Ossabaw Island, Georgia, April 4th
Mary Magdalene at the House of Simon
Aunt Lena Is Committed to Bellefonte State Hospital
Retreat to the Country of Pure Drought
30 Poems in 30 Days: Confessional Poetry
September 26, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 19 Comments
This is Day 23 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
The Personal Postmodernist
The current era of poetry is commonly referred to as the Postmodern Era. Postmodern thought is a complex series of philosophical and literary responses to the post World War II changes in world view and the acceleration of society. It isn’t the sort of thing you can explain in a blog post. I’ve taken entire classes on postmodern thought and I still can’t really explain it. The important thing to remember though, is that postmodernism is greatly concerned with challenging the traditional conventions of thought and communication.
One of the poetic movements that rose to prominence in the Postmodern Era is confessional poetry. Confessional poetry is about the writer. The poetry is about the writer’s life and the world around them. While confessional poems often touch on universal themes, they do so from the personal perspective.
The concept of poets writing about their own lives is not a recent development. You can go back through the ages and find poets discussing elements of their lives. What changed in the Postmodern Era was their approach. The language became more direct. The subject matter became more personal and the limits to what poets were willing to discuss evaporated. If a human being does it, chances are there’s a poet out there writing about it. The boundaries of sexuality, drug use, violence and other morality issues were the first and most obvious to fall, but the movement extends far beyond that.
Poets were writing about their role in society. They were writing about all of the things that were changing around them. The rise of commercialism, technology, social awareness and discontent were all subject matter for the postmodern era. In confessional poetry, all of this was related from the personal point of view. Problems weren’t presented as being out in the world at large, they were presented in the way that everyday people faced their problems.
The key to confessional poetry is an honest assessment of the poet’s life and experiences. Confessional poetry is written in the first person. While it can still be poetic and beautiful, it is often more direct and common in its language. It presents the poet’s point of view and relates strongly to the realities of the poet’s world. In many cases, no conclusions are drawn and no philosophy is discussed. Instead, the poet conveys their point by presenting life as they experience it. In other cases, the poet lays their point out directly, telling the reader exactly what they want them to think about things.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Write a poem that discusses a real moment in your life without discussing its larger meaning or attempting to lead the reader to a conclusion.
Today’s Recommended Poet
Terrance Hayes poetry is both personal and sociological. It comes wrapped in pop culture references and discussion of the world around him. He often mixes very real images with surreal touches.
Poems
Books
- Wind in a Box
2006
- Muscular Music
- Hip Logic
30 Poems in 30 Days: Breaking the Rules
September 25, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 15 Comments
This is Day 22 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
Doing What You Can’t
“Can’t” is a word that should rarely be applied to poetry. There is very little that “can’t” be done in a poem. The beauty of poetry is that the risks are so low. While it would be stupid of me to say that you “can’t” get on the bestseller’s list with a book of poetry, I can tell you that the market for poetry is significantly smaller than the market for fiction. You can choose to be saddened or frustrated by this, or you can embrace the minuscule size of the market. If you aren’t writing poetry to get rich, then you don’t have to worry about the demands of the market. You don’t have to write “marketable” poetry, because most poetry isn’t very marketable anyway. You are free to indulge you wildest and most experimental ideas (or your strictest and most conventional ideas) precisely because the consequences are so minor.
So what if most poetry doesn’t rhyme anymore? If you like the way it sounds, do it.
So what if nobody reads epic poems anymore? If you have that much to say about one thing, then you should say it.
So what if sestinas don’t sell well? Nothing sells well. Write it if you like it.
There is nothing wrong with taking risks and breaking rules. Just remember that broken rules don’t make a poem good or bad. You aren’t going to impress someone with your combination enjambment, alliteration and tetrameter unless the poem is actually good. you don’t break rules just to break rules. You do it because it is what produces the poem you want to produce.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Try something that scares you (just a little) and then write a poem about it.
Today’s Recommended Poet
Ken Rumble recently released a book, Key Bridge
- Ken Rumble’s blog
- A Review of Key Bridge
- Five Poems by Ken Rumble
- More Works by Ken Rumble
- More Poems, including excerpts from Key Bridge
30 Poems in 30 Days: Progression
September 24, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 16 Comments
This is Day 21 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
On the Move
Poetry, unlike prose, is not reliant on plot. While it is possible to create a poem with a plot, a plot is by no means a requirement for a successful poem. It is merely one option out of many. Progression, however, occurs whether a poem has a plot or not.
There should always be a reason why one line appears before or after another. There should be a reason why the first line is the first and the last line is the last. Even in an Imagist poem, the description of the image needs to progress. The readers shouldn’t feel as if they are being fed a series or random but related facts. They should feel as if the poem is leading them towards a shared goal or destination.
For many poets, progression is second nature. They automatically write in a linear style and it comes through with very little effort. That doesn’t mean that they can just assume the progression of the poem is perfect every time, but they often find little reason for change. Other poets spend much more time determining the order for their poetry. They consistently move or change lines simply because the original version (or even the revision) doesn’t seem to move forward or evoke the right impression. Determining order can be especially difficult in longer poems and Imagist poems that are not intended to tell a story so much as to develop an impression or feeling in the reader.
There are no quick and easy solutions to the problem of progression. Every poem is different and has different needs. It is fairly easy to judge the progression of a poem with a plot, but a poem about an image or an issue can be harder to interpret. Below are some ways to measure progression. This isn’t an exhaustive list, but it probably covers 90% of poems.
Chronological: Progression through time.
Spatial: Progression through a physical position
Process: Progression through a sequence of events.
Size: Progression from the large to the small or the small to the large.
Climactic: Progression through levels of importance
Relational: Progression that shows a relationship such as cause and effect, problem and solution, comparison and contrast
When reading and editing, try to determine what sort of progression is taking place and how successfully that progression is shown. Once you determine the type of progression you can judge each part of the poem by how it relates to the intended progression.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Write a three stanza poem that shows a progression with each stanza. The three stanzas should serve as a beginning, middle and end respectively. It might help to picture the poem as a three act play.
Today’s Recommended Poet
John Kinsella is an Australian poet that was recommended by axe-grinding Rosemary Nissen-Wade. I haven’t had the chance to read one of his books yet, but from the poems that appear online I detect a strong Imagist influence in his writing. He is definitely worth a look. With any luck, Rosemary will post her views on the poet.
Books of Poetry
- The New Arcadia
- Peripheral Light
30 Poems in 30 Days: Staying Positive
September 23, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 13 Comments
This is Day 20 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
The Other Kind of Stress
Poets can be a sensitive lot. In a way, that’s what poets are known for. Unfortunately, it can be a poet’s undoing. Writer’s block, in most cases, is simply a lack of confidence. A person gets so wrapped up in negative self talk, that no matter what they put on the page, it never seems good enough. When it reaches the point that the poet can no longer put words on the page at all, it has become a severe problem. Try to recognize when you are being overly self critical. Here are some ways that all people, including poets, sabotage themselves. Please note that I am adapting some of the material from Walt Schafer’s book, Stress Management for Wellness.
Negativising: Focusing only on the negative aspects of a situation. For example, if someone reads your poem and has mostly positive things say, but you focus only on the criticism, you are negativising.
Awfulizing: Focusing too much on a problem or obstacle until you build it up into a disaster. For example, you decide you can’t write today because you can’t find your favorite pen and without that, you won’t produce anything good.
Catastrophizing: This is when you go into a situation expecting the worst. For example, you decide not to submit your poems to a poetry magazine because you “already know they are going to turn you down.”
Ovegeneralizing: This is when you take a single negative event or piece of data and apply it to a much larger situation. For example, if you write a bad poem, you decide that you must have “lost it” and you might as well give up. Plenty of good poems get written right after bad poems.
Minimizing: This is when you downgrade praise or an accomplishment. For example, if you get published by that magazine you thought would never publish you, you decide that it must have been a fluke or they didn’t get very many submissions.
Perfectionism: Setting impossibly high standards for yourself or for a situation. For example, deciding that you have to have the perfect word to finish a line and you can’t move forward until that word comes to you.
There are other ways to sabotage yourself but I think you get the point. Don’t focus on the negative aspects of your writing. Its good to want to improve, but don’t paralyze yourself with unreasonable expectations or poor self image. Just write.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Write a poem that begins with a negative image or statement and ends with a positive image or statement.
Today’s Featured Poet
Sherman Alexie is a Native American poet, novelist and stand-up comedian. He is a prolific writer who probably doesn’t know the meaning of the words “writer’s block”.
- Review of The Business of FancyDancing and Old Shirts & New Skins
- Sherman Alexie’s Iowa Review Interview
- General Commentary on Sherman Alexie
- Alexie’s Web Site
Books of Poetry
30 Poems in 30 Days: About the Line
September 22, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 10 Comments
This is Day 19 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
Get in Line
The first and most recognizable difference between poetry and prose is the line. Poetry is written with line breaks and prose is not. While it is possible to write “prose poetry” without line breaks the reason it is called prose poetry is because it is written in a prose style. All other types of poetry rely on the line.
There are many ways to play with and manipulate the line in poetry. The most established way to define your line is the use of meter, which we have discussed several times already. Even when you use meter, it is far from the only consideration in the creation of a line.
One of the primary considerations in the use of the line in poetry is to determine the line break. Even if you use meter, you have to determine the number of feet in the meter you choose. Pentameter (generally a ten syllable line depending on the length of the feet) is going to have a much different feel than trimeter (generally a six syllable line). The first is around the length of the average sentence while the second is closer to the length of a phrase. Each creates a much different feel and rhythm.
The line is open to other sorts of manipulation beyond meter. One is the use of the enjambed line versus the endstopped line. An enjambed line breaks in the middle of a phrase or thought. An endstopped line finishes at the end of a sentence or a thought. The use of enjambment changes the rhythm of a poem and gives it a feel that is more like prose. It often results in readings that ignore line length entirely.
Another way that poets manipulate the line is through placement. They indent or otherwise displace a line, often to emphasize that line or to show a progression. These placements can often get quite intricate, with lines appearing in all sorts of locations on the page.
A final way to manipulate the line is length. With meter, there is generally (though not always) a consistent line length. When meter is not used, line length can be much more variable. Some poets manipulate this, following short lines with long lines, or combining line length and line placement to create shapes on the page. These poems are often called shape poems or pattern poems.
The key point, in my opinion, with any sort of line manipulation is that it should be done for a reason and it should enhance the reading of the poem. If a poem uses lines in a disruptive way, it can harm the overall experience of reading the poem and often says more about the poet than the poem. There is often a fine line between art and artifice. The more manipulative you get, the more you risk creating the latter.
Today’s Poetry Assignment
Write a poem that has a variable line length rather than a set meter. Use either enjammed or endstopped lines.
Today’s Featured Poet
Jennifer Perrine’s first book of poetry, The Body is No Machine
Sample Poems
30 Poems in 30 Days: Joining the Community
September 21, 2007 by J.C. Hewitt · 13 Comments
This is Day 18 of 30 Poems in 30 Days
Take your Place
One of the great things about this poetry project so far is that we have started to develop a community. We have regular contributors, occasional contributors and readers. A sense of community is important in poetry. Because the market for poetry is so small compared to the fiction market, it needs constant support to keep going.
There are many benefits to joining or creating a poetry community. You gain the support of your peers. You have the opportunity to compare yourself with and learn from other poets. You encourage each other to keep going. You meet the people who can help you down the road.
The people who publish other people’s poetry do it because they love it. There is no great financial benefit, and it is certainly easier to make money publishing something else. The best way to get noticed by these people is to get out in the poetry community and start introducing yourself. Attend poetry readings. Take poetry classes. Attend open mic nights and poetry slams. Get up on stage if you can. Support other people’s poetry by buying their books and magazines. The more you support poetry the more it will support you.
Today’s Assignment
Include the words “formal” and “casual” at some point in your poem.
Today’s Recommended Poetry
Rather than pick a single poet today, I am going to include a list of poetry magazines. I have linked to their submissions guidelines because I know that is information you will want to know, but I don’t just want you to consider submitting to them. I want you to read them. Subscribe to at least one or two of these magazines. Help keep them alive.
