Many poets get into a rut at some point in their lives, and begin to churn out the same old stuff, time after time. You know how it goes... You try to take a different route, but end up reverting to the same old beaten track you've been down so often. You want to write something unique, different, but it ends up just like all your other poetry. It can be very frustrating. How about doing something extraordinarily different to write your poems? Are you up for the challenge? Then read on...
Method 8: Overlapping Voices. Have you ever been at a party, a shopping mall or other social gathering where you stand there and try to listen to all the voices talking simultaneously? This cacophony of sound feels like a waterfall of noise - a sonic wallpaper - and its usual to consign it to the background and focus on your own conversation as you block it out. But what if you listened more closely and tried to discern the things people were discussing all around you?
Now imagine trying to capture all those words on paper. Transcribing at this level is utterly impossible, but that's the point... If you want some new ideas or lines for your poetry, listen to what's going on around you and try to grab the words. The voices will overlap, the topics will be diverse and the noise will be difficult to penetrate. It will be an absolute mess, but from out of that chaos comes order!
Another less conspicuous way of doing the same thing is to record the multiple conversations from a party or a visit to your local coffee shop, or listen to several recordings simultaneously (e.g. Radio or TV news) and try to grab the words you hear from the hubbub of voices. The idea behind this method is that you either hear words or phrases you can capture, or you will imagine you hear those words. Either way, it doesn't matter because you'll be creating a new piece, regardless.
Steve Wheeler
Image from Flickr used under a Creative Commons Licence
Previous posts in this series:
Experimental Poetry 1: Found Poetry
Experimental Poetry 2: Stream of Consciousness
Experimental Poetry 3: Fake Translations
Interesting! I am definitely going to try this.
ReplyDeleteWould be interested in.uour results, Sarah. Share them here if you can!
DeleteSomeone recorded a choir and claimed angels could be heard singing on a religious show I watched once… it was obviously a cassette tape dragging… but it made for a great poem! Thanks for the push buddy.
ReplyDeleteEvery little helps Matt. Cheers.
DeleteT.S. Eliot's The Wasteland overlapped with miscellaneous Beatles lyrics:
ReplyDeleteApril is the cruellest month
Yesterday, love was such an easy game to play
Yet ... I could not speak and my eyes failed
Now I need a place to hide away.
The typist home at teatime
Wearing a face that she keeps in a jar by the door
The young man carbuncular arrives
With one bold stare. Who is it for?
After the torchlight, red on sweaty faces -
I've been working like a dog
Dragging my slimy belly on the bank
I should be sleeping like a log.
For thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire
I can connect nothing with nothing
How many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall -
These fragments I have shored against my ruins.
Love it Iain. It's a form of poetry briccolage, as espoused by Claude Levi-Strauss.
DeleteI've a question about this. My daughter, who has worked in publishing, said I could never publish this in a book, since copyright lasts till 70 years after the author's death, which would rule out both T.S. Eliot and any of the Beatles. Is this correct?
DeleteYes, you'd need to wait another 10 years before using any of Eliot's lines, and longer for Lennon's. But I'm espousing using overlapping voices you hear in the street or at a party. No copyright on that.
DeleteOverlapping words are the best. The juxtaposed of unrelated conversations challenge the mind & suggest new (to you) couplings of though, new directions. Works with radio in your car, too.
ReplyDeleteYep, plenty of variables to be explored in this method!
DeleteI will give this a try...I already did the prompt one earlier today!
ReplyDeletewrote one I know isn't right ~ will try again, at my age these lessons are hard , because I have to try ~ my poems come to me all at once, never tried to write..
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