Writing great poetry

Is there a secret to writing good poetry? There are certainly no real rules. Watch Dead Poets Society, where the teacher tells his students to tear out the turgid introduction to 'How to Write Poetry', because it is rule bound, and actually stifles creative expression rather than encouraging it.  

So how do you go about writing a good poem? What is the process by which you end up with verse that is lyrical, beautiful to read, with some emotional impact? 

Well, the clue should be in the three elements I just listed. Let's take them one at a time...

Lyrical - what does it mean? Think of the lyrics in a song (more on this in a moment). Or think of the work of some of the masters of poetic expression. They don't simply say it as it is. William Wordsworth didn't just walk about a bit. He wandered lonely as a cloud (a simile). Dylan Thomas didn't write blandly about death - he raged against the dying of the light (a metaphor). Think deeply about what you are trying to describe and then go the extra mile. Nothing is off the table in poetry. Language can be made to mean what you want it to mean. Experiment, take risks, and write lyrical poetry that gets people thinking. Step out of the rut of the ABAB rhyme and try to colour outside the lines you've imposed upon yourself. 

Secondly, poetry should be beautiful to read. Now beauty is in the eye of the beholder (you can remove it with any eyewash). Essentially, poetry is subjective. Some may love your writing while others might despise it. Most will be fairly ambivalent, so it's up to you as the writer to convince your audience to keep reading. How do you captivate them? Think about the poetry of Paul Simon: 'My eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light, that split the night...' or 'The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls, and tenement halls...' and see how he generates a stark urban imagery for his classic song Sound of Silence. There are various devices, tempos, formats and literary techniques you can employ to create atmosphere, tell a story or capture your reader's attention. Many are already presented in previous posts on this blog, so you'd be very silly not to explore them, wouldn't you? 

Finally, emotional impact. Yes, you can write a poem that is devoid of emotions, but such poems tend to be bland and sterile. Most poets have been through some kind of trauma, heartache or sadness in their lives. Write about your experiences, and you'll naturally have emotional impact.  Emotion can also present as joyful, angry or fearful, or a whole range of other expressions. Your poetry doesn't have to be melancholic to have emotional impact. It can be humorous, or it can be quizzical. Whatever you're writing, write it with some passion, and it will naturally have an emotional impact. 

Steve Wheeler

Image source Flickr

Poetic devices 15: Paradox

Life is complex and full of contradictions. As poets, we try to represent life in all its complexity and we can call upon an extraordinarily diverse range of devices to achieve their goals. One of the least understood, but perhaps most appropriate devices to illustrate our complex and contradictory lives is paradox. The poet can create tension that represents turmoil, confusion and even hypocrisy. Take the example of the line by William Shakespeare in Hamlet 'I must be cruel only to be kind.' It's a paradox. 

Paradox should not be confused with oxymoron. An oxymoron commonly uses just two word to create a contradiction - bitter sweet, awfully good, police intelligence (the last one is a joke, don't @ me). A paradox, by comparison can take up a full sentence or even an entire stanza. The following example by English romantic poet William Wordsworth is a great example of paradox:

my heart leaps up when I behold
a rainbow in the sky:
so was it when my life began;
so is it now I am a man;
so be it when I shall grow old,
or let me die!
the child is father of the man;
and I could wish my days to be
bound each to each by natural piety

The line 'the child is father of the man' is clearly paradoxical, but interestingly is a profound statement about how childhood shapes character in later life. It was so deep that Sigmund Freud stole the idea and used it to develop his philosophy in the development of psychotherapy. 

Paradox is not easy to achieve, but if you can do it, it's a neat yet effective way to add some depth to your poetry, so have a try!

Steve Wheeler

Image source

Previous posts in this series

1. Simile
2. Metaphor
3. Repetition and refrains
4. Alliteration
5. Assonance
6. End Rhymes
7. Internal Rhymes
8. Rhythm and Tempo
9. Enjambment

10. Allegory

11. Metonymy

12. Cacophony

13. Calligram

14. Personification

Poetic devices 9: Enjambment

Enjambment .... it's a French word, right? Lots of poets have never heard of it. But we've all seen it. We just don't know the correct word to describe it. You know... that weird thing where a new sentence starts in the middle of a line... maybe even the last line of a stanza... and then carries on as if nothing has happened into the next stanza. 

Enjambment comes from the French verb enjamber which means to stride across, or to encroach upon. And that's exactly what happens. The half finished sentence rides across to be completed somewhere in the following line, couplet or stanza.

Enjambment presents readers with an unresolved, and hopefully intriguing sense. They feel compelled to read on to find out what happens next. Whilst a rhyme provides closure, enjambment delays it. We are continually seeking for resolution, meaning, closure; enjambment creates a tension that provokes us to read on. 

Enjambment can create a free-flowing poem that places emphasis on unexpected tempo or change of pace. It works with punctuation too. In It is a Beauteous Evening, Calm and Free, William Wordsworth places a semicolon in the middle of a line instead of at the end:

The holy time is quiet as a Nun
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun
Is sinking down in its tranquility;

It makes all the difference! Here, enjambment has been used to maintain the rhythm and flow of the poem, and also to preserve the integrity of the end rhyme scheme; Nun, sun.

Enjambment can also be used to build momentum in a poem, to provide some contrast or complexity, and playfully, to add some fun elements to the syntax of the lines. 

In the poem Endymion by John Keats enjambment is mixed with rhyme to create an illusion that there is closure after each couplet. But the thoughts keep coming, driving the reader on...

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

I hope you can get to grips with this poetic device. It is remarkably adaptable and can take your writing to the next level. 

Steve Wheeler 

Previous posts in this series

1. Simile

2. Metaphor

3. Repetition and refrains

4. Alliteration

5. Assonance

6. End Rhymes

7. Internal Rhymes

8. Rhythm and Tempo

Image by Banalaties used with a Creative Commons Licence

Writing Collaborative Poetry

Isn’t it nice to have a friend to call when things get rough? Is it not good just to vent thoughts and having some kind of validation as to what you are thinking…? Maybe even better to have someone put things into a perspective you never thought of before to form a broad enough conclusion ..? 

This metaphor presents an overwhelming aspect of collaborating poetry with other like minded poets. 

Just as when you are calling on a friend with a conversation to talk about a subject… a collaborative poem draws two expressions together about a subject for one final absolute conclusion!

This happened to two friends in Somerset in 1795. Poets  Samuel Taylor Coleridge  and William Wordsworth got to be great buddies. Samuel even moved closer to William in Grasmere to be able to talk poetry and swap ideas. Now that’s friendship! The culmination of their collaborative book entitled “Lyrical Ballads” started what many thought to be the beginning of the Romantic Era 

Even more than that,.. their collaboration came to involve the talented Robert Southerly, among others. These came to be known as the “Lake Poets”, named for the Lakelands of Northwest England. Their like minded aspirations matched their introspective ideas of love and nature in an almost conversational delivery well worth reading.

The idea of stepping off of a narrow path onto a multi-laned freeway of ideas reduces a one sided direction. It inspires poets to yield to many more opportunities to accelerate into the passing lanes of new perspectives.

Poet  Jen Hofer also adds a great point in on article on collaborations from the Poetry Foundation,  “ … collaborative processes create conflicts, frictions, difficulties, and discomforts that wouldn't exist if I were working alone. Moving through those challenges is as crucial an element of the work as whatever legible "products" the work produces.” 

Conflicts of ideas can often have the most obscure positive effects on the final draft of a collaborative poem.

Surrealist French poets Andre Breton , Paul Eulard , and Rene Charl  wrote a line by line publication over five days in 1930 game referred to as the “Exquisite Courpse ”, a collage of intense words and images. My colleagues and I wrote our own version of the “Exquisite Courpse” in my last year as an editor of our school literary magazine at Western Illinois University. The “game” turned out so prolific, I decided to publish it exactly as it was. An honest poignant collaboration between friends.

Poets are not hermits, as many would seem to imply with the stereotype (though some do prefer to be alone). Poets are people, and people at some time have to communicate. Collaborations are a wonderful way to take an interesting conversation and turn it into art.

I invite you to comment on this article with whatever feelings or experiences you may have had as an artist with collaborations. Thank you for reading!

Matt Elmore

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_poetry

https://sites.udel.edu/britlitwiki/coleridge-and-wordsworth/

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet-books/2014/03/on-collaboration

Writing Sentimental Poetry

This writing gig is getting personal. But hey, when you’re a poet… what isn’t personal?!

Love assumes many forms. It can be hurtful to healing, vulnerable to impregnable, intimate to stone cold, longing to “get away from me!”… it is the most diverse dichotomy in our emotional repertoire. 

Love love love… it is both the answer to a question and a question to an answer. Like the old adage… can’t live with em, can’t live without em… it presents quite the confusing allure that haunts us all. 

We are not meant to be alone.

This theme provides the very fabric of a poets being… whether professed for nature, a person, a place, or even a thing… I’ve written love poems about ice cream for heavens sake! Yet is also has a dark side, that potent fault that pricks our very souls. Yes, the love to hate. 

Dark poets love Lord Byron… he is always one of my go to poets for dark inspirations with a glimmer of light. His poem “Darkness” illustrates this perversion of all that beautiful and true, yet remains a draw upon us all… take the ending of this magnificent blast…

“…the waves were dead; the tides were in their grave, 

The moon, their mistress, had expir'd before; 

The winds were wither'd in the stagnant air, 

And the clouds perish'd; Darkness had no need 

Of aid from them—She was the Universe. “

Byron takes cruel manifestations of the human condition … mankind’s passions, selfishness, death, evil intent, war… mixed with elements of nature, and formulated a hope for love defined as the infinite range of texture it weaves.

William Shakespeare was never one to miss a poignant dart no matter how sweet its intention… demonstrated within this excerpt form “Sonnet #40”…

“I do forgive thy robb’ry, gentle thief,

Although thou steal thee all my poverty;

And yet love knows it is a greater grief

To bear love’s wrong than hate’s known injury.

    Lascivious grace, in whom all ill well shows,

    Kill me with spites, yet we must not be foes.”

Master at turning a phrase, the immortal bard knows his damage control! He’s saying we have to talk it out before it destroys us! 

Intricate poet code… this is what we use, isn’t it? I often have to explain what I’m writing about when my writing may throw my woman into fits… saying one thing meaning another. 

Of course there is the drippy, sappy, overtly romantic poetry that is reminiscent of the sunsets, candle light dinners, and sweet professions our hearts desire. Love poems. So many of them. But they all go to the same place… the heart. Let’s look at “A Red Red Rose” by Robert Burns and prepare for the collective “Awwwwwe!!!!”…

O my Luve is like a red, red rose 

   That’s newly sprung in June; 

O my Luve is like the melody 

   That’s sweetly played in tune. 

So fair art thou, my bonnie lass, 

   So deep in luve am I; 

And I will luve thee still, my dear, 

   Till a’ the seas gang dry. 

Yep… works every time!! Who can resist?

Yet there are so many forms… so many loves. It can go so many places that as poets I am not sure we can ever find the shore of where it all ends as to what can be written of this feeling. “In My Heart Leaps Up”, William Wordsworth sets his adoration to existence itself within the ultimate cinemascope of life itself within his beautiful references to awe inspiring aspects of our natural world…

My heart leaps up when I behold 
   A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began; 
So is it now I am a man; 
So be it when I shall grow old, 
   Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

I myself hit upon this vein as I realized it is my mothers birthday today, and in haste scribbled her out a poem addressed within a birthday card I had bought as a just in case affair. I placed it on her favorite chair to be found when she wakes up. Direct and simple, when she read my book, she said she liked the poems that meant what they said and said what they meant. Easy to understand. This was fine by me because I’m not Wordsworth! So I wrote this out before I hastily headed out the door to work this morning…

you are the music to my song

always here and never gone

for in my mind it’s you I see

and in my heart you’ll always be…

Simple, direct, and to the point. No poetic code there… just a simple statement of a tender hearted son to his sweet mother on her 83rd birthday. 

Sentimental poetry remains one of my favorite to write. Its surface simplicity hints at the complex currents that run so deep at the water’s edge. It is there always, as a constant muse in its many shapes… inviting poets of all ages, classes, and colors to dive into the universal beauty and even ugliness of its universal truths.

Matt Elmore