Poetry

The art or work of a poet; a piece of literature written in meter; verse; prose that resembles a poem in some respect, as in form or sound; the essence or characteristic quality of a poem; a quality that suggests poetry, as in grace, beauty, or harmony.

Truth and music. This is what my creative writing teacher told us that our poetry should be. (Just a side comment here, a few weeks ago he told us we should lie if it made our poems better, but that's neither here nor there.) At any rate, I am kind of buying into this idea of truth and music, and trying to figure out how to incorporate it into my poetry.

I have been a consistent scribbler of words and phrases, jotting down narrative ideas and perceptual experiences with the intent of using them in my writing at some vague future point. I have not been so consistent in going back and using those scribbles to produce any finished work. When I started my creative writing class this semester, I figured I had a decent advantage in my collection of notes, having all of these undeveloped ideas to draw upon in the event that I didn't have anything current to write about. As it turns out, I really need to be in the mood to write about something. Years worth of notes have done me absolutely no good, truth and music can not be forced.

The upside is that I don't really feel so bad about all the notes I have not managed to revisit over time, and am just happy that they got down on paper at all. On the downside, if I am ever going to get around to turning all those notes into poetry worth reading, I am going to need to spend a lot more time writing than I am right now. Four poems into the semester, I think I have four pieces of writing worth more work and further drafts. When I am going to have time to rework those drafts, who knows? Having a new piece of writing due each week kind of forces your hand on prioritizing your work.

Well, off I go. I have a poem to write about a dove on a fire escape.