Introduction: Please read before posting
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PLEASE DO NOT POST ANYTHING HERE. THANK YOU.
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REFRESH BUTTON
WELCOME TO DEAD POETS SOCIETY (SINGAPORE)
After watching the movie ‘Dead Poets Society’ years ago, I’ve always wanted to create my own ‘Dead Poets Society’, i.e. a place where poetry lover can gather and share their favourite poems and talk about their favourite poets. It is also a place where one can share his/her poems with each other.
I took up Literature during my ‘O’ level and ‘A’ level, but poetry was never my strong subject. Actually I hated it. But along the way, I slowly fell in love with the subject and there is no turning back. Being a very emotional person, poetry helps me to express my feeling in a totally new way. It helps me to see things differently and provides a channel to vent out my feelings, which could not be done by other means. Personally, writing poems is a self-awareness process that helps me keep in touch with my inner self.
Poetry is really a blessing to mankind especially to introvert like me. By saying that, I am not suggesting that one must be an introvert in order to experience the magic of poetry. Instead one must lives to his/her fullest and is able to feel for his/her fellow beings to truly appreciate poetry. One can be a good poet living in his/her own ivory tower, but to be a true poet (in my opinion) you have to mingle with the rest.
For me, I am neither a true or a good poet. At most I can only considered myself a poet at heart.
Although I am not very good at writing poems, but I really enjoy reading them. So feel free to post your favourite poems or your own work here. Actually, not just poems, short stories, and other topics are most welcome.
In DPS (S), we are not that concerned with the technical details of poetry writing. As long as you are able to express yourself clearly, get your message across to your readers, you are okay. On the other hand feel free to explore the technical aspects of poetry. Read on meter, metaphors, sonnets, etc. Explore new ways to reach new height.
Please understand that DPS (S) is not a workshop forum but purely a posting forum.
I usually donÂ’t criticize the poems posted here. In fact I am not really qualify to criticize your poems. But if I think it is really bad, I will pm you directly with some suggestions or I might suggest some slight amendments in the thread. Words are like fire, it brings light but it burns too.
A completed poem is like a baby to the poet, it is a product of efforts and love. It is a mirror of his/her inner soul. You must treat it with respect no matter how ‘bad’ you think it is. On the other hand, since you want to share your poems with others, it is also your responsible to make sure that you convey the messages clearly.
Be thankful to the readers for taking the time and efforts to read your poems.
Do feel free to comment on the poems posted here. Actually you are strongly encouraged to do so.
This privilege does not belong to just the moderators, it belongs to every one of you. To be exact, you are part of the DPS (S) team.
I believe in freedom of speech and expression, but do keep in mind such freedom comes with responsibilities. It is very easy to offend somebody in today’s modern society; a harmless stare may even cost your life. To make matter worse, written form of communications such as forums lack the presence of body languages, which is crucial in effective communication. Miscommunications and misunderstandings are expected in Internet Forums. Unless it is really very serious, do ‘shake hands’ and let it go.
However there are some things that will not be tolerated in this forum.
They are vulgar or profane material, vulgarities, materials that intended to convey hate towards others, threats and pornographic materials, etc.
Please do not post them here. Thank you.
Lastly, authors of poems/stories submitted here maintain ownership and copyright of the material. It is presumed that when a poet/writer submitted his/her poems/stories here, it is his/her own work. If they are from other poets/writers i.e. in the case of sharing your favourite poems with the rest of us, please indicate the name of the original author in the post.
Thanks for reading such a long introduction. Have fun and happy writing!
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Writer-centered poems are most welcome here. However I am also dying to read some reader-centered poems.
Important: If you want other to comment on your poems, please indicate it in your posting. When you take, you need to give. So please remember to provide feedback to otherÂ’s poems too. -
Useful Links:
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www.heteropoetryclub.com
A Singaporean literary portal dedicated to bilingual poetry, with a primary focus on translations to and from the Chinese language. This is one of my favourite sites; I think most you will like it. You need to change the language in order to view the postings. Go ‘View’, ‘Encoding’ than select ‘Chinese Simplified’. www.poetrybillboard.com
An online anthology of new poems, primarily from Singapore. The first edition of the website was started in 1996, presently it is the third edition. It does not have a forum but you can post your comments or suggestions in ‘your voice’. As for poems, you can also post them in ‘your voice’, or send them to the editor directly. www.the2ndrule.com
Another Singaporean counter culture e-zine by Alfian Saat, Koh Beng Liang and other non-conformist types. A very unique, creative and interesting site. www.qlrs.com
This site is for serious poets. They have many great poems, stories, etc for reading pleasures. It also features a forum. Do check it out. www.poetryscams.com
This is a 'MUST SEE' site. There are bad guys out there who want to cheat your $$$. -
News & More Links:
------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.nbdcs.org.sg
National Book Development Council of Singapore
Local Poet Felix Cheong is conducting a Creative Writing Course on 28 March 2005 / 28 September 2005. Course fee is $200, 1 day.
Click here for more details. http://www.wordfeast.com/index6.asp
Let's hope there will be a WORDFEAST 2005. Can be considered as outings for DPS (S)
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The Golden Point Award
Organised by the National Arts Council and sponsored by the Press Foundation of Singapore and Singapore Press Holdings, the Golden Point Award 2005 is seeking the best, most original unpublished short stories and poems in English, Chinese, Malay or Tamil by a Singaporean or Singapore Permanent Resident. First prize winners stand a chance of receiving $10,000 in cash and educational grants. Second and third places are also awarded. The closing date for submissions is 23 May 2005. For more details, please go to the Singapore WritersÂ’ Fest website
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2005 NUS Literary Society Creative Writing Competition
This competition, to be judged by Cyril Wong (poetry) and Gwee Li Sui (short stories), is open to full-time students from pre-university (e.g. junior colleges, polytechnics, centralised institutions) and tertiary institutions. Students who are studying in overseas universities and wish to participate must be stationed in or have a permanent address in Singapore at least for the next one year. Each entrant can send in a maximum of 5 poems and 2 short stories. Short stories should not be more than 3000 words in length. Each poem/short story must include a SGD 2/- fee.
Important: to obtain a registration form and full competition info, email to [email protected] as soon as possible. The closing date for all entries is 30 October 2005. Late entries will be disqualified. Winners will be notified via email or phone.
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True Singapore Ghost Stories Wanted
Jonathan Lim, a freelance writer/actor/director, is putting together a book in two volumes for Marshall-Cavendish Intl (Asia), aka the former Times Publishing, on the ghostlore of Singapore and Malaysia. It is intended to offer an introduction to the supernatural world seen through the various cultures of the region, along with real-life accounts of ghostly/spiritual encounters, old and new. To submit your story or seek more information, please contact Jonathan Lim directly at [email protected]
------------------------------------------------------------------------ AsianVoices: Poems and stories by young Asian writers. The ReaderÂ’s Eye, Poems, mostly by Gilbert Koh. Verbosity, Alvin PangÂ’s Homepage. Iambus Online, Toh Hsien Min's Homepage. CyrilWong, Cyril Wong's Homepage. SoftBlow, For your reading pleasure. -
Useful Information/Tools:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.etymonline.com/
Online Etymology Dictionary, one of the best! http://www.worldwidewords.org/index.htm
Michael Quinion writes about international English from a British viewpoint. http://www.onelook.com/
Link to many other online dictionaries. Fantastic! http://www.rhymezone.com/ http://www.rhymer.com/
Having problem with rhyme? Check these out. http://www.poeticbyway.com/glossary.html
Glossary of poetic terms, a must for serious poets.
Haiku Links How to Write Haiku Haiku Talk
Omg!!! More Haiku Links!!! Haiku Haiku for People History of Haiku Developments in World Haiku Special Brazilian kind of haiku The Haiku Society of America
Clichés! Clichés! Clichés Clichés: The Sleeping Puppy Clichés W.S.U. Writing Center Clichés: The Great Ear Closers ClichésSite.com The Book of Clichés
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If you have any other interesting links that you want to share with us. Please feel free to pm me.
Thanks. -
More Links (Forums):
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://piptalk.com/
DonÂ’t have the time to really check this forum out yet. But look quite cool to me. http://poetrypoems.com/
Another very interesting forum, you can create your own poetry homepage here. Poetry Free-for-all
Enter at your own risks!
But to be frank, this is a very useful forum if you are humble enough. The Pink Palace of Poetitude
Although closely related to Poetry Free-for-all, the culture here is very different. http://contemporarypoetry.com/newhaven/
Another enter at your own risks forum!!! Prepare to be slaughtered!!! http://www.eosdev.com/discus/
Another great forum!!! -
A short message
Usually a beginner poet, started off by wanting to share his/her emotions/experiences with the reader via his/her poems. This is a good thing and I strongly encourage you to pick up your pen and draft your first poem.
At this stage, the focus of the poems is about ‘self’ in the highly ambiguous term ‘self-expression’. These poems are mainly about ‘this is how I feel’, ‘this is what I did’, etc. i.e. about ‘me’, my experiences, my emotions and my feelings.
Such writes usually received praises from friends, family members, and colleagues. I am not surprise if these poems also receive very positive comments in some poetry forums. Some of my works were highly praised in other oversea poetry forums. But I am not so sure about that now.
It is absolutely fine to stop at this stage. Most of us do that.
However some of you might want to take your poetry further, i.e. to explore the ‘expression’ portion. To express something efficiently, you need to learn the necessary skills. Be it learning how to cook, dance, sing, and yes, also in the craft of writing poetry. In reality, learning the correct skills is especially important in poetry writing.
For these small group of people the shift is towards a reader-centered writing style. I am presently working toward this direction. I am working towards writing poems that, hopefully, are able to create experiences for you, the reader. And for me to do that, I need to take many factors into considerations, i.e. linkbreaks, meter, abstract/concrete, clichés, rhythm, grammar, spelling, etc.
I am not saying that those poems that I've written were bad poems. But the truth is they could be improved. For example, you wrote a love poem based on your experience. But remember, there are millions of love poems out here. The only thing unique about the one that you have written is because it is your experience and you don't really care what other people think about it. But wouldn't it be great to write love poems (also based on your experience) that stand out from the rest?
For example take this poem written by me years ago. Is it special to you? No. But it is a very special poem to me. It is for my first love. But it is just another love poem to the readers.
Just for You
Life is full of Joys and Pains,
In every heart a dream remain,
Should sad memories ever haunt your mind,
Always remember I'm by your side.
Believe in yourself, have Faith in God,
Over the mountains against all odds,
Every sunrise is a bright new day,
Yesterday's tears will never stay.
You need to write poems that mean something to the readers if you want to reach a wider audiences.
Unfortunately, there is no Internet workshop forum in Singapore. Creative writing workshop is also rare in this country. I have to teach myself poetry by reading books on poetry and from the handful of overseas critical workshop forums in the Internet.
So the question is which part of the term ‘self-expression’ do you wish to focus on? For me, I am going back to kindergarten in poetry writing, back to basic, start all over again. (I’ve deleted all my poems)
P.S.: This is just me hor. Please continue to feel free to post your poems here. It is so difficult to find someone who writes poems in this country. -
Five Critique Tips for Beginners By John Boddie
There are a few things to keep in mind:
1. You are trying to provide feedback to the author that will be useful in helping the author understand what works and what doesn't work in the poem.
2. Try to find something specific that you like in the poem - a specific image, possibly an imaginative word choice. Tell the author what it was. This is far more helpful than saying "I really like this."
3. If you find something you don't understand, ask the author what was meant. It's helpful to an author to know where his or her audience is confused.
4. If you find something specific that you don't like, identify it and tell the author why you didn't like it.
5. If you read a poem and find that it is filled with spelling and punctuation errors, don't spend time on it. The author, by not preparing the poem to be read,is showing that he or she does not value your time. Why should you think the author would value your opinion in this situation?
As you read more, you will begin to form a richer idea of what constitutes "good poetry." This, in turn, will make your comments more valuable to the authors.
You won't be able to improve your reviewing skills unless you actually write reviews.
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Want to try this out on the poems posted here? -
While my English teacher was teaching the class about usage of verb, adjective, etc, I was thinking about the pretty girl next door.
So till now I am still not too sure which is the correct sentence, should it be ‘She has succeeded at everything she has tired’ or ‘She has succeeded in everything she has tired.’
And when do you use semi-colon in the sentence anyway?
So as a reminder, I will post some of the common errors in English here.
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Useful links: BBC – Skillswise
Brush up on spelling and grammar with interactive quizzes, games and factsheets.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Which is never used to refer to people. Use who when referring to people.
Wrong: The people which were here asked for you.
Right: The people who were here asked for you. Beside: Means at the side of. Besides: Means in addition to.
Usage Note: Some critics argue that beside and besides should be kept distinct when they are used as prepositions. According to that argument, beside is used only to mean “at the side of,” as in There was no one in the seat beside me. For the meanings “in addition to” and “except for” besides should be used: Besides replacing the back stairs, she fixed the broken banister. No one besides Smitty would say a thing like that. But this distinction is often ignored, even by widely respected writers. While it is true that besides can never mean “at the side of,” beside regularly appears in print in place of besides. Using beside in this way can be ambiguous, however; the sentence There was no one beside him at the table could mean that he had the table to himself or that the seats next to him were not occupied. Taken from here Its is an adjective meaning belonging to it. It’s is a contraction of it is – a pronoun plus a verb.
Wrong: The dog lost itÂ’s tail.
Right: The dog lost its tail. Quality is a noun, not an adjective.
Wrong: The salesman claims that this is a quality product.
Right: The salesman claimed that this is a product of high quality. -
Dust of Snow by Robert Frost (1874-1963) Version 1.
Please read the following poems,
Version 1
The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree
Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.
Version 2
The way that a crow
shook down right on me
some snow, sort of like dust,
from a high hemlock bough
has given my heart
a different feeling about things,
and partly saved
a day I felt had been wasted.
Version 3
How dear the ways of Natue! Lo, you crow
Precipitated earthward, even on me,
A pulverous silver essence, dust of snow,
White benefactions of a hemlock tree;
Bequeathing (legacy unto my heart!)
Transfigurations of an erstwhile mood,
Redeeming a jeweled modicum, wee part
Of one diurnal unit I had rued.
Taken from Western Wind: An Introduction to Poetry
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Which version do you like? Why?
Natural speech
Most revolutions in poetry aim at getting back to a more natural language. “The norm for a poet’s language,” said T.S. Eliot, “is the way his contemporaries talk.” Pound has insisted on this norm again and again. “Good god! Isn’t there one of them that can write natural speech without copying clichés ?” Poetry, he liked to repeat, ought to be at least as well written as prose. -
Someone asked me the other day which poetry forums will I recommend? Well, this is a difficult question because different people write poems for different reasons.
To be fair I can only comment on those forums which I am a member. www.heteropoetryclub.com
If you like contemporary Chinese poems I think you will like this place. Although I am a member here, I usually just lurk around. www.qlrs.com
HmmÂ… although many local poets hang around here its forum is not very active. If you post a poem there, please ask for a C & C or else nobody will take any actions. Having said that, it is a good place to make some new friends who share the same interest. http://poetrypoems.com/
I used to be quite active in this forum but for some personal reasons decided to spend less time there. One thing I like about this site is that you can create your own poetry homepage here. Most members are non-Asian so it is also a good opportunity to see what the ‘ang mohs’ think about your poems. The Pink Palace of Poetitude
Although I have registered as a member here but I find it too similar to poetrypoems. So I have not post anything here yet. Between the two i.e. poetrypoems and Pink Palace, I prefer poetrypoems. Poetry Free-for-all
Currently this is my favourite site. If you are really serious about writing good poems this is the place for you. I’ve visited a few workshop forums but I think this is still the best. If you are going to post there, PLEASE read the posting guidelines carefully. Start with the ‘General’ forum. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. If you are not sure, feel free to pm me.
So the conclusion is, I will highly recommend Dead Poets Society (Singapore). 
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Interesting Articles/Threads
--------------------------------------------------------------- Walt Mcdonald:Advice I wish I'd been told
(From Valparaiso Poetry Review: Contemporary Poetry and Poetics)
Extract
"Most times, though, general statements and abstractions are your jailers. They are stiff-necked impostors on guard duty in your writing room. They are cynics, failures of the imagination; they envy your successes; they want you to fail. They hope writing won't delight you, that you won't discover exciting images and details that will delight your readers. They know Robert Frost was right: "No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader." Abstractions don't want you to move your readers. Abstractions are your captors, and they work without pay, because they hate poems. They hope you'll lose faith in yourself; they want you to quit writing, and let them sleep.
Resist abstractions, and they will flee from you. Writers that I admire believe Pound's warning about abstractions and try to write vividly. The best writers remember this, and they never ease up on themselves. They work always on basics, harder than when they began. They don't throttle back and cruise, but constantly push the envelope. Like Twain, they try to "find the right word, not its second cousin." Poetry is Experience: The Writer's Responsibility
(From Poetry Free-for-all, Blurbs of Wisdom)
Extract
"A reader comes to a poem for one reason: she wants to experience something herself, to feel something herself. She doesn't care what the writer has experienced or felt; she wants those things for herself. That's why successful poetry is reader-centered, not writer-centered. " How to Write Better Love Poem
(From Poetry Free-for-all, Blurbs of Wisdom)
Extract
"Obviously all emotions are abstractions in this sense. That means that poems specifically about emotions often end up full of abstractions. Also, if the poem concentrates purely on the emotional response of the poet, often the result is a poem with nothing of the lover in it at all. A loved one is reduced to nothing but a gush of happiness on the part of the poet; all the things that make them special – the way their skin smells, their lilting accent, the way they take their tea, the curve of their buttocks in their scruffy jeans, their moodiness in the morning – has all vanished. This is what I mean by 'generalities'. All the interesting specifics are gone. " Woe is Hell
(From Poetry Free-for-all, Blurbs of Wisdom)
Extract
"Paradoxically, poetry about depression and misery has the goal of bringing comfort to both the writer and the reader. The benefit to the writer is that he or she is given a means to express feelings that need release before they become overwhelming. The event of writing provides for some degree of introspection and may act to put the current problems into a larger perspective, or even trigger action to overcome them. It's not unusual to see author's comments that say, in effect, "I had to let this out before it kills me. " On the Function of the Line (1979) by Denise Levertov
Extract
The most obvious function of the line-break is rhythmic: it can record the slight (but meaningful) hesitations between word and word that are characteristic of the mind's dance among perceptions but which are not noted by grammatical punctuation. Regular punctuation is a part of regular sentence structure, that is, of the expression of completed thoughts; and this expression is typical of prose, even though prose is not at all times bound by its logic. But in poems one has the opportunity not only, as in expressive prose, to depart from the syntactic norm, but to make manifest, by an intrinsic structural means, the interplay or counterpoint of process and completion--in other words, to present the dynamics of perception along with its arrival at full expression. How to write good poetry by Carol Tilley-Williams
Extract
When a poem is brought to any public forum it immediately invites reader participation. Yet, so often I hear comments like, "but I write for myselfÂ….poetry should come from the heartÂ…if it's heartfelt it is poetryÂ…" and so on. It is difficult to argue the point that poetry should start at some place of zeal within each writer; however, the operative word here is "start." Writing down raw emotions,simply because they are genuine, does this qualify them as poetry? I believe this is merely a starting place, the seed if you will, of a poem. The verve - the true poem - is yet to come. -
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Quotes
Because I don't have enough talent,
I depend on reality.
- Takamure Kotaro
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To Generalize is to be an Idiot. To particularize is the Alone Distinction of Merit.
- William Blake
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Among the most sinister phenomena in intellectual history is the avoidance of the concrete.
- Elias Canetti, the winner of the 1981 Nobel Prize in Literature
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If I read a book [and] it makes my whole body so cold no fire ever can warm me I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only way[s] I know it.
- Emily Dickinson
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Poetry presents the thing in order to convey the feeling. It should be precise about the thing and reticent about the feeling, for as soon as the mind [of the reader] responds and connects with the thing, the feeling shows in the words: this is how poetry enters deeply into us.
If the poet presents directly feelings which overwhelm him, and keeps nothing back to linger as an aftertaste, he stirs us superficially; he cannot start the hands and feet involuntarily waving and tapping in time Â… set heaven and earth in motion and call up the spirits!Â’
- Chinese poet Wei TÂ’ai
Translated by A. C. Graham in Poems of the Late TÂ’ang (London: Penguin, 1965
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… a poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language …[this] is certainly the sign by which one recognizes whether a young man us potentially a poet or not. “Why do you want to write poetry?” If the young man answers: “I have important things to say,” then he is not a poet. If he answers, “I like hanging around with words listening to what they say,” then maybe he is going to be a poet.
W.H. Auden, “Squares and Oblongs,” in Poets at Work, ed. C.D. Abbott (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1948.), p. 171.
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I think my poems come immediately out of sensuous and emotional experiences I have, but I must say I cannot sympathize with these cries from the heart that are informed by nothing except, you know, a needle or a knife, or whatever it is. I believe one should be able to control and manipulate experience, even the most terrifying, like madness, like being tortured Â… and should be able to manipulate these experiences with an informed and intelligent mind.
- Sylvia Plath
Transcribed from The Poet Speaks, Argo recording No. RG 455, Record Five (London: Argo Record Company Ltd., 1965). -
NOTES ON POETRY
(Mostly taken from 'Western Wind: An Introduction to Poetry, 4th Edition)
Filmmakers and Poets on the use of imagery
There is a famous sequence at the end of Lewis MilestoneÂ’s All Quiet on the Western Front in which the hero, Paul, a German solider, is shot by a French sniper. The sniper is shown carefully aiming his rife but all we see of Paul is his hand stretching out to try and touch a butterfly that has come to rest. We recognize it as PaulÂ’s hand because we already know he is a butterfly collector, and, because of the sniper, watch it stretching farther in anxious suspense. Then there is a shot, the hand jerks, slowly drops, and lies still. PaulÂ’s death is as vivid as if we had seen a full picture of him dying.
The rife, the hand, the butterfly – these are the kind of images the poet also uses. Agood way to check on the visual imagery in a poem is to ask: What kind of camera work would it take to present this image? Could it be filmed at all?
(R. Stephenson and Jean R. Debrix, The Cinema as Art (Baltimore: Penguin, 1965), p. 207.
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Poetry and verse
The word “verse” refers only to the shape an expression takes, not to its content or quality. Poetry may be in verse, and often does use some kind of verselike structure. Many poets, for example, have been attracted by the shape of the sonnet, which arranges rhythms and rhymes in a definite formation. But the sonnet in itself is only a verse-form; a sonnet may be poetry or it may no.
Poetry is not poetry because it is in verse; to the shape of verse it has to add qualities of imagination and emotion and of language itself.
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Poems are made out of words, the right words.
The painter Edgar Degas, not content with doing his graceful paintings of dancing girls, also wanted to write poems. Finding the literary work difficult, he complained to his friend, the celebrated poet Mallarmé, that he could not seem to write well, although he was “full of ideas.” Mallarmé’s famous answer was: ‘My dear Degas, poems are not made out of ideas; they’re made out of words.”
The best ideas, even though they turn into images, are of no avail as poems unless the words are right – just as a statue of even the noblest subject is a failure if the wood cracks or the marble shatters.
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On adjectives and adverbs
Some parts of speech are more necessary than others. Nouns and verbs are the most important, the most existential – nouns referring to the forms that being can take, verbs to their activity.
Adjectives and adverbs are hangers-on, with little independent existence of their own. Used weakly, they are decorative rather than structural, hence attractive to the apprentice writer, who needs surface decoration to cover up the architectural flaws.
In his writings on style, Pound constantly warns against adjectives. Perhaps nothing so weakens a poem as to have the nouns “chaperoned” (as Pound said) by adjectives, or the verbs by adverbs.
What we have been saying about modifiers is a caution, not a rule. Adjectives and adverbs tend to run to fat, to be sagging appendages on the bone and muscle of poetry. But just as we need some fat for the health and contour of the body, so we need some adjectives in poetry: for precision, for luxuriance, sometimes even for a needed of muchness.
The most useless adjectives duplicate the meaning of their nouns, or express a quality implied by it. We have no need of them in such expression as
celestial stars
fragrant flower
vernal spring
deep abyss
empty chasm
cold winter sun
flaming pyre
fair beauty
soft whispers
sweet perfume
loud strife
bleak waste
stimulating wine
dark forebodings
nobly enshrined
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Inspiration
The ratio between inspiration and deliberate effort differs in different artists. Music came easily to Mozart, but not to Beethoven, who had to jot down his ideas, rework them again and again, sometimes completing a theme twenty-five years after the idea for it struck him. His way of composing compared with Mozart’s was stodgy and plodding, but the music that resulted was no less “inspired.”
So too with poets. Some work rapidly, some slowly. The number of flashes of inspiration that go into the process may have little to do with the quality of the poem that results. Frost considered unfinished one poem he had begun to work on fourteen years before; he left another “lying around nameless” for forty years because he could not find a fourth line that suited him.
It should be stressed again that our inspirations are as specialized as our minds are. If our whole bent is toward Romance philology or football strategy, we will not come up with inspirations in the field of economic theory. Inspirations follow common-sense rules: We get only the inspirations we are qualified to receive. And unless we have laid the groundwork by conscious planning and hard work, there is no inspiration to be hoped for.
“Chance,” said Pasteur, “favors the prepared mind.” Poets have to condition their minds to produce and handle inspirations. If they have a vocabulary of only a few hundred words, the unconscious has very little to work with. If they have taken little notice of the world around, their minds will suffer from a poverty of images. If they have not read other poets, they will not know then they are original and when they are not – as if a young physicist, scorning the achievements of the past, were to spend his time reinventing the wheel.
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Their own emotions!
There are literary aspirants who think that the strength of their own emotions is enough to invigorate the poems they write. “But I felt it so strongly! So sincerely! It came from my heart!” they are likely to protest when the worth of their work is questioned.
Unfortunately their own feelings are beside the point.
Readers are not mind readers or heart reader; they will feel only what the words and rhythms tell them to. Genuine feeling guarantees nothing. “All bad art,” said Oscar Wilde, “springs from genuine feeling” – genuine feeling, that is, which the artist does not have the skill, the technique, to put on canvas, to show in stone, or to embody in a passionate work of words.
Significant emotion, as T.S. Eliot said, is that “which has its life in the poem and not in the history of the poet.” Our expression of an emotion may be so clichéd, so incoherent, so fulsome as to be wholly inadequate to what we really feel, or think we feel.
The Russian poet Bella Akhmadulina has warned us about this: When struck by what seems a brilliant inspiration, she admitted in an interview, she immediately grew distrustful of it, was careful “not to confuse the intensity of the feeling with the worth of what I’ve written.”
The two are not the same, much as some apprentice writers wish they were. Often when we are carried away by what seems the inspired quality of any work of art, we forget that only technique enabled the artist to share those raptures with us. The dancer Rudolf Nureyev seemed “wild and spontaneous’” when dancing “Swan Lake” with Margot Fonteyn, yet, as Miss Fonteyn tells us in her Autobiography, “It was paradoxical that the young boy everyone thought so wild and spontaneous in his dancing cared desperately about techniques.”
Technique is how we communicate passion in the arts – but we need hardly say that passion has to be there to begin with. -
Interesting blogs (To me lah) Drifting Round the Corners of Life A Xeno Boy in Sg Finicky Feline Mr. Brown Singapore Ink Molly Meek AlfianÂ’s Secret Cheeky by Nature
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Any interesting blog? Pm me. -
The Poet's Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry Media: Paperback Author: Kim Addonizio, Dorianne Laux Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company Release date: 20 October, 1997
I bought my copy last week @Kinokuniya for around $20 plus. I canÂ’t remember the exact price. Anyway it was worth it. Great read!
Comments from other readers, For adult writers...
Although I don't doubt this is a great book for writing poetry- I thought I would mention that it is for adults. I read the reviews and ordered the book for my 14 year old who loves to write poetry- thinking the reviews made it sound perfect. The content does include adult topics, sexual language, and some language. Just thought others may find this helpful to know. I sent it back, as it was not appropriate for my daughter The best there is...
I have read a large number of poetry textbooks, workbooks, courses, and reference books, and this book is the best I have ever read on the subject. It was clearly written, with a lot of useful information, and truly great exercises. Almost Stopped Before I Started: So Glad I Didn't!
I almost ruled out reading this book when I read the author's (to me) bold statement on page 225: "Can you write a poem in 20 minutes? We seriously doubt it."
Being, at times, a very fast poet, I *gasped* when I read that assertion! (Don't ask me how I got to page 225 before I read the rest of the book but nonetheless, it stuck out to me!)
I kept at it, though, and found my way through the original assessment and into many of the glorious exercises, the truth in words that I so resonate with such as "We don't believe in writer's block. We believe there are times when you are empty and times when you are full."
The section on Metrical poetry is truly magical - I enjoyed learning about how Free-Verse as a form blossomed as well.
There are also many, many valuable resources in the appendices such as Books on Poetry and Writing, Finding Markets for Your Poetry and More Resources for Writers.
Finally, this book is chock full of exercises so that you can continue picking it up and revisit, use, revisit, use some more, revisit over and over again. Definitely worth the investment AND I am so glad I didn't toss it all because of one difference in opinion. -
Is that really a poem? by Gilbert Koh
"The unexamined life is not worth living." - Socrates.
He could very well have added that the unexamined poem is also not worth writing. I think that every poet, at one time or another, has had the following experience -
he writes, and he writes, working for hours on a new piece of writing. At the end of all that labour, he scrutinises the paper before him. Doubt creeps in, and he asks himself, "Is that really a poem?"
It's a good question, of course. And in answering it, I have my personal criteria. To me, none of my poems is a poem unless I have, in the course of writing it, scrutinised some aspect of my own beliefs, thoughts or experiences, seriously challenged and engaged myself, and walked away with some new, personal insight.
Otherwise, what I've written is probably just a collection of clever words. Like a slick new ad. Or a politician's speech. But not a poem.
If you are in the habit of writing clever words without seriously engaging yourself, well, do feel free to congratulate yourself for being clever. But don't mistake yourself for a poet. If you don't take a risk and challenge yourself, what you produce is unlikely to be a genuine poem.
DP said Â…
Sorry Gilbert, but can you kindly elaborate on this? I have read it several times but I am still not sure what you are trying to say here. I mean, is it necessary that a poem must always provide one with new, personal insight?
Gilbert said Â…
That's how I think about poems (whether I'm reading or writing them). A poem has to show me something that I wasn't aware of; or it has to show me something that I was aware of, but in a way I'd never thought of before. If I don't discover anything new in a poem, then it doesn't work for me. It's not a poem to me.
An extreme negative example of what I mean is the abundance of teenage angst "poetry" in blogosphere. You get plenty of cheesy lines like:
"I loved you with all my soul, but you walked out of my life. My heart is forever broken into a million pieces ..."
I have no doubt that the emotion is authentic (we were all teenagers once upon a time, weren't we?). But these kinds of lines don't present anything original, insightful or perceptive. There are probably thousands of teenagers who put these same kinds of lines out onto the internet every day.
It could be cathartic for them, but it isn't poetry to me. More specifically to your question, yes, I always get some new insight out of writing my own poems (ie those works which I actually dare call "poems" ).
When I start writing a poem, I hardly ever know what the finished product is going to look like. Usually I have two or three lines floating in my head; or some visual image that I want to capture in words (eg old man walking with grandson on the beach - you know which poem I'm referring to).
As I start to put the lines down, the process which I called "self-engagement" begins quite apart from solving technical problems like flow, structure, choice of image, I have to start asking myself questions like -
do I have really have anything to say here? Why is this important? Why should I bother to write this poem?
... and depending on the subject matter, the engagement can be much more specific:
How do I feel about my father growing old? How much time has he got left? Is he afraid? How do I feel about it? What kind of father am I to my own son? Isn't it strange that one day I will be an old man too? Etc.
And the process of examining my own thoughts and feelings about the topic leads me to create what I hope can authentically be called a poem.