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pantryslutI hope I'm not freaking anybody out with the sudden appearance of poetry here.
Back in my early 20's, poetry is all I wrote. And I was serious about it, serious enough to apply to MFA programs ( I was waitlisted a lot), serious enough to submit my poems to various places, serious enough to read a book of poetry a month, to take classes, to participate in workshops and readings.
I even had a poem published in The Second Coming. And in Black Sheets.
But I began to struggle with my line a bit. (That sounds so technical, but there's no other way to explain it; I lost all sense of when a line should break, and why.) And then, I had a bad experience with an instructor.
That's so lame-sounding. I knew that I might have difficulty with her and her teaching style, and I thought I was prepared. I was resolved not to let her get to me. And actually, she let me off the hook compared to some of the other students in the class.
But it may not be coincidence that I stopped writing poetry shortly after I took her class. Or it may be. I don't know.
I thought, for a while, that I had just transformed. I had a spell of writer's block in my mid-20's, and when I came out of it, I was writing fiction instead of poetry. I was OK with that -- I was writing again, that's all that mattered. And my study of poetics had given me a great set of tools to use when crafting fiction; I had to learn all the bits about structuring a story, plotting it, and so on, but my language skills were kick-ass already.
But now, I am writing poetry again. Off and on. About a year now, to be honest.
I don't know if I want to dedicate myself to writing poetry the way I used to, though. Unlike last time, I haven't been submitting it anywhere; I've hardly been revising (although I did just complete a revision of a poem I wrote a few months ago). The thing I just posted is the first thing besides what's up at Poets Against the War that I've shown to the public in...nearly a decade?
It's weird. I am bewildered.
P.S. There aren't enough moods available. Or else I just have non-standard moods.
Back in my early 20's, poetry is all I wrote. And I was serious about it, serious enough to apply to MFA programs ( I was waitlisted a lot), serious enough to submit my poems to various places, serious enough to read a book of poetry a month, to take classes, to participate in workshops and readings.
I even had a poem published in The Second Coming. And in Black Sheets.
But I began to struggle with my line a bit. (That sounds so technical, but there's no other way to explain it; I lost all sense of when a line should break, and why.) And then, I had a bad experience with an instructor.
That's so lame-sounding. I knew that I might have difficulty with her and her teaching style, and I thought I was prepared. I was resolved not to let her get to me. And actually, she let me off the hook compared to some of the other students in the class.
But it may not be coincidence that I stopped writing poetry shortly after I took her class. Or it may be. I don't know.
I thought, for a while, that I had just transformed. I had a spell of writer's block in my mid-20's, and when I came out of it, I was writing fiction instead of poetry. I was OK with that -- I was writing again, that's all that mattered. And my study of poetics had given me a great set of tools to use when crafting fiction; I had to learn all the bits about structuring a story, plotting it, and so on, but my language skills were kick-ass already.
But now, I am writing poetry again. Off and on. About a year now, to be honest.
I don't know if I want to dedicate myself to writing poetry the way I used to, though. Unlike last time, I haven't been submitting it anywhere; I've hardly been revising (although I did just complete a revision of a poem I wrote a few months ago). The thing I just posted is the first thing besides what's up at Poets Against the War that I've shown to the public in...nearly a decade?
It's weird. I am bewildered.
P.S. There aren't enough moods available. Or else I just have non-standard moods.
