Listening to yourself is not always fun

I remember the first time I heard a recording of my voice: I couldn't believe that was me. (I still don't.) But I've learned a couple of things.

1. Hearing your poems gives an entirely different and very valuable take on them

2. Reading them aloud and hearing them are essential exercises during revision

When the poem breaks down in the reading it probably breaks down in the meaning as well. Keep this in mind. One of the things I see is that the music of poetry is often neglected. Remember, it should sound nice. Poems are meant to be heard. The sound and the meaning should inform each other in a symbiotic relationship. Often you can identify where this relationship breaks down by hearing your poem read by another.

Hate those text-to-voice voices? So do I. However, use them. We cannot always find someone to read our poems to us and, frankly, we shouldn't want to. Voice to text programs are freely available online. I use Text2Speech and there are certainly other more sophisticated ones available, some requiring download. Text2Speech has a 5,000 character limit which is pretty generous.

Despite the machine-like quality of the voices, you can listen for those points at which the flow breaks down, weakens; and you may then check the poem for similar thematic weaknesses that may want attention.

So, listen to yourself if you can. This will help your readings. Also, listen to your words spoken by another person (a valuable asset of workshops) or by a machine. In any event the result will be a better poem.

So long for now.

Quick Rules for Writing, Part 5

Work you poems. Revision is a word so over-used it is largely meaningless. We need to bring it back to life. First understand that we tend to revise for meaning and understanding. This must change for it enslaves us to what we want and not what an art demands. Dedicate revision as well to HOW the poem means. This means conscious applications of the elements of the poetic art to your poems. Learn the craft. Learn the craft. Learn the craft. Yes, poetry should be passionate but it is an art that transcends passion in search of truth and beauty. When we hear that a poem has its own life, its own direction we should act accordingly and let the poem be and become what it will, what it wants to be, not try to make it what we want. Rarely, if ever, is it right to know how the poem will end when we begin it. This flies in the face of creativity. The process of practicing the art will release all the creativity we can handle. Dedication to the features that make poetry poetry will release all the creativity we can handle. We too often want to show our passion, dedicate the poem to honoring our feelings and sensitivities. This is wrong. The poem should be a service to the art of poetry. If it is so then all the other things we think we want from the poem will be there only if appropriate. Poetry is not therapy. Revise to the greater art, not to the greater passion, the greater feeling.
So long for now.

The Best Use of a Poetry Mentor, parts 1-2 or 3

This has two parts because my use of a mentor had two parts, actually three, that were distinct. I emphasize from the last entry that a long relationship with a single mentor can be really productive. Initially I submitted poems, we worked them over, I revised the poems, we worked them over again and repeated the process until the poems were as fully realized as they could be at the time. This was a grueling process and hugely educational. The more you learn about writing and the way you write the more you will eliminate bad writing from your drafts (more later about the notion that you shouldn't self-censor in the earliest stages of a draft). This phase of being mentored lasted several years and was indispensable. In the second phase I did much less revising and preferred to take what I was learning from my mentor (Baron Wormser) and apply it to my future poems. Keep in mind that at this time my poems were coming fairly rapidly and I felt that each new one was better than whatever came before. I rarely returned to the mentoring with the same poems again. The most recent stage came about both because I was evolving satisfactorily and because I was low on money. In this stage I worked with the mentor only occasionally, often less than once every six months, and usually with a batch of poems in which I had a specific interest. We have achieved a stage of marvelous mutual regard and friendship and there is nothing I won't show him or that he won't say about my poems-- good, bad or ugly. It has taken more than a decade to arrive at this.

In the next post I will discuss the pros and cons of self-censoring an initial draft.
So long for now.