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September 14, 2005
Join the Poetfox School of Poetry Writing Today! Free Hugs!
Blizzard Downloader sucks. It's totally true. For something that seems based in Bittorrent, it's total crap. Seriously.
Oh, before I forget, new poem over at poetfox.com. The point has already been mostly missed once. Will you miss it too? Only one way to find out! It does include a line that I really, really think is smart and creative. I'll let you guess which line of the poem it is, though. And I never linked that, yes, the new Crappy Asst is up. Download and be whatever you are when you listen to those.
The Boy Least Likely To is probably the cutest music I've ever heard.
We keep talking and reading about all these "schools" of poetry and whatnot in my poetry class... and it just... I dunno. I don't fit into any of them. So I thought I'd write an essay for what my "school" of poetry would be. But I didn't. So I think I'll just cover the main points here, because the more I think about it, the more shitty the idea of that being an essay would be. That's not the kind of essays I'm trying to write. I dunno what they are, but... yeah. Well, I guess this discussion will really cover alot of my philosophy about personal essays too...
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The Poetfox School of Poetry!
(Hereafter called "Outrospection," a shortened name picked on a whim)
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Okay, here are the major ideas behind my style which I terribly just dubbed Outrospection.
1. A work aims to make you know the author without knowing her. After you read something I wrote, I'd like you to feel like I am at the very least an aquantance of you. You should know something more about me, and feel closer to me. You should hopefully see the person behind the page... you know?
2. Closely related to 1, is that it's honest and not hidden, or at least any more than a poem or whatnot would normally hide it's point. You should be able to read something I wrote and know what the hell I wrote about. You should understand what it is I was trying to say. It's not going to be hidden in the "Oh, I guess the bird represents her desire to blahblahblah" and all that shit. That's no fun. Leave that to the professors. Read, enjoy, and then you can move on. Isn't that nice? As a corollary, though, the understanding the reader would leave with with a first quick reading is okay. If they get one, that's the important part. They shouldn't leave confused. But a subtler, different meaning brought on by phrasing with multiple meanings, etc... that's when the poem gets REALLY good. That depth. I don't get that too often, but when I do, that's when the poem is GOOD.
3. It flows. When you write, it flows. You don't know how many pieces of paper or Word windows I have closed because the flow only took me in for one stanza and stopped, and that wasn't enough. The words flow out, and when they stop, you stop, and then it's done. I'm not against revision, I'd like to do more of it, honestly. But revision is little tweaks. Finding a couple of better words. Changing a line break. Not changing the poem.
4. The writer learns about as much as the reader. You think I plan all the crap in what I write? Heh. I'm always impressed with myself when I find deep meaning in what I write, or whatever in what I write. It sneaks in. If things flow, it sneaks in. After you write something, you should be able to meet and learn something about yourself. Perhaps not as much as the reader does in number 1, but there should be something there to learn.
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My writing is very personal. Sometimes I worry about that, but I can't write things that are impersonal and feel... real. I can write happyfun poems without me involved. But those are just happyfun, they aren't POEMS, perse. It needs me there to put the soul into it. Or so I feel. Obviously there are other schools than the one I just made up... but that's how I try to write... I want you to meet me through what I write, and come back like you'd come back to talk to a friend, and, like you might do when discussing and thinking about something that happened to a friend of yours, compare your experiences to it, and draw something out of that. That's the idea behind what I write.
It probably sucks, but that's it. Heh. Now join my writing school and give me money, dammit!
Posted by poetfox at September 14, 2005 12:28 AM
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