Reading poetry hurts my brain. I thrive on simplicity. I appreciate more than anything when people will just get to the point and not dance around anything, no matter how beautifully they dance. I love when people tell me, in the simplest, most basic words and sentences possible, what they plan on doing and why. That's not to say that I don't enjoy writing tricks like metaphors and similes and whatnot; I just can't stand it when poetry uses gigantic words that are supposedly "rich" and "exciting" when they could have substituted "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" with "cool". It's interesting, but it's too much for me.
Yes, there are poems which use the simple words that I like, but then they're too short, or they don't give enough detail. I can't just have one moment. I have to know every single little detail about that moment. Who is the person? Why are they going to the store? What color is the door on the store? What are they doing after the store? Is this visit to the store going to change their life in any significant way? And it can't just be in little sentences--the more detail the better. Honestly, I just can't win with poems. Every one I've read has something I don't like. Plus, when I try to take my want of simplicity, directness, and detail and make it a poem, it doesn't work. It always comes out a story, or a paragraph, or something un-poetic.
Every time I try to write poetry, the words, phrases, and even the way I want to write it just slips out of my grasp. Using that little analogy (or whatever that was), if poetry were a fish, this is how our relationship would be symbolized:
As you can clearly see from my little GIF above, poetry and I don't get along very well. I think I can write it, and I think I can understand and conquer it, but then I actually set about doing the actual poetry writing. That's when everything falls apart and I lose every creative thought that had been in my head before.
So for this particular assignment, I had no idea what I was going to do. I wasn't inspired, I was exhausted, I was lazy, and I really did not want to write a poem. I stared at a blank Google Doc page for the good part of an hour, at 1AM because I couldn't think of creative words to put down. I had moments outlined, and they were good moments, but I wanted to make books or movies of them, not write some sort of "mind-stimulating" poem about them. I seriously just gave up and went to bed. I just couldn't do it. At five in the morning, I woke up, channeled every frustration I had over the past couple of weeks into the Google Doc, and arranged it in what (to me) seemed like a poem format. I added in unnecessary big words and ramblings that could be interpreted as poetic for good measure, and turned it in.
Was I proud of my work? Not really. Could I have done any better? I don't think so.
Then, the second draft came along. At that point, I had forgotten all about the rambling paper I had turned in weeks ago, and was surprised when I got it back; it sort of looked like a poem.
We were told to fix it up with some new guidelines, so I took it home, and the cycle began again. I'd stare at the poem and wait for inspiration to come to me, then give up and watch Netflix. Then I'd stare at it again and try to change words, and then I'd give up and do other homework. I did that until 2AM. Eventually, I just deleted the unnecessary words and fixed some of the sentences up. It still didn't feel like a real poem that I'd actually like yet, but it was a little better than the first draft.
The third draft was a re-do of the second draft, so I figured that my edits weren't good enough. I deleted half the poem and channeled new frustrations into the paper. Then I arranged them accordingly and turned it in. I still was pretty annoyed with the poems I could produce, but it was getting better. At least now I had a semi-consistent format, a theme that I was comfortable writing about, and a story outlined a little bit.
The fourth draft was better. Big changes still had to be made. Apparently, most of the problems were with how the story wasn't set in exactly one moment and how it was too vague. I devoted most of my time to cutting down the time frame. I rearranged things, characterized here and there, and I essentially transformed my poem into a short, short story in poem-form. It wasn't incredibly descriptive, but it was just enough so that it was at least semi-interesting.
I turned the fourth draft in, and I actually felt pretty happy about it. It was miles and miles up the road from the first draft, much better than the second, and made much more sense than the third. So, even though I don't like writing poetry, at least this poem (if you can even call it that) turned out okay.
I think that it was a very standard creative process with me. In a way, I used my procrastination skills without even knowing it, because my mind procrastinated in giving me a useable copy of my poem that I could actually be semi-proud of. I also always did this assignment in the wee hours of the morning because my brain couldn't think of relevant information during the night. Also, the poem's quality increased with every time I turned a draft in. This can be expected, because that's generally the point of doing multiple drafts--getting the best final project that you can by fixing old essays you wrote that potentially have problems.
I still don't like reading or writing poetry, but my poem is okay in my book. It may be because I'm narcissistic and love myself and my writing more than others, but I think it's more because I had to go through with the whole creative process for it, so I really got to analyze it in my own way, which is my favorite thing to do. So, I actually enjoyed this assignment towards the end. It wasn't really thrilling, mostly because my mind just doesn't work poetically, but it was interesting.
_________________________________________________________________________________
JUST FOR KICKS
A GIF Representation of How I Felt After Writing each Draft:
Draft 1:
Draft 2:
Draft 3:
Draft 4:
When I first started reading your blog, I couldn’t believe you hated poetry! But then I started to realize what you meant. Poetry read in English class is usually confusing, over-analyzed, and overwhelming. Everything has a purpose and a meaning. And when you look at poetry that way, it’s not enjoyable, it’s just stressful. However, I do believe that you shouldn’t give up on poetry. I like poetry the best when I read it for fun; it is much easier to find a poem that speaks to you.
ReplyDeleteAs for writing poetry, I don’t think you should try to conquer it. I know this is easier said than done, but I like to get into a flow. I hate writing poems and creative pieces for classes, but if you stop thinking about the assignment and just let everything pour out, you might find something amazing.
P.S. Love the GIFs, and loved your poem!
I KNEW IT! I KNEW IT!
ReplyDeletePicking your blog page was a good decision. I loved reading this. You described your love/hate relationship with poetry very well. Your levels of relationships with your poetry as shown in the multiple drafts were hilarious, interesting, and it really hit home. When I created my first draft, I thought I became the God of Poetry. My first draft was about chess and it was so awesome. I understand your first draft didn't go well because of brain freeze but my first draft went well. I had an epiphany and everything came together.
THEN I GOT THE FIRST DRAFT BACK.
Mr. Allen pointed out things in my poem that I never seen before.
My poem was not perfect.
I was not God.
I went through multiple drafts trying to write a poem about chess, Afghanistan, and President Obama. With great frustration and annoyance, I trashed everything and started to write a new poem. I wrote a poem about Subway. Yes. The sandwich place, not the transportation system where that Syrian guy got arrested in that move, The Guest.
This poem was a success and I was very satiated with it.
In addition, you mentioned that you ended up liking this assignment and poetry overall. However, I personally think it was more than just writing a poem. It taught me a lesson that there is an always a better idea. I thought my chess idea was great and became very stubborn with it. This caused me hardships and many downfalls. A new beginning with this assignment was a good idea.
I am wondering if this applies to life too. My dream every since I was a child was to become a doctor.I am not sure if I should become a doctor or not. On one hand, my stubborn childhood dream is too good to give up because I had this passion for becoming a man of medicine for SO LONG but I know the road to becoming a doctor is tough and rough. I just don't want to give up my dream. Call me a stubborn ox but I call myself a zealous disciple. In all, I loved reading your post. The GIFS were excellent additions and improved the flow and humor of the blog post.
I just want to start of by saying that I love your writing style and your gifs made me laugh, a lot. After reading your blog I feel as though we sort of went on opposite journeys during this assignment. I started out loving poetry and so excited to write my own that I began writing it that day in class. But then with each draft that I turned in and every revision, I started to hate my poem. I started to feel less and less creative as my poem grew longer, because I just didn't know how to fix what I had already written, so I instead just kept adding stanzas. Whereas you started out apprehensive and then were able to condense and enjoy each new draft you handed in.
ReplyDeleteI think that our journeys differed so much because of our attitudes when we started. I enjoy poetry and was so happy with the second draft of my poem that I became stubborn. I didn't want to change what I thought was good writing just because someone else didn't like it, but after awhile it got hard revising something I desperately wanted to keep the same and in the end I ended up just getting angry and frustrated. However, you came into this project with an open mind and were able to take criticism and mold it into a a better, more concise poem. You were able to succeed where I pretty much failed and I have to give you props for that because I know it was no easy task.