How to Write Poetry

4 Techniques to Write Poetry

© Ugur Akinci

Writing poetry is a process of discovery; discovering what’s deep inside your heart and mind through a patient digging through the layers of what's not true and authentic.

That unauthentic facade is cemented and bolted to where it is by your mind in an attempt to protect you from perhaps what’s painful or unpleasant in your life.

Imagine the easy comfort of daily small talk: “How ya doing?” “Great, fine! And you?”

What does that mean? Poetry would buy none of that.

How many times you’ve heard exchanges like that even though they nowhere near reflect the truth? Poetry is the sharpest knife available in any language that cuts through such small talk and worn out pleasantries that stifle our growth. It's the xenon light that flashes in the dark cave of unknowing.

Average daily exchanges are boring for a very good reason. They are so by design. They are the safe channels of exchange, aimed at upsetting nothing and protecting the status quo at all cost.

Poetry, on the other hand, is the innocent child of (what that most-fearless of all writing gurus Natalie Goldberg calls) "the wild mind.” Once you’re in the alluring tunnel of poetry, you never know how you will emerge from the other end of it. And that’s why poetry is so exciting. It’s the linguistic equivalent of a high-flying trapeze act with no safety net.

You can start flirting with a poem by almost writing anything.

Let’s say you jot down the following sentence: “Gray skies, closing like a fist.”

You don’t need to judge such a sentence right away. You have to withhold judgment and allow poetry the space and time it needs to grow, unfold its antennas, get up on its feet and gaze at the world.

Those first words and first sentences are just the introduction to the dance. It’s the opening act; the shivering petal that hints at the Fragrant One.

Something is beckoning you forward, but what? To find that out, you have to start digging deeper by listening to yourself honestly, totally, almost in a meditative state of mind, come what may.

“Gray skies closing…” What does that mean? Are you sad? Worried? Why did you say that? What kind of emotion is propelling you to choose those words?

“Like a fist...”? A grown up man’s fist? A child’s pink sweaty fist that he immediately brings to his mouth? Is it a fist that looks like a sea conch from the side?

Did you feel threatened when you wrote that line or felt tranquil and at home?

What can be the next line? Is it really about the sky that you’re trying to write? Or perhaps the joy of staying safe indoors while the skies are closing?

Are you waiting for someone? Is loneliness turning the corner like a stray cat when you think about what’s next?

You need to keep asking similar questions to arrive at the TRUTH at the core of your poem.

Without the COURAGE to descend step by step down to the CENTRAL HEATING DEPARTMENT of your being, you can't write poems that will connect with others.

Yes, we are all connected to start with -- but not at a superficial level. We are connected universally on a very deep primordial platform. When through your poems you go down that "medieval" (that unforgettable adjective that Samuel Jackson delivered with such authority in the closing sequence of PULP FICTION), all of a sudden you are touching millions of others by just talking about your honest personal predicament. That’s when the personal transcends the petty daily constraints and becomes the universal. That’s the victory and glory of poetry because that's also when we all (finally) meet and we all win!



Here is a poetry writing exercise for you:

Write ten adjectives and ten nouns. And then try to come up with ten verbs for those adjective-noun pairs. Write your short phrases one after the other. Read the list slowly and see if anything moves inside. If it does, you might be at the verge of a poem launching itself the way a sailboat is pushed quietly into a lake. Try to lift up a sail and see if your poetry boat picks up any speed or not. It’s always a trial and error process; always a hit-or-miss struggle to capture that elusive nuance, that slipery texture.

And if it doesn’t click, let it be. Don’t force it. If there is one writing genre that you cannot force into submission it’s poetry. Poems are born out of freedom and they breathe and grow towards even more freedom. They are oxygen machines. If you crack the whip of your critical business mind, you’ll only shatter it into pieces and it’s going to hurt. It’s much better to be friends with your gentle side and wait for another day, another cup of warm tea or the fine smiling face of your friend or loved one to try it again.

I’ll leave this general introduction to poetry with these words of well-earned wisdom from Billy Collins:

Introduction to Poetry

Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem's room
and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.



Return from "How to Write Poetry" to HOW TO WRITE ANYTHING home page

Have a Great Tip, Photo or Comment About This Topic?

Do you have a great tip or photo about this? Something that you believe we should read or see? Contribute and share it today!

What Other Visitors Have Said

Click below to see contributions from other visitors to this page...