Jamie (Internet remix)

  1. How to Write a Poem

    the-how-to:

    by Catherine Pond

    1. Use imperatives to amplify urgency. For example: Wink. Go to bed. Open the door. Listen up, fucker.  Love me again.              Get it?              A build-up is nice too. Do this, do that, then do this other thing which is clearly impossible and probably abstract to add texture to the language. (Note: This works in fiction too). 

    2. Try, every time, to exorcise that thing which you cannot exorcise. (Be it an event, a person, a trauma, an apple you ate, etc.) 

    3. Sleep with as few people as possible. This prevents confusion about whom you are addressing in your poem. If you know whom you are addressing, the poem will come about faster. This may or may not be at odds with

    4. Get your heart broken a few times. That shock of motivation you feel after you finally get out of bed—use it. Take it, run with it, run alongside the ocean with it or the bay or the river. (If you have no access to water this will become a problem later so I’d get right on that.) On that note

    5. Do not deny yourself nature. In an interview this summer, Charles Simic said something like, “It’s hard to find the sublime in the urban.” True story, bitches.      

    6. Do not use the word “dream.” Assume your readers understand that every poem is a type of dream. There are a few exceptions to this rule. Like being Sylvia Plath. Don’t push it.    

    7. Don’t pity yourself. Do not think you are the only one. At the same time, build a world in which you can validate that you are the only one. Use specifics to convey the nature of the speaker, the speaker’s tone, and the conflict of emotion in the poem. These should all strike the reader as idiosyncratic, entirely individual to you, the writer. They should be proof, in fact, that you are the only one (in the world of the poem) and that there is no one else like you.      

    8. Be aware of the duality of human nature. Mary Gaitskill described this duality as two currents at odds with one another moving within the same channel. No one is happy all the time, or sweet, or miserable, or unmoved. We are often two opposing things. To say otherwise (also known as being reductive) would reveal a deep naiveté that you, as oft-revered poet and sage, do not want to be associated with.

    9. At the same time, pick one emotion and aim for it. If you are writing a poem about grandma and you think of grandma with equal parts nostalgia and disdain, pick only ONE for the sake of clarity. Make every word in that poem so heavy with disdain that the tone is unmistakable. Yes, I chose for you: disdain. It’s more interesting.

    10. Don’t be afraid of punctuation. Embrace the Dick. (Emily Dickinson, that is.) This can be hard to pull off, even for me. Wink, Etc.  

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    Jesus, the How-To is just killing it.

    2. Source: the-how-to

    Tagged:  how-to   poetry   writing 

    Posted 9 months ago 87 notes

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    6. thepetitepaddler reblogged this from kinkypixie and added:
      This is frickin awesome, well done!!!
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    8. suttonhays reblogged this from 183poetry and added:
      I have water to run by, cross, travel down stream, scream into will come in handy when writing artist statement thanks...
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