Poetry Notes

Time Out

When too many chores press, my first impulse is Just get everything done! It isn’t easy to step back from a lengthening to-do list. Duty and logic push onward. Meanwhile a delicate light flickers out. Yet how much I miss brighter days working on poetry for hours. After stepping

Writers' Horror Stories

(for Halloween) As night fell over the publisher’s downtown backyard, wieners sizzled, and smoke curled high through the dimming branches. Gaaass--p, beer cans popped open. Ice cubes knocked in punch glasses. “Bottoms up, everyone!” The Unfinished Monument Press tenth anniversary Burnout Barbecue was warming up. Bobo & the No

The Existential Moment

In the late 1970s, since high school days I had been spilling out narcissistic poems, and a true novice, fancied myself quite the writer. One afternoon, the ground shifted. “I”, “I”, “I”—that pronoun! Was my writing nothing more than ego-babble? On the desk, lay my white loose-leaf binder thick

Milestone

A milestone birthday is a time to celebrate but also to reflect. This month I turned 80. Since the first phonetically spelled story I scribbled in Grade One, writing has been an elemental part of my life. As Natalie Goldberg1 wrote: “Writing is a path to meet ourselves and become

Finding the Poem (3)

The well is deep. Beneath the surface, poems wait. But to loosen right-brain creativity from left-brain restraints and reveal what they want you to find out takes time. Away from interruptions, put pen to paper and begin writing down nonstop—a half hour at least—whatever trickles across your mind.

Finding the Poem (2)

Outside your head, a poem can be waiting to form. As you peruse factual or scientific text, an idea, an image, even a sound stands out and intrigues you. In its oddity or uniqueness you believe you see poetry and want to bring this potential to the forefront. For example,

Finding the Poem (1)

Occasionally it’s the other way round. Surprise! Something simple, delightful, or poignant moves you and unexpectedly, on its own, a line begins forming inside your head. Listening to its rhythm, you feel it tap into the meaningful and right. You stay open and another line forms. As your mind

Missingness (2)

At a recent book club meeting, even though a New York Times Bestseller, the month’s selection sparked a lively discussion. Many in the group strongly disliked the novel. Yes, it was a sad story, set over a period of many weeks in a hospital room. They found the writing

Faith

In 2001, the day after the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, American Poet Laureate Billy Collins was asked if he was composing a poem for the nation. No, he said. The events had stripped him of words, as they had countless other poets, including myself. Was art,

Missingness (1)

Not what’s there, but what isn’t, suggested Elisa Gabbert in a New York Times1 article. That’s what distinguishes a poem from other kinds of writing. I think poetry leaves something out. All texts leave something out, of course — otherwise they’d be infinite — but most of the

Airiness

Even free verse can feel more constructed than flowing. Just the carefulness of the writing itself sparks images of the poet’s controlling hand, moving relentlessly forward, laying down images, self-consciously calculating the line breaks. What a treat when occasionally a poem surprises and lifts off the page. Pamela Porter’

Seasoned Advice ~ Bruce Meyer

A mention on Facebook drew me to a full-length discussion1 with poet, writer, and all-round Canadian man of letters Bruce Meyer sharing his experience and insights from a long career rolling with the ups and downs most writers face. Below is a sample of his authorial reminders, both for those

More on Form (2)

Some years ago, halfway through scrawling a poem I was surprised how easily the words were flowing in an unplanned, but pleasingly similar rhythm. I stopped and scanned several lines: ᴗ /   ᴗ /   ᴗ /   ᴗ /   ᴗ /:  iambic pentameter, but lacking end rhyme, Shakespeare’s blank verse. Again, I hummed and tapped

More on Form (1)

Traditional forms of poetry—be they sonnet, villanelle, or many other variations—consist of a preset pattern of end rhyme, metre, and layout on the page. The poet’s words, what Ezra Pound termed the “solid” content, are made to fit inside this frame. Difficult to write well, such forms

Wordsworth Again

Recently, I was leafing through Hologram: an Homage to P.K. Page1, when to my delight, the passionate words of Kate Braid leapt up from the opening lines of “Tree Song”. They reminded me of Wordsworth’s first reference in Lyrical Ballads to poetry as a “spontaneous overflow of powerful

Intoxicated by End Rhyme

That first high, and you crave another and another… While I love the flexibility and potential for subtlety in free verse, I am not at all against poems composed in metre and end rhyme. It’s just that they are more difficult to write well than many who attempt it

Quick Quote

“It is a great thing to write. To be no longer yourself, but to move in an entire universe of your own creation.” —Gustave Flaubert

Seniority (2)

Older than Allan Briesmaster and myself by a decade, Christopher Levenson has also written about ageing in his newest collection. The poems admit the inevitable physical deficits of advancing years and the distress as those dear to us pass on, into a memory itself fading. But what happens after the

Seniority (1)

Forty years ago, after reading a lot of Canadian poets my age, it dawned on me that the poems of those considerably older might be substantively different. What I loved was a poem about the birth of his first grandchild written by a sophisticated gentleman who had travelled the world

Gems

Many years ago I chanced upon Louis MacNeice’s book-length poem Autumn Journal1. Written in 24 sections from August to December 1938, it recorded his state of mind as World War II loomed closer. I loved how the undernotes of coming doom rolled forward with quiet clarity. The lines intentionally

Bird Metre

After days of grey skies and rain showers, through 4:00 a.m. stillness burst joyous bird song announcing first glimmers of light.  I lay in bed, listening. Not only was the singing lovely, it even had a pattern: one strong long note, followed by two shorter and softer—like

Inspired

What prompts us to write a poem? As my thoughts meandered, something flashed back. Years ago discussing my latest volume, the reviewer remarked that many poems appeared to be written as gifts to other people. Many? Curious, I pulled my books off the shelf and listed every poem directed or

Another Dip

Dipping again into Charles Bernstein’s intriguing book Poetics, I was delighted to read his resistance to ideology. Following the cultural shock of the Second World War, poetry composition and criticism fell under the sway of Postmodernism, as well as other literary schools of thought such as Black Mountain, and

Time and the Writer

Time. Aspiring writers complain they would write “if only” they had the time. Daily life can be crammed with distractions, deadlines, and too much to do, ironically often coupled with feelings of isolation. My favourite fantasy used to be ambling down a tree-lined avenue, quaint with wide lawns and Victorian

Bouncing Off

Bouncing off what someone else has written can be an exciting way to inspire a poem. I love what Kris Kaila has done in “Bearing Witness”, posted on a recent Poetry Pause. She begins by quoting Maya Angelou who wants her life to be “a poetic existence”. What a lovely