It's barely day five of National Poetry Month. I've got four poems for the four days, and I love how I feel: gratified by the completed work, excited by the variety and possibility of some quality among them, and whirring with thoughts about word choice, form, and imagery. How are others doing?
I've managed it so far, four in four, with today's one started. I'm posting them on a private blog (access by invitation only) to get round issues of copyright and 'no prior publication'. Looking at them, they're clearly first drafts, with quite a bit of work needed, but there's maybe some potential, so it's positive. I'm working on my random words prompt list, but I'm getting other ideas too.
ReplyDeleteLike Colin Will, my friends and I have kept up so far. We are sharing them between ourselves as 'self-certification'. I have experienced all that Carrie says but with the added cushion of knowing that they do not have to be finished, they can be polished and tweaked later. The idea of having 30 poems to work on, edited (my favourite part) is very encouraging.
ReplyDeleteI've done it so far, despite a slightly slow start. I am using poems I have already begun otherwise I'd have no chance. Very useful sifting process though. As my blog is public I have the discipline of asking myself, what would I actually make public? Luckily, I'm not too proud ... So far I'm finding the question of titles quite interesting. When the poem is a communicative act, not written for class or for myself, the title becomes much more important.(If anyone wants to see my poems you can find me at @catherinedreyer on twitter. The blogs on wordpress called coulddobetter after Gavin Ewart's 'The Black Box'.)
ReplyDeleteKept up so far, despite taking my son to The Somme on Tuesday and Wednesday - that produced some wonderful images, and will feed my own obsessions for a good while.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing I have found about this exercise is that the necessity encourages a freedom to write more adventurously, anything goes as long as it's a poem. Counter-intuitive perhaps, but it can be sorted later if it doesn't work. Yes, I think it is all working very well for me. When I'm made to write something in a workshop I might seize up but here I am alone with 24 hours (give or take!).
ReplyDeleteVery much agree with Meg. I've now got a bullet-point poem, which I'd never have tried before!
ReplyDeleteHello. So far, so good. I've chosen not to publish my work as a) some of it needs polishing (quite a lot in several cases) and b) I may want to use some them in competitions at some point. However, I am keeping a track of what I've done on my blog (http://candidepeel.blogspot.co.uk/) by listing the titles.
ReplyDeleteAt the moment, and against all expectation, I'm not finding it too difficult to produce the work. I had imagined it would be much harder to find the inspiration, especially as I've not written anything much since before Christmas. Maybe this was the kick-start I needed! As for your prompts, I haven't used any of them yet although several are now in my notebook for future reference - so thank you for that!
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ReplyDeleteI just put up my poem for day six, 'More Pigs Than Fish': http://www.matthewsperling.com/
ReplyDeleteHave done something each day so far. Should be things to come back to at the end of the month.
James Womack called me 'a Prince of the Quotidian' on facebook. One for the back cover.
Ha! Well I like the everyday in poetry, but I looked up 'quotidian' just to be sure I had it right. And yes, 'everyday' but qualified by 'esp. if mundane' - not so good. So I looked up 'mundane' which can mean 'of this earthly world rather than heavenly'. So that's OK again! It is a compliment.
DeleteI think he was playing on Paul Muldoon's title The Prince of the Quotidian, the book where he wrote a poem every day in January 1992. Published by Gallery. My own poems probably have their face obnoxiously turned away from the everyday, on the whole. But I'm still managing one a day!
Deleteoh dear, I do let myself down sometimes. I can't be expected to know everything. I've read some of your poems and I think they are fine, everyday and great.
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