We aren't suggesting that mental instability or unhappiness makes one a better poet, or a poet at all; and contrary to the romantic notion of the artist suffering for his or her work, we think these writers achieved brilliance in spite of their suffering, not because of it.
Dorianne Laux
Maybe it's what we don't say/that saves us.
inspiration
poetry writing writer poet
Who you are contributes to your poetry in a number of important ways, but you shouldn't identify with your poems so closely that when they are cut, you're the one that bleeds.
poetry writing
Poetry is an intimate act. It's about bringing forth something that's inside you--whether it is a memory, a philosophical idea, a deep love for another person or for the world, or an apprehension of the spiritual. It's about making something, in language, which can be transmitted to others--not as information, or polemic, but as irreducible art.
poetry
Every good poem asks a question, and every good poet asks every question.
poetry poet
Good writing works from a simple premise: your experience is not yours alone, but in some sense a metaphor for everyone's.
writing
Writing and reading are the only ways to find your voice. It won't magically burst forth in your poems the next time you sit down to write, or the next; but little by little, as you become aware of more choices and begin to make them -- consciously and unconsciously -- your style will develop.
Moon In the WindowI wish I could say I was the kind of childwho watched the moon from her window, would turn toward it and wonder.I never wondered. I read. Dark signsthat crawled toward the edge of the page. It took me years to grow a heartfrom paper and glue. All I had was a flashlight, bright as the moon,a white hole blazing beneath the sheets.
dreams moon
You are not your poetry. Your self-esteem shouldn't depend on whether you publish, or whether some editor or writer you admire thinks you're any good.
writer poet
The slate black sky. The middle stepof the back porch. And long agomy mother's necklace, the beadsrolling north and south. Brokenthe rose stem, water into drops, glassknob on the bedroom door. Last summer'spot of parsley and mint, white rootsshooting like streamers through the cracks. Years ago the cat's tail, the bird bath, the car hood's rusted latch. Brokenlittle finger on my right hand at birth--I was pulled out too fast. What hasn''tbeen rent, divided, split? Broken the days into nights, the night skyinto stars, the stars into patternsI make up as I trace themwith a broken-off bladeof grass. Possible, unthinkable, the cricket's tiny back as I lieon the lawn in the dark, my harta blue cup fallen from someone's hands.
broken
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