New inspiration

 

I finally finished reading the book Why I Write Poetry. While I haven't been writing, I have been trying to catch up on reading. I have a backlog of Writing Magazine and Mslexia which I am now going through. And then two bits of inspiration came on the same day. Yeah, finally, thank you, Lord!

I was reading an essay by the Welsh poet Jonathan Edwards (in Why I Write Poetry) about how he writes about family in his poetry. This was a complete eye-opener. Over the years I have written about my family, but this gave me a new perspective on doing it. Suddenly, I had an idea for a poem about my grandfather and how he played piano in a bar and was paid in kind with beer! I have linked it with something that's not true, but, blimey, it works.

Edwards talked about how readers see poetry as being personal and true to what happened. We associate the poem with the poet's experience in a way we don't with fiction. This has opened up new possibilities for me. Think of it like a fiction writer's licence to exaggerate. Edwards illustrated this by two poems he'd written and then explaining which bits were true and which wasn't. Absolutely fascinating, and I loved his poetry. I exaggerate all the time in my fiction, obviously, but when writing about family in my poetry, I tend to stick to truths.

Why I Write Poetry contains essays by twenty-five different poets and they show new, fascinating ways to write, and each essay comes with an activity. I've attempted most of the exercises and have come away with poems I wouldn't normally write. I'm definitely going to rework my poem about my grandfather and see where it takes me. The prospect is exciting.

My other inspiration, as I said, came on the same day. I went along to my writing group where there were some picture prompts. I was drawn to an eerie snap of a dark place with fog swirling around. I began tentatively, not knowing quite where I was taking this and whose voice it was to be in, but gradually it opened up. Two hours later I had a complete story. Yes, it needs editing, but I was so pleased. This is the first new thing I have written since way before Christmas.

I'm going to be writing about picture prompts and other things in my next post on Substack. Now it's back to the reading and typing up my scribbled lines of poetry and fiction. See you next time.