At the beginning January, I got an e-mail from Amanda saying that sign-ups for her next session of Write Now were open. I hemmed & hawed about signing up. I'd wanted to take it since she first offered it this past Fall but the timing wasn't right with the end of my pregnancy falling during the course. And then at the beginning of the year I thought I shouldn't do it because I had a new baby.
I finally took the leap and just signed up. I am SO GLAD that I did! Last Friday was the last day and I've felt kind of lost this week with no daily e-mails!
I learned so much, and am feeling much more confident in my writing because of the course. I think the biggest thing I took away is the need to write every day. No matter if I sit down with something in mind or sit down and just write the first thing that comes to mind. Right now I'm just journaling for the most part. But that's a start. And I'm not really sure where I want the writing to take me. But I am happy with it and what I've learned.
At the beginning of this week, when I was feeling a little low and floundering a bit about "what should I write now?" I decided to start putting together a little project for myself.
My word for 2014 is Poetry. Finding the beauty in the everyday moments. Funny thing is, I haven't really read too much poetry before. I want to change that. So I've started putting together my own little "course" in poetry. I'm hoping to have it complete in time for April--National Poetry Month.
I want to read poetry, but also books ABOUT poetry. How poems work. How to read them. How to write them. To read a biography or two about a poet. While e-mailing back and forth with Amy about this, she asked if I was going to stick with a genre or time frame or just dive in. I thought about it and decided I may just dive on in.
Right now I am still compiling information and putting my thoughts together. Which is why I am starting now! I think (I hope) a month is enough time to get my thoughts straightened out and be ready to go in April.
My question for you:
Who are your favorite poets?
What is your favorite poem?
Do you have any suggestions of books on poetry?
I picked that book up at the bookstore the other night. I haven't read too much of it yet, but I think it's going to be a great resource!
I am very excited about this new project of mine! I will be sure to report back here as I move forward with it and finalize things!
I'm partial to 20th century american poetry: T. S. Eliot, e. e. cummings, James Wright, Frost, Adrienne Rich...I could go on and on. Favorite poems are hard, in that it's hard to pick just one. Many years I posted a poem per day for National Poetry Month. "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is probably my all-time favorite (that's Eliot), but I love "The Blessing" (Wright) and so much of Frost and Diving into the Wreck (Rich) and and and I don't have enough time or space for this! I'm excited about your leap. :)
ReplyDeleteMary Oliver, Robert Louis Stevenson, Wendell Berry, Shel Silverstein, Robert Frost, Maya Angelou, e.. e. cummings.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite poem would have to be The Dash by Linda Ellis.
Love your word for 2014, it's just beautiful.
love maya angelou, mary oliver, emily dickinson. Please share more when you compile your compiling, inquiring minds want to know, I might learn something!!
ReplyDeleteA poetry project! Just a little bit excited about this. I love GM Hopkins, Yeats, Heaney, Emily Dickinson, Mary Oliver, Wendell Berry, and a slew of French poets. Can't wait to see the list you come up with!
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful. I was directed here via Write Alm and your post really made me smile. There are so many wonderful poets. Yeats, Rumi, Frost ... My favourite poem would have to be life itself.
ReplyDeleteThere are also many online poetry communities, such as TS Poetry - http://www.tweetspeakpoetry.com/ - where you can read poetry old and new, and talk to other people about poems, and write your own.
I hope it's not obnoxious of me to mention a post of my own regarding "how to write poetically" - http://knittingthewind.blogspot.co.nz/2013/04/how-to-write-poetically.html
A few books of poetry that come to mind: Raymond Carver's Ultramarine, Grace Paley's Fidelity, and Mark Strand's Blizzard of One. Enjoy your year of exploring poetry!
ReplyDeleteFavourite poets: Erica Jong, Pablo Neruda, Michael Ondaatje, Anne Michaels, Amy Turn Sharp
ReplyDeleteFavourite Poem: 'Woman Enough' by Erica Jong: http://www.ericajong.com/poems/womanenough.htm
I love their biographies, 'I Saw Ramallah' is the book of poet Mourid Barghouti. Pablo Neruda by Adam Feinstein.