I find that in my poetry, I am often inspired by the stuff that is around me - that which I see. In fact, if I had to define my poetic style, I would say that I am a sensual poet - not as in, "Fifty Shades of Grey" sensual, but rather, that I use my senses to garner inspiration, and then take what I see, hear, touch, taste, and smell and process that through thought. In a way, all poets do this to some extent, whether in metaphor or simile, in order to make their point understandable and relatable to the reader. In my case, though, I almost always do this. The imagery in my poems comes from my surroundings. What I do with it - that's the creative aspect.
In sharing my poetry, I find there are a few themes that run in common: the simpler my images, the simpler the thought, the better the response I get. I find it interesting, because my temptation is to try to emulate the classic poets that we all grew up studying: Shakespeare, Byron, Keats, Shelley, et al. After all, if they are so great and we continue to study them as paragons of the language, then to achieve such things, I should copy them, yes? It makes sense, to the student. And therin lies the problem: They were masters, not students. They wrote the way they did because it was their way, their voice, their progression. More simply, Their poetry. I could copy the style, the meter, the phrasing, the flow of language, everything, and it could be textually perfect, but this is not the essence of poetry. The essence of poetry - and therefore, the job of the poet, is simply this: "can you make the reader feel what you feel, even though they (the reader) were not there?"
This question is why I write poetry. Sharing our experiences, our joys and pains, can draw us together, to feel what each other feels, and maybe one day, to learn not to hurt each other. Would that I could accomplish that through simple poetry, born from the senses.
Today's offering is spurred by my morning commute today, and was at once a thoroughly delightful surprise to behold. We often use the metaphor of a building - it's a rather old trope, that you can find as far back as biblical days, "...the stone the builders rejected..." and if I could read ancient sanskrit, probably back even further. Yup. It's still around, and I hope you are able to relate to it.
Thanks for reading,
Me
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