Poetry and its Power to Inspire

 

Poetry is capable of delivering so much to a reader. A lot of poetry sings and dances when we read it aloud. Poetry can also laugh and cry. It can shout and whisper. Poetry delivers emotion by drawing on a wide range of moods and feelings.

 Best of all poetry does these things while using the very best of our words in tight spaces. This is what gives poetry it spark! Minimal words, maximum delivery. Poetry is as varied as life itself because it draws so much from the life we are here to live. 

Importantly,  poetry is accessible to everyone of us. Anyone can write poetry should they choose to try. In order to write poetry however, it is essential to read a lot of poetry. You must read what you wish to write. This is what will make poetry your friend and trusted companion. Notice what poets are choosing to write about and also take note of the many ways they present poems on the page. Poetry offers such a feast of choices. 

By reading poetry you gain a clear sense of how poems look and how they sound. Poets often arrange words so certain sounds are highlighted. To do this poets use alliteration and repetition.

Here’s a way for you to launch into poetry:

• Read a poem of your choosing (to yourself or your pet) maybe two or three times
• Now read the poem out loud and listen carefully to what it says. What is it telling you?
• Share the poem with a friend and talk about it
• Copy the poem, or your favourite part of the poem into your notebook. This will hopefully inspire you to write your very own poem. 

So, What’s Special About Poems?

For a start they look different. It’s quite easy to spot them on the page. A small boy once told me ‘Poems are those things that don’t go all the way to the edges of the page.’ They take up less space on the page than a story. If you look closer you will see they have a variety of shapes as they spread down the page. They are written in lines and groups of lines called stanzas. Some poems are long and others quite short. Poems can say a lot using just a few well-chosen words.

Poems says things in special ways. Their words sound appealing to our ears often using rhyme, repetition and rhythm in ways that are fun to listen to.

We often enjoy a poem for its message, or the way it makes us feel. Poems often make an appeal to our emotions. Poets like to use the senses to create word pictures for the reader. They also do this by comparing things using devices such as similes and metaphor.

Just as a sculptor shapes a lump of clay into a pleasing form –sometimes adding ,sometimes taking away, a poet must be willing to make changes to a poem until it looks and sounds right to your eyes and ears. We can begin to write our own poems using the style, shape or the form of a poet we admire. In this way we gain the confidence to try our own ideas. 

I write a lot of poems. I write them when I sense I have to say something in a way that gives my ideas a special shape and sound. I have learned how to do this by collecting and reading hundreds of poetry books. I have created friendships with a host of poets and the many poems I have discovered in those books in my collection. I’m still collecting poetry books and I’m still learning from the poets whose words inspire and inform my own words.