You Should Write More Poetry, and Here’s Why

Unpopular opinion: poetry is underrated. For a while, poetry has gotten a bad reputation as a form of communication. Poetry is subjective, which is why many people do not understand or care to read it. A poem can be anything the writer wants it to be. In my opinion, a poem is the most romantic form of communication, and I’m tired of hearing that writing poetry is gushy, lame, or embarrassing. So if you are interested in how you can incorporate poetry into your life, keep reading!

Let’s do a simple workshop to get you started with writing poetry. There is a big stigma around filling a poem with imagery, descriptive language, or personification. Here is an example, 

Light-winged Smoke, Icarian bird,

Melting thy pinions in thy upward flight

Lark without song, and messenger of dawn,

Circling above the hamlets as thy nest

– from “Smoke” by Henry David Thoreau

While this poem is beautiful, it is also very advanced. Many readers might be overwhelmed by the imagery, but your poems do not need to be this complicated. For example, this is a quick poem that I wrote in under a minute. 

For I may just be the writer, the artist, the actress

But you, my darling, are the words, the paint, the script.

-K.H 

It is short, has poetic imagery, but it is also easier to understand. It is easy to understand that this poem is about relationships and depending on another person, and for many, it is easy to relate to. When writing a poem to someone, I start by thinking about how that person makes me feel. Whether sad, happy, nervous, mad, in love, etc. You just need to figure out how to turn that feeling into a moment. Sometimes the most powerful moments in our life make us think ‘I feel like I’m in a movie,’ those are the moments you want to think about when writing poetry. Here is another example of a poem that doesn’t have imagery, but it is a direct thought toward someone. 

How do I tell you that my guilt is stronger than you?

Do I leap off the deep end, give you a piece of my mind?

My love for you will never vanish, you’re my one and only.

Will you still love me, accept me, remember me… despite my mind?

-K.H

This poem was written out of rage and my anxious thoughts. It isn’t meant to be romantic, although I turned my thoughts and feelings in that certain moment into art by simply writing it down on paper. 

My close friends will notice me pulling out my phone and opening up my notes at very random times. At that very moment, an idea sparked because I was feeling an intense moment. My boyfriend knows this best because we can be in the middle of a discussion and I say, “give me a minute, I’m writing a poem”. At that moment, he knows to let me write as much as I need to and then the world can go back to normal. 

Writing poems or a paragraph about your feelings are great ways to get out your emotions. Reading back on old poems will remind you about a certain time in your life. Similar to a picture, when you look at an old picture you think about how you were feeling at that moment—poetry can have the same effect. You don’t have to show others your writing, it can be a moment of peace for just yourself. On the other hand, I think that life is too short to not let others know how you feel about them. Even if your poem is a sentence, you will be more in tune with your emotions and will be practicing how to live in the moment. 

Your feelings are all valid and normal. Turning your emotions into words is powerful, so write them down more often. 

 

• feelings
• poetry
• writing