My minor is Creative Writing. I remember a younger me in sophomore year declaring this minor believing that I will write a novel, become a bestselling author of a young adult book, maybe even have a series that would be inspirations to Netflix’s unlimited series. BUT. What I forgot to check was the class requirements. The excited fiction writer that resides within my heart had to find out tragically that I would be forced to take three poetry classes. Form and Technique of Poetry, Poetry I, and subsequently Poetry II. Sweet.
In my mind Poets and Fiction Writers live on opposite ends of the writers’ spectrum. We are all writers, but poets don’t love writing a three-hundred-page manuscript, and fiction writers don’t want to be held down by the oppressive page and line limit of poems. We agree to disagree. Now that I am in an actual poetry class, I get to test my theory every Tuesday and Thursday. I hear my fellow Fiction Writers murmuring to each other about the dreadfulness of writing an Ode, or an Anaphora, or something as basic as an Abecedarian. On the other corner, I hear Poets whining about a Fiction professor who asks for more character descriptors, more world building, less pretentious vocabulary, and a better formatting for crying out loud.
We are an often-misunderstood group and offering our sympathy towards each other is a stretch. But hey, we have to try everything in this life. And if I am being 100% honest, I have to admit that I am sort of liking my poetry class. I have written three poems that always seem to get praised by the Poets in my class. I feel like a high school freshman being embraced by the cool high school senior girls. Am I part of the clique? The only thing that has been bothering me so far is that my professor finds a certain joy in “highlighting” the best poems in class, and every week I convince myself that my crappy poems are so freaking awesome that I am certain he will pick mine. He hasn’t yet. YET. It is only the beginning of February.
So, wish me luck, seeing that all my fiction writing classes are over and only poetry classes lie on the horizon within my last two semesters.