|
October 10, 2004 (Please note that the posts that follow are neither in chronological order, nor in order of importance. I know the order I’m posting in says a lot about me, I’m sure, but I’m not sure I want to know what that is).
I need to say first that all the poets (who are grouped into “Featured” and “Poets Among Us”), were so generous with their time that it was easy to let drop that barrier I usually find between myself and clear speech when in the presence of a hero of mine. I need to say this first or you’ll be surprised when I congratulate Paul Muldoon for reacting with a smile to a woman yelling at him “Jesus, Mary and Joseph, Mr. Muldoon, you’re scaring the bejeezus out of me!” We’d been talking about craft. Mr. Muldoon – whose work displays structure and rhyme more prominently than many major poets today – was telling us that he very rarely revises a complete work because he revises intensely line by line as he writes, so that he “finishes” a line before going too far past it. He did explain that he often gets to the end of a poem and has to revise back through it then, but that since he so intensely crafts as he writes, he can’t reenter the mindset he was in later to continue that process. My audience-mate’s primary objection involved capturing the idea, her point being that her poems come to her as flashes of inspiration, and she fears losing them so much she has to get it all down before it flees. Mr. Muldoon commented that if an idea is good enough, it will linger long enough to be written well. This is interesting to me (though it was heresy to some in that tent). I very frequently will jot down an idea for a topic or a title that I have no idea how to deal with and come back to it later with success. I very infrequently have stopped in the middle of writing something and been able to finish it later. I have frequently, though, stopped writing in the middle because I’d run out of interesting things to say. I have a technical writer’s approach to revision – I like to have access to all earlier drafts of an idea – so I like to complete a thought before revising it, even if I know the first thought isn’t exactly what I wanted to say. I tell myself it’s to be able to return to the earlier thought if the later one isn’t any good, but I’m starting to think that’s nonsense. It seems more likely me now that I’m dragging out the dying of the idea, hoping the muse will blow new life into its lungs. And the ideas that I scribble and return to often have been kicking around in my head since I wrote them. In fact, I don’t usually return to the paper scrap or Word document I dropped the idea – I just remember it and start over. My audience mate didn’t stop disagreeing until long after the end of the session, but I think Mr. Muldoon hit an important point: If the idea you have for a poem is strong, it will survive its crafting into a poem – whatever your crafting (or revision) process is.
|