When/where poems come

[Piscator]

I've followed this following exchange between Angeline and champagne on where and how poems come from in Guilty Pleasure's Wheel Challenge - read and weep and then came across an interesting conversation on CBC's q guest host Angeline Tetteh-Wayoe and Jasmin Kaur on spoken word, Sikh women, fame, Instagram and at 16:10 of the Listen audio clip where she reads her poem "When the Poems Come" which adds to what I hope might be an continuing conversation here.

For me, a poem often develops from a line that comes to mind "spontaneously," which provides the grist for further drivle.

You understood it perfectly, and your articulation of it helps me understand it better. Often when I write the poem comes out really fast (like 15 minutes or so). It's like it bubbles up from my subconscious and I feel what it means but not in a way I can describe. Does anyone else experience that when writing poetry, I wonder?

Yes, this. I often feel that poetry seems to fall onto the page when I write. Even if that writing is meant to be businesslike, I go back and find poetic devices scattered throughout it. Then I feel guilty that it comes so easily when countless others seem to struggle for the right words.

When I let it all sit for a while (2 weeks +) and come back for editing, often that's the difficult part of the process. But then, when I read it, I see assonance or maybe internal rhymes that I had no idea I'd written. It's a bit disconcerting, there are poems that I totally can't remember writing.

Isn't it fascinating how this happens? I have the same experience of going back to reread a poem, not right away, but maybe a few hours or days later and seeing things I did that I did not recognize at the time of writing the first draft! Often for me it's double meanings of phrases or line breaks that allow for various interpretations. And often a second or semi-hidden meaning will feel portentous to me. I'll think about how I definitely did not try to do that and about how my subconscious finds ways to speak to my conscious self. Poetry can be a mysterious and awe inducing business!

 

[oggbashan]

Someone favorited an older poem of mine. Re-reading that poem inspired me to write and submit another.

Edited to add:

This one:

https://literotica.com/p/my-first-love-is-dead

 

[oneblueye]

hey ...

what has been said about a poem coming from [a spontaneous line].
I had been watching t.v. sometime a go back in 18 or 2019 and was on my way drifting out and my consciousness caught a phrase something about racism, all I caught of the phrase was -- 'rise up'. When I woke up, it came out like this,

"One hundred and sixty is too damn many years
to be washing freed blood and wipe away the tears.
Then the 9's start talking and the 10's soon begin
everybody hit the floor cuz boots they's coming in --,
RISE UP! RISE UP!!"

(Then a guy I once knew turned it into something more when he added this...)

I work hard all day and when I come home at night
just wanna love my family don't wanna piss and fight.
I got my finger in the dam, I hope it aint too late,
to help stem this rising tide of violence and hate--,
RISE UP! RISE UP!!

I ain't trying to get over I don't need what you got
just trying to keep whats mine and yeah it ain't alot.
Then POTUS talking steak and giving nuttn but shit
don't ask if I remember cuz I never forget --,
RISE UP! RISE UP!!

In 1963 a 'boy' became a man
when he picked up his dream and said yes I can.
Then from ocean to ocean from the North to the South
spreading faster than the net damn near all word of mouth --,
RISE UP! RISE UP!!

Tell us about the dream Martin.
There ain't no "back of--" on this bus.
We all driving this bus baby,
Grab a piece of this steering wheel.
RISE UP!!!

 

[GiadaRosetta]

What dreams may bring

For me, most of my poems and my writing in general come from images I find in my head as I wake. Things that lingered from dreams as I lay there in my hypnopompic state. So I do most of my writing in the morning over coffee, chasing the images in my head. I tend to be moody and barky at others who disturb me while I am in this process.

Sometimes later in the day something comes to me, an image or thought I am pondering. I find at these later parts of the day the Haiku form to be helpful in capturing the feeling or emotion I am experiencing.

I have been chastising myself lately for I am very lazy with my work. I have a poor habit of tossing or deleting things, especially my Haikus. So I am making an effort now at saving them in a file, because sometimes they are half-way decent. Laughs at myself.

Love Giada