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Hi wD.![]()
I'm glad you stopped in this thread and I appreciate your thanks. When someone new like you comes to Lit and I read their poems and see the talent there, well that is my favorite thing about being here: the opportunity to meet and learn with new people who bring fresh and different perspectives to writing. So thank you.
I have never been a moderator anywhere but here so I can only speak to this experience. For the most part I love it because while it is work it is also work that is my passion, you know? If I can help get new people to come here and write or "old" people to come back I know it's good for everyone here, including me. And that gets to your question about inspiration. I am definitely inspired by reading other poems here as well as by challenges (thank you Annie!). I read something that excites me or gets me thinking and then I'm writing. There is a wonderful synergy that develops when a large group of people are writing here and reading each others' poems, commenting on them. I look at some of the poems that have been written here lately, stuff from Tess and Harry, Remec, Neonurotic and even people like you who write and submit rather than write here on the forum and I see everyone's writing taking leaps forward. Harry wrote a poem here about his trip that is a tour de force. Tess just writes one gorgeous poem after another. And you have been taking chances, imo, in some of your poems, exploring new territory that is making your poetry more nuanced and complex. That is all inspiring to me.
I love being a moderator enough that I will make a fool of myself and start goofy threads or act like a cheerleader, schmaltz it up, whatever if it helps make poetry happen here. I'm a little nutty about that but ok with it. I do not like being a cop (oh how I don't like it) or telling people what to do, but this is a moderated forum and sometimes I have to go there to try to keep the forum from degenerating into people yelling at each other. My experience is that when that happens it makes everyone feel uncomfortable and distracts from writing. Of course sometimes I lose my temper, too. I have a long fuse but I'm human like the rest of you. I regret some of the things I've said in anger or things I've done here that seemed like a good idea at first but turned out not to be. I've made some dumb mistakes that resulted in my losing the friendship of a few people I really love here. That hurts. But, overall, I like doing this and I know my heart is in the right place about it.
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Tess brings up a really interesting topic; the melancholia I'm sure only poets find a way to express in such a manner that we're all driven to tears and catharsis through reading mere words!
I second the question about unhappiness related "juice flow" and add: I know you write to answer literotica-based challenges, personal emotions or current events. I've read your jazz, your political liberal leftiness take and so much more that (although even I didn't realize this until just now) I've been drawn to write my view of your view many times. So, inspirational you, what draws you to write a poem as opposed to a rant?
You talk of bringing poets back, so who would you if you could?I would like to point out to readers that she once more kicked my backside to come backSome alas we can't get back but if you had a magic wand?
Mistakes are invariably a part of the human condition, and must be taken as a matter of course, when they are made honestly and without malice, the way I see it. While we learn more from doing things right, we have more opportunities to try when we do things wrong, so the balance is what is important when deciding regret over mistakes. In your experience have seen any trend in whether there is a correlation in ability to span for writers? I mean, do those that write over a longer, more spaced out timeframe seem to be better or worse than those that produce in a shorter, faster paced flurry? I ask because I had an English teacher in high school who railed against 'flash in the pan' authors who would write a fistful of works and then step aside, their days writing at an end after only a few years of a high volume of output. She thought that nothing worthwhile could come of a short salvo that exhausted inspiration. I ran into her not long ago and we quickly found that old argument again. I would like to hear your opinion on the matter.
As an aside, I have never sat down and read through the entirety of Rime Of The Ancient Mariner, but I listen to Iron Maiden's take on it quite often. Not the same, I know, but if classic poetry came with Dave Murray on lead guitar more often I think that there would be a hell of a lot more English Literature majors in the world. Just my opinion.
OMG! Don't turn this thread into an "I-can't-wait-for-a-4-hour-hard-on" Denis Hale thread... LOL no more foreshadowing, missy. Let's keep your interview rolling.
I'm sure you've written something that all the world (or at least the part of the world you showed it to) has gushed over and praised it, only to decide to hide it away for a while; then bring it back and get told that it's pure and utter trash. How do you cope with unfavourable review and critique besides the inevitable "thick skin"?
Or maybe, you feel you aren't receiving honest critique around here because the majority of us, all love what you do. How can we turn off our Angeline blindness and point a harsher glare at your poems? I know you're of an editing background so you must have some technique in your arsenal that allows you to form an unbiased opinion, which I hope you'll share.
Do you remember that thread CharleyH started where we had to send her a poem and then guess which poem all the others wrote. Eve was the spoiler in that one. I'm going to look it up, because I learned from that exercise that a) 'tess and I write in a similar style and b) no matter how well I think I know someone else's writing voice, that once you put a pair of "blinkers" on, you're really on a path where everyone sounds alike.
I can't remember if I guessed you correctly or if I was totally off in left field with your bunt. Maybe we should do a similar challenge with our newbs.
eta: Poet auteur
voila, c'est ca.
First a thanks to Tzara for making this happen and second a thanks to you, Ang, for revealing (exposing - lol) so much of yourself. I've been reading the entire conversation with intense interest and fascination and adore all of your reflections and experiences, both of life and of poetry, and to a certain extent the way that they interact, almost symbiotically.
While there are so many questions, I did want to delve a little into your reflections on your own poetry, if possible. You mentioned earlier that all of your poems feel unfinished, but I'm curious, how do you view your poet today as compared with the poet you were when you first found Lit, to the poet you were as a teen and/or to the poet you were when you wrote your very first (sort of) finished piece?
Hey there, Angeline
Great interview so far, and I've just been off reading all the poetry entries and comments on the poet auteur thread champagne linked! So I got a little side-tracked.
So, how consciously do you apply poetic ticks of the trade as you write? Or is your process more organic, a more internal/visceral approach that gets modified after the fact in the editing process? As someone with well-developed skillsets, do you find you've used a whole lot of stuff that - possibly - you weren't aware of as you wrote? And do you now find that, although the editing process has to be thorough, there's often a lot less you actually change or discard? How hard do you find jettisoning a phrase you really really like from a piece because you know, ultimately, it makes the whole thing work better without it?
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Which are your favourites of your own poems? The ones that make you think 'Yes I got that down exactly how I wanted'.
I'm a lurker here rather than anything else but have I hope learned a lot from reading you. I have noticed many times what an effective critic/editor you are. You share with Wicked Eve the ability to unerringly focus on that one thing in a poem which really needs looking at again.
The first time I noticed, was in a comment on a piece by (I think) Patrick Carrington which was a poem I had uncritically admired. I was almost shocked - then it dawned on me - blimey she's right! A point soon confirmed by Mr C.
That 'eye' is perhaps your teacher gene coming through and there have been many beneficiaries.
Thank you for taking the time to stand under the spotlight, I believe that this is revealing quite a bit of context for a lot of the critical observation that your supply to the community so often. A view of the person behind the advice. Not that you seem to be hidden away normally, but this kind of direct discussion about the views of those that are giving instruction or guidance is always a benefit to both sides. I valued your input before this closer look into your perspective, but now I have a better understanding of where it comes from, and that is a wonderful thing. How much value would you place on the source of a critique? Not in general, I suppose, but for example: From a close friend, would you worry overmuch about being patronized for fear of hurt feelings, or would you simply account for it from the start and assume it would be there? Would you place a high value on the words of an anonymous critic, someone who simply gives a short review and disappear? Or another poet, not necessarily a friend or rival, just an acquaintance. Would that be deemed neutral, or would you feel that bias could still linger there for whatever reason? I know that the review of peers is important for the growth of a poet, but how important is it for you? How much do you think is effective in most instances? I don't know if I am phrasing this well, forgive me if this doesn't make much sense.
...What’s her favorite color? Comfort food? Beatles song? (One sung by John I’ll bet.)
...
Oh, and “Why Lester Young and not, say, Dexter Gordon or Charlie Parker?” I’m especially curious about that one.
We’re open for questions, people. Fire away.
It happens to me all of the time, like suddenly there's a rhyme in the middle of my free verse and it just works to perfection ... Like my e.e. cummings glosa; I had no idea I'd done such a thing until 2 days from when I posted it. Then I thought, how 'bout that! I like that it snuck in since it seems to flow seamlessly through the meter right back into that sense of fear I was trying to convey.to you, too! This is more fun than I expected lol, but it's also a little like psychotherapy.
My process is both studied and organic imho. Elements of poetry like assonance, alliteration, repetitions, even rhyme and near-rhyme to an extent, have become internalized. As I am writing I do notice the words I'm choosing (obviously) or that something is or isn't working. But beyond that are the things that just show up in poems that I don't even notice until after I've written and edited and go back to read. It might be a metaphor that I don't really recall thinking about as I wrote or a word that has layers of meaning germane to the subject of my poem. It seems like some weird synchronicity to me when I notice it, but of course it can't be coincidental because it's bubbling up from my subconscious and into the poem.
Please someone tell me I am not the only one who experiences this when they write!
But yes you know me for the liberal, lefty, humanist hippie that I am who recycles and freaks out about global warming and what it will mean for my kids, so I would like, in general, to see less emphasis on fossil fuels and more on renewable resources. I don't want to see jobs lost but I also believe we can create jobs and improve our respective economies in the long run by creating a grid of alternate energy sources. So yeah count me with Neil and Paul though I am willing to listen and potentially be convinced of my wrongness. I'm a poet, not a scientist!