Complete and Utter Failure

[dr_mabeuse]

Failure's a subject that fascinates me, probably because I'm so familiar with it, and because I think I might secretly be a blood relative to it.

I write fiction mainly. I used to write poetry in high school and college and remember being fairly good at it, or at least comfortable, and seem to remember getting into a special kind of mindset where it would come to me without much difficulty, at least in a crude form. The polished, perfected form took more diligence and effort, but a kind of raw product was always pretty much there on tap.

Then I stopped writing altogether and now when I look for that raw product and even that mindset, they're not there anymore, and so I'm trying to get them back. I admire and respect (and envy) poetry immensely, I want to be able to do it again. So far it's really been hell. No fun at all.

The thing is, I find failing at poetry much more painful and humiliating than failing at fiction. Poetry's much more personal, of course, and much more concentrated and condensed than fiction, but there's something else as well.

In fiction, there's usually a story that, theoretically at least, is independent of your telling of it. You may do a good job of telling it or you may really screw it up, but the story's still there. In poetry, your telling of the story is the story, so you don't have any room for error.

In any case. I find these embarrassments I'm tossing up here very disconcerting, and I'm wondering if you pros ever feel the same kind of thing, and how you deal with it, how you deal with major failures and embarrassments or if you do at all. I thought I'd open a thread dedicated to major gaffes, blunders, and abject failures to see how other people handle them

I'm a very harsh critic and very hard on myself I know, very demandingl. That's a pretty bad place to start from in poetry, isn't it?

And this is interesting for me because I have people coming up to me all the time asking me for advice on how to start writing fiction, and for me it's so easy, I hardly know what to tell them. You just go to the keyboard and start writing. Now I'm in the same position of asking you people how do I start writing poetry, and I'm sure your first instinct is to tell me the same: you just start writing poetry. It makes me see how worthless the advice I've been giving has been.

 

[wildsweetone]

i don't know if it happens to anyone else, but for me, if i have a break from poetry posting online, then when i come to post again, i have the screaming ab-dabs in my tummy, i'm scared to death to post. it's daft. maybe it's just the equivalent of First Night jitters. but it sure makes me rethink and squeeze my eyes closed tight when i hit the enter button. lol nuts.

i think you're right, that the 'telling of the story' is the poetry. i think once a person's poetry voice has set, then those feelings of failure should be minimal. right?

i think i have scars on my knees from the amount of times i've tripped over in here. but the best part is it's okay to get up and try again, or to carry on. for me, it's just one of my ways of learning the-long-way-around.

if we were perfect with our poetry, then language might well cease to grow.

 

[Angeline]

I'm like a shark. I keep moving. I can be very hard on myself, which incidentally is why I never mind harsh or brutally honest feedback. I figure no one can be harder on me than I am on myself. The past year especially has been a real challenge for me because of personal struggles (nasty divorce which, thank heavens, is almost final) and also because I feel burnt out. I've probably written 5,000 poems in the past five years. I was writing 2-4 a day pretty solidly for about two years. Now it seems like everything I think of I've already written about it. The old poem pops into my head and messes with my muse.

But, I also happen to think that writing poetry is like riding a bike. Once you know what you're doing, you don't unlearn it. You might get rusty but it comes back. And that, Dr. Mab, is why I think you shouldn't worry over this. I've read your writing here for years and the prose verges on poetry quite a bit. I've read your poems, too, on occasion. Your utter love and lust for words is clear. And everyone writes clunkers. I don't care how good you are. Maybe you don't show the worst of them here or don't write new poems in threads here (the old copy and paste), but if you write poetry, you've written bad poems.

Hence, my shark theory. Just keep writing. I may not be thrilled with a lot of what I'm producing now, but I know I got lots of poetry left in me. A lifetime's worth.

 

[ghost_girl]

oh, Dr M



the only thing that defines a man as a failure is when he finally accepts "failure" as a description of himself. ( I saw that as a quote on a soldier's profile on MySpace, sounds appropriate)

everyone needs to walk as a dream of himself at times, whatever he defines that dream as.

perhaps you have been awakened during your dream phase and are just a bit uncomfortable.

I too have read you. you'll be fine

 

[Tzara]

Failure's a subject that fascinates me, probably because I'm so familiar with it, and because I think I might secretly be a blood relative to it.

Piker. I wrote my PhD dissertation on failure, but then my committee rejected it.

I write fiction mainly. I used to write poetry in high school and college and remember being fairly good at it, or at least comfortable, and seem to remember getting into a special kind of mindset where it would come to me without much difficulty, at least in a crude form. The polished, perfected form took more diligence and effort, but a kind of raw product was always pretty much there on tap.

Then I stopped writing altogether and now when I look for that raw product and even that mindset, they're not there anymore, and so I'm trying to get them back. I admire and respect (and envy) poetry immensely, I want to be able to do it again. So far it's really been hell. No fun at all.

The thing is, I find failing at poetry much more painful and humiliating than failing at fiction. Poetry's much more personal, of course, and much more concentrated and condensed than fiction, but there's something else as well.

In fiction, there's usually a story that, theoretically at least, is independent of your telling of it. You may do a good job of telling it or you may really screw it up, but the story's still there. In poetry, your telling of the story is the story, so you don't have any room for error.

In any case. I find these embarrassments I'm tossing up here very disconcerting, and I'm wondering if you pros ever feel the same kind of thing, and how you deal with it, how you deal with major failures and embarrassments or if you do at all. I thought I'd open a thread dedicated to major gaffes, blunders, and abject failures to see how other people handle them

When I was an undergraduate, I published something in the college literary magazine. One of the faculty members, in his review, singled my piece out as being the single worst thing in the entire magazine. I didn't show anything else I had written to anyone else for thirty years.

Maybe it's age and the attitudinal changes that brings, maybe I've just gotten used to doing dimwitted things over the years, but I try to not worry about writing shit and placing it where people can see it. To use an agricultural analogy, I may just have to spread a lot of shit around to get something green to grow. Or at least sprout.

My motivation for writing is probably a little different than that of most people here. People often say something like "I need to write" or "I just have to express myself" when explaining why they write. I obviously don't need to write, as I've been through very long periods in my life where I simply didn't. I read or listened to music or watched baseball or went for long walks or played golf. I no longer play golf, though. I had even less talent for that than I do for writing.

I write because it is fun. I like to play with words--shove them around this way and that. And it is fun even when I'm doing it badly, or being silly about it. So I try to be not too sensitive about it.

I'm a very harsh critic and very hard on myself I know, very demandingl. That's a pretty bad place to start from in poetry, isn't it?

And this is interesting for me because I have people coming up to me all the time asking me for advice on how to start writing fiction, and for me it's so easy, I hardly know what to tell them. You just go to the keyboard and start writing. Now I'm in the same position of asking you people how do I start writing poetry, and I'm sure your first instinct is to tell me the same: you just start writing poetry. It makes me see how worthless the advice I've been giving has been.

But it isn't worthless advice. It is perfect advice. You produce poems by writing them. They may be bad. You look at them, and then look at some you think are good or, at least, better, and write some more or rewrite the first.

You can try some exercises of the "pick a topic and write a poem on it" type. There are often challenges posted here of that nature. I find those help with the "inspiration" thing. I am rarely, if ever, inspired to write a poem, at least in the sense that I have some overweening emotion I have to capture. I sometimes think of a metaphor or simile I'd like to explore, or see something that gives me a germ of a theme on which to write.

I think Angie is on to something with her riding a bike analogy. I know I find when I haven't written poems for a while that any ones I try to write are particularly bad. I just try not to worry about that.

I mean, they're just bad poems. So I wrote a bad poem. Who cares?

 

[UnderYourSpell]

I used to think writing poetry was easy .. give me any subject and I will write you a poem .. then I came in here. Ohe dear what an eye opener that was! Suddenly I was completely old fashioned and outdated. I still don't know what the hell I am doing anymore but I keep trying. I read all the poetry in here that I can and seems to me you all know more words than I do because some that I read make me think what the hell was that all about but I wouldn't dream of asking. That old paranoia thing again of not being good enough. Yet again I read some and they go straight to my heart and I understand them completely. If I get a bad revue or comment yes it does hurt and shuts me up for a while but I bounce back and a sense of humour helps even a weird one like mine. If something I write gives me a tingle I hope it feels right for someone else too.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

because some that I read make me think what the hell was that all about but I wouldn't dream of asking. That old paranoia thing again of not being good enough. Yet again I read some and they go straight to my heart and I understand them completely. .

no no baby. I think many poets would totally cream their jeans if someone actually said, Hey what the hell was that about, because it would give us a chance to explain further what we were trying to do... Poets love nothing better than to talk about what they wrote. To parse it, explain it, discuss the intent, yada and yada.

It helps us reinforce the delusion that what we're doing is Important. Never hesitate to ask. it's like my fucking daydream that someone would say to me, please, bijou, talk about that poem and why you did what you did there, what you meant, what you were trying to express or accomplish. You'd be really really sorry, cause I would.

I'm not speaking for anyone else officially but i bet I'm not the only one...

bijou

 

[FifthFlower]

When I was an undergraduate, I published something in the college literary magazine. One of the faculty members, in his review, singled my piece out as being the single worst thing in the entire magazine. I didn't show anything else I had written to anyone else for thirty years.

I don't show anything I have written to anyone I actually know, probably out of fear.

For the concern about not writing "good" poetry, well, there will always be someone, who is recognized as some sort of authority, who will think your work is garbage, no matter how much you like it. When I write formally, I assume the free-verse crowd won't like it. That doesn't bother me. However, when a so-called "new formalist" says that I write shit because I capitalize the first word of the line, use too strict of a meter, rhyme too exactly, blah, blah, blah, that does make me wonder, but I just have to remind myself that they are not my employers. Then my innate love of telling "experts" where to shove it, especially those whose work I'm not fond of either, starts kicking in, often to my later regret.

There are a lot of things I would like to do, like dr_mabeuse, that I don't because I conveniently spend my time doing something else, like writing this prose right now. I would like to draw, paint, compose music and write some good stories. I think I could do all of these things well, but I always have something more important to do. I'm going to have to do something about that.