Reader's Responses

Reader’s Response
Writing and knowing

“We’ve been told again and again to write what we know but we don’t trust that advice.”

“These and other poets began with the simple idea that what they saw and experienced was important to record, and that the modest facts of their lives, what they knew within the small confines of their limited, personal worlds, could contain the enduring facts and truths of the larger world.”

“No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.”

“No one can call herself a poet unless she questions her ideas, ethics, and beliefs.”*******

“Good writing works on one premise: your experience is not yours alone, but in some sense a metaphor for everyone’s.”
 
Reader’s Response
The Music of the Line

“There is often no single correct way to do it.”

“Poets need to tune their ears as finely as musicians; that’s why reading poems aloud is a good idea, including your own poems as you write them.”

“The rhythms of certain lines also serve to intensify the contrasts in the poem.”

“Line lengths, ultimately, are something you develop a knack for by fooling around with them.”

“As we said earlier, there are no real rules, only effects.”
 
Readers Response
Images

“Images are closely linked to memory, that in fact many of our memories consist of images.”

“Magic. That’s what an image should do, produce a bit of magic, a reality so real it is ‘like being alive twice’”

“Images aren’t primarily visual.”

“Images are the rendering of your bodily experience in the world.”

“Never ask a question you can’t answer.”

Readers Response
Voice and Style
“We read contemporary writers and imitate their line breaks, or their similes, and worry that we shouldn’t, that we’ll only create bad reproductions instead of original works.”

“Beginning writers often sound remarkably alike, because they have the same limited range of choice; they haven’t yet discovered a wider range.”

“Writing and reading are the only ways to find your voice.”

“Ezra Pound said, “poetry should be at least as well-written as prose,” and we agree; bad grammar doesn’t fly in either one.”

“Know your work. Being aware of your stylistic strengths and weaknesses will not only help you grow, but will help you deal with criticism from others.”


Reader’s Response
Simile and Metaphor
“The use of figurative language isn’t a new skill; it’s one you already know.”

“One difference between good and not-so-good poets is that the good ones recognize when they’ve written stuff that deserves to be dumped, and load up the trucks.”

“Strong similes and metaphors are integral to a poem’s meaning; they aren’t merely clever comparisons tacked on.”

“Another thing about the figurative: it gives you access to words and images that wouldn’t be there otherwise.”

“This is one of the pleasures of both reading and writing poems: the recasting of one thing in terms of another, the revelation of the ways outwardly different can be seen to have a similar core.”