Today ends my 10-day commitment to post a poem a day. It’s also the end of April, last day of National Poetry Month in 2009. I’ve posted new poems at my creative writing blog, Telling Stories. Starting with the introduction, I managed to get a poem a day up there.It’s been a lot of fun. Not only did I post them daily, I wrote them daily. Later today I’ll post #10 the last one for this series.

There’s much more than these 10 poems on the site. So please explore and tell me what you enjoyed. I have a wedding poem called Mine that is often well-received. I posted it last April. You should check it out!

Poetry is a very important literary form that is explored all the time. April, National Poetry Month, is a big deal for me because it’s the time when poetry spills over into mainstream writing and reading. Here are a just a few of the benefits that poetry presents.

4 Benefits of Reading & Writing Poetry

1. Poetry helps you to know things more fully. When I turn things over to put them into verse, I often find that I have to shift my perspective, usually to see more closely. In a poem of gratitude, Amen, I was thinking about how happy the spring had arrived. I sat by the lake thinking of all that was going on. I passed beyond the big things moving closer and wider to see a broader picture than had originally come to mind.

2. Poetry commands your attention. There’s reading and then there’s reading. You can’t skim a poem and get what the writer sets forth for you, which is not the whole of it. The rest is filled in with a big part of who you are. Really, when you think about it, anything you can comprehend is understood from the context or frame of reference you have. Poems leave a little more room for you in the verses.

3. Poetry can sustain good conversation. Two people can read the same poem and get very different things out of it. I’ve had some really interesting conversations around poetry. In fact, one of the poems I wrote called What Could I Lose brought a woman to tears, whereas it made me smile when I wrote it. After the reading she spoke with me and made me understand where the poem transported her.

4. Poetry writing asks you to dig deeper. It feels like Twitter sometimes. Poetry makes no restrictions on the number of characters you use, or the words. However, you work to tell your story, to convey your thoughts and emotions, reflections and opinions. And you do this in verse form instead of prose. One of the shortest poems in my book Partly Cloudy didn’t make it the the table of contents and yet it got a lot of feedback, both commiseration and query of What led you to feel that way?

Keep Reading Poetry

I saved this post for today because poetry is not just for the month of April. I invite you to read verses regularly. Find favorite poets, collections of poetry blogs and more; and return to them to get all that’s there for you. There’s tomorrow and tomorrow.

Telling Stories is where I put my creative expression that’s not work-related. If you should visit, you may find short essays, videos and more. I hope you enjoy my free form space. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

UPDATE: Just Outside, poem no. 10 in the set is ready for your enjoyment.

Poetry can enhance understanding of life’s moments. It tells a story and gets you to another level of experiencing the world. And April is the month when poetry lovers explore ways to push poetry into the literary mainstream. I like the idea so I participate in my own small way on my blog, Telling Stories. This year I missed a lot, but I will be closing the month by posting a poem a day over there. I started yesterday. If you get a chance, please stop by and let me know what you think.

During National Poetry Month, I generally step up my poem writing and posting and read more. Through the Twitter search, there is a lot of poetry from all over the web. It’s a great place to find a huge cross section of poets and poems and back-stories. I’ve come across some great poetry voices and you can too. And, if this is your month to get started, I hope you’ll continue beyond this month to enjoy the gift that poetry offers.

One blog I came across from exploring #npm is Susan Taylor Brown. It’s been a pleasure reading her poetry and other offerings.

Are you reading all the great stuff that’s online? Or, writing your own poetry? Tell me how you celebrate National Poetry Month. When you want to share poetry on Twitter, add #npm or #poetry month so all searchers can find them, including me, even if we’re not friends. By the way, my Twitter ID is @sharils

When It Must Be Done

Why not just wait for the muse to to bowl me over? Sometimes, when a poem is requested I have to do a little work, especially when it’s on a topic that requires me to stretch myself. My muse is usually present, but I’ll need to clear the way so I can get to the heart of the project. My process has two steps:

1. Journaling – I try to write everything; things useful to the project and things that may be obstructing the way.
2. Scavenge My Writing – After taking a break from it, I return to pull out everything that is useful, either typing it or writing, whichever appeals to me at the time.

It’s How I Got Mine: Whittling While I Work

It was my biggest command performance. My sister-in-law (to be, at the time) asked me for a poem for her wedding. I was humbled and honored and intimidated. When it was time to begin, I went straight to my journal. There was too much stuff in my mind to just relax and let the poem flow.

At first I tried to figure out what was expected of me. Having never been married, I thought that perhaps I fell too far short to get to what I needed.

In my journal I wrote out every doubt, hesitation, short-coming, blank space, distraction and limitation that came to mind, pages of thoughts related and not. Every negative reason I could think of for why I couldn’t do this was put in those pages. Then I dismissed them all.

Shaping the Verses

I focused on what I would want for my wedding and let that wish take over, after my crappy first draft failed miserably. It carried in it the vestigial effort of contriving something that was not from me. None of us liked it; and that was my final proof that I needed to trust in what I knew, to trust in me and how I understand things.

When it was time to write this poem, when I was ready to let it out, having cleared the way, it practically came out whole. A few line cuts and word substitutions were all it took—and weeks of journal writing, fretting, talking, and Lego® blocks building.

The Finished Product

When it was right, it resonated in my spirit. I like that feeling. You know, that YES that you feel with your whole self, it lets you know when you’ve got it right. The poem I that came out of this effort is Mine.

I was pleased with it before I gave it to Nicole. And she loved it. They loved it.

Tell me how you write on demand. Do you bother? Let me know why you do or don’t go after the verses.

Capturing Ideas to Write By

National Poetry Month is coming to a close. And I was thinking about poetry and finding verses in my head. One thing led to another and I landed on the randomness of thoughts, how it seemed like there was no catching up to them.

You know those ideas that just flit in and out? The ones that stay just long enough for you to notice that they were present before they bug out? Sometimes those ideas come fluttering around the edges of my consciousness and then just float away like butterflies. They may be really good, but rarely can I just know for sure since they glide in when I’m distract.

What Works for Me

I feel like I’m supposed to catch these thoughts; and if I don’t, I have to chase them down. I start where I stopped working to listen.

Meditate – Thoughts fly in from all directions, work, home, family, friends, and more. At times everything comes through at once and they tend to sound like nothing but a hum—like writer’s block.

Meditation practices have in common that they take you out of place with silence as long as you can sustain. It’s a high powered break that when done properly returns you to your tasks, fresh, revitalized and focused.

Ramsey of The Daily Mind gives an excellent overview of meditation techniques. And, as you may know, I have my Morning B.R.E.W. practice. Find what works for you and try it the next time your thoughts overwhelm or abandon you.

Recording Your Ideas

To end the quiet, let the thoughts return slowly. They’ll start to come faster without any insistence usually. Now you have to catch them as you can.

Brainstorm – Everything that pops into your head is important when you’re tracking a random idea. I try to take brief notes enough to know where that thought was headed and short to not neglect the next one. Often, I will use index cards to capture mine. Diagrams and lists work well too.

Write it out – This recording is done in traditional paragraph form. My goal here is to write until I hit upon the idea that brought me up out of whatever I was working on initially. One such poem that I caught is Partly Cloudy. These thoughts go into my writing journal.

Why You Can Catch Them

Many of the writing books, blogs and magazines that I read talk about how you don’t have to wait for inspiration. I think they’re right. We are constantly receiving ideas. The activities that I’ve listed here will help you to process and catch some of the ideas that may become your next great poem.

This is the idea phase. Crafting is another stage.

For my participation in National Poetry Month, I’ve added a few poems at my Telling Stories blog. I hope you’ll check them out.

Related article:

How to Use Your Work as a Meditation