Very few artists enjoy being controlled. Most of us break away from convention and the status-quo just by breathing. We tend to dress strange, talk strange, keep odd hours, and spend a lot of time introspecting and creating, things that the world of work-buy-die has absolutely no use for. One thing we all have in common is: we disrupt the dreariness of life. We spice up the world with paintings, music, poems, dances, skylines, and films that are as essential to living as air or water. Everyone knows we need art like we need food. Just imagine a world with no art. That includes every meme, viral video, and cooking show ever created. It also includes clothes. From tuxedos to trashy lingerie. Fashion is art. Take away creativity, we're all wearing sacks -- without product logos. Don't forget WWE! Also tattoos. Beer logos. And everything on Netflix. So why are artists treated so cruelly by society and by people in general? What do you mean, cruelly? Artists are rich, famous, and free! Nonsense. Despite the b.s. hype the media showers on less than 1% of working artists, most artists struggle financially, have a tough time finding outlets for their work, and also have to keep growing, learning and creating for their entire lives. They don't take up a post somewhere and start watching the calendar till it hits: "Social Security and 401k." Every day is a battle with a blank canvas, an empty page, a lump of clay. Because artists need so much time alone to think and create, they often suffer from relationship issues and loneliness. Then there's critics. Rivals. Failed drafts. Failed revisions. Many artists suicide or turn to drink and drugs. This is also true of non-artists, but there's a greater risk if you're an artist. When an artist cracks up people say: "Yup that's what happens. Crazy artiste..." When an artist, after working for years or decades, is successful people say: "Wow, you're lucky to be so gifted." So in any case, people who are not creators simply do not understand artists. It's a cliché that happens to be 100% true. Non-artists just don't get creative types, but they really need our work just as artists tend to step outside of conventional life, but need it as inspiration. My advice on this is simply: don't bother trying to explain yourself to people. Nothing works. You will literally argue with people for years over the value of a dollar or the propriety of men not wearing dresses. Nothing will come of it. You'll still be an artist; they'll still be scanning the room to see if they're "normal." When people question your outrageous verve -- your audacity to spend the morning writing a poem rather than gossiping about your third cousin's mistress -- your subversive will to paint watercolors of an old barn rather than spend another afternoon complaining about your bad back or someone's barking dog -- just smile and say: "I can't help it. I'm an artist..." Tally Poems Written: 301 Submissions: 50 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Some People" Categories All
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One of the more surprising things to me about being a poet is how many people try to stop you. From parents to teachers, spouses, friends, and rivals, it seems the one thing everyone agrees on is: you should be doing something else. Anything else. Just, please, don't write poems. Not in class. Not when you should be working. Not when the lawn needs mowed. Not when actually talented people can already do it better than you. Not when you don't have a degree. Not when you're too young. Not when you're too old. Not when this, not when that... Everyone, probably even your cat, has a sneaky reason for why you shouldn't write poetry. Some are not so sneaky. My mother, for example, literally took her contempt for my art to her deathbed. People will tell you things like: "nobody reads poetry" or "these days poetry is hip-hop" or "my favorite poet is Dr. Seuss" but what they're really trying to say is: you can't make any money with poems, so why bother? But that's their love talking. People who try to stop you because they think you're being irresponsible are just being conscientious hall monitors and stating the blatantly obvious. No point in telling them you think there might just be things as important, or even more important, than money because they won't believe you. Just know in your bones that nobody's opinion matters except your own. Creative people are, by nature, unbound and free of the constraints that others accept as obligatory and routine. As soon as your feet leave the ground, somebody's going to say: "You're going to fall. Gravity's real." But think of this. If a tightrope walker (without a net) walks the rope and nobody watching predicts her death, what's the point? You can't bring off your full creative effects without doubters. That's what the "peanut gallery" is all about. In fact, you need them to be pushed to greater heights. The people who stand around and criticize or try to undermine your efforts will help you soar and --- if you learn to leverage their gloom ---- gasp in awe as you dance the tightrope and jump through hoops of fire. Tally Poems Written: 300 Submissions: 50 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Poet's Place" Categories All Clearly, poetry is a dangerous business. Brilliant poets like Hart Crane, Sylvia Plath, and Dylan Thomas lost their lives prematurely to substance abuse, mental illness, and poetic ambition. Others, like Robert Lowell or Ted Hughes descended into a kind of tedium of accomplishment and self-satisfaction that, to any working poet, appears worse than actual death. Most of us don't risk our lives for poetry, or our sanity, we just write poems and suffer a lot about how many people read and like them. But is this kind of worrying unavoidable? There's actually a kind of golden path that even the most sensitive creator can follow to artistic fulfillment and a happy life. The key is knowing and remembering that it's all about creativity and growth, not about popularity and "likes." I'm not saying there's anything wrong with being popular. I'm saying, don't worry about it one way or another. The more you worry, the less you'll create. Fortunately, there's a single all-purpose cure for burnout: just keep creating. Push yourself hard everyday and stay excited and inspired. If you dig deep enough, "likes" and followers will take care of themselves. Tally Poems Written: 299 Submissions: 50 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Sky with Machines" Categories All Have you given up things for poetry? Do you feel the time you spend reading, writing, or thinking about poetry diminishes other areas of your life? Do you have fomo because you're a poet? Poets, particularly serious poets, spend a lot of time on poetry and might even seem overly obsessed. I've had at least one close friend express their pity to me over what I've "sacrificed" for my art. Since May 3rd, I have setting my (internal) alarm for 4 a.m. each morning, getting up, and writing poems. I'm also typing and editing poems and submitting them to journals. My goal is to reach at least one day where I give my full 100% effort to poetry. As of today, I have no regrets about the time I've spent on poetry -- now or ever. In fact, I stopped writing for about 8 years when my kids were young. I wrote a bit here and there but most of it was mediocre because my attention was happily focused elsewhere. And I don't regret the time I spent away from writing poetry and more than I regret the time I'm devoting to it now. The only sacrifice that could have taken place is if I had not started writing seriously again and used being a parent as an excuse to just hobby it on down the road or quit altogether. I'm not built to be a Sunday painter, although I have solid respect for those who are, so... for me passion precludes "sacrifice." Poetry exists outside of the stream of linear time. You can pull out of your focus and go back months later, picking up where you left off or even improving without having tried. What you can't do is ignore that internal voice that lets you know when it's time to give 100% to your art. If you follow that voice, you'll never have to sacrifice anything for poetry to reap creative rewards. Tally Poems Written: 298 Submissions: 48 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Storm Breeze" Categories All My notebook is filling up quite fast since I determined to write a poem every day. Some general observations about writing poems by hand in a notebook: 1) It makes it easier for someone like me who typically overwrites to keep things simple. 2) I usually write the entire first draft without stopping. If I'm typing instead of writing by hand, I tend to revise in process and also look things up! 3) I'm writing fully in my own voice. When I type instead of writing by hand, I notice I tend to echo other poets more frequently. 4) When it comes down to typing up poems, I can take a slow, careful look at the draft and build on it. 5) I tend to keep a sharper focus because I'm writing short poems, usually no more than a single page. 6) The poems, as a whole, are a lot stronger than when I type first drafts. 7) The notebook becomes like an actual book of poetry as I write it and I can read over the drafts, like reading another poet, many times before I get around to typing and revising them. This may only be the case for now. I'm wide open to changing my métier at any time, almost at the drop of a hat. I feel very strongly that a poet should try many different approaches, although I also feel we each have a certain comfort zone. For example, I like to write nature themed poems in tercets. If my life depended on writing a poem, that's probably where I'd start. But that doesn't mean I shouldn't experiment with city themed prose poems -- or sonnets about the "supreme" court. At any rate, I plan to change the size of the notebook when I fill this one up. My biggest problem is finding gel pens that I can rely on and that feel right to me. The last ones I bought are excellent, but they don't have any labels on the actual pens, like absolutely nothing, and I threw the package away so I don't remember what brand they are! Tally Poems Written: 297 Submission Tally: 47 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poems written today: "Park Sprinklers", "Cherry Climb" Categories All As a poet, it's sometimes good to not know how you feel. "Nameless" emotions are often where great poems begin. Famous poems like "Kubla Khan," "The Chariot," or "The Road Not Taken" continue to defy emotional straightjacketing and -- without sacrificing meaning -- continue to lead readers to fresh emotional experiences for which there are no simple quantitative terms, but rather libraries full of analysis.
One of my favorite poets, Hart Crane, wrote a powerful essay on the theory of poetry called "General Aims and Theories." Crane was only in his twenties when he wrote the essay and it was in response to criticisms by Harriet Monroe. Basically, what Crane said was: a great poem can create a new word. Or, more specifically, it is as if a (successful) poem created a new word. A "word" that only that poem can capture, because it represents an emotional state for which we have no literal word. Two things I'd like you to take away from this. The first is that some poems, not all, are best off in creating a new "words", while others are best off celebrating existing "words." The second is that, yes, human beings have that many emotions. More than there are grains of sand in the world, or stars in the sky. We may fixate on the 6-8 basic colors, but we have an entire crayon box (the size of the universe) to color with. If you want to read a great series of poems that deal square-on with he search for a new poetic word, try reading Plath's "Bee Sequence" (click her picture above). What you'll see here is a poet using everything she has to try to understand who she is as an artist. Because Plath was a mystic, it was extremely difficult to find words, or even imagery to convey what she was going through. Like Nina, in Black Swan, she is transforming; she is becoming the Bee Queen. Poetry can lead you to the deepest parts of yourself and the deepest emotions that can be experienced. You have to be careful with intense emotions, but you can't write truly remarkable poetry without going into emotional places past existing "words." Tally Poems Written: 295 Submission Tally: 47 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Plain Poem" If you're not feeling pain in your creative life, you're no longer growing. If you're experiencing a lot of pain in your creative life, you have a lot of potential left to reach. The old cliché: "No pain, no gain" is probably even more true for creative work than it is for bodybuilding. The kind of pain one experiences when working out -- the "burn" -- becomes something every active person learns to love and look forward to. But I don't know many poets, even the wisest and most accomplished, who look forward to the "burn" of poetry. Not hard to see why. The muse, as another venerable cliché reminds us, is a harsh mistress. You can't overstate this. Even if your poems are currently flowing like rain and you've got enough acceptances, Twitter followers, and blue-ribbons to fill your tombstone, you're still going to face pain as a creator. This is tough in a culture that tries to turn a blind eye to not only suffering, which is all around us, but also to growth. Broadly speaking, in a capitalist culture, you're supposed to get a job, maybe a nice title to throw around, make money, buy stuff, and die. That's it. But poetry wants more from you. Life wants more from you. It wants you to give voice to something only you can bring to life. And to get to that very special, so profoundly vital work, you have to keep growing. Not only that, but if you restrict your feelings in any way as an artist, your work will suffer. I'm not saying your work will inevitably suck, just that it won't be fully realized. That's why being an artist is truly a dangerous business. You have to deal head on with what everyone else runs away from and you have to do it with style and conviction. Darren Aronofsky is one of the more "popular" artist working in past few decades who really has a handle on the pride of suffering that any serious artist needs to maximize their potential. Go back and watch Black Swan again. It's not a tragedy; it's the birth of an artist free of the past, and free of self-imposed limitations. But to get to that place, you have to love your pain. And wear it as a badge of honor. Tally Poems Written: 293 Submission Tally: 47 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Talking Points" Categories All Disaster!!! For the first time since May 3rd, I missed my 4 a.m. wake-up.
But this is actually good news!! Why? Because I felt really bad about it. It made me mad. The reason I overslept is because I had a good time on Sunday and wound up staying up a bit later than I should have. So, I paid the price... It's infuriating to be put off my game like this! Sometimes our emotions send us messages we don't really "get." For example. when we're mad we just feel... mad. In this case, my anger is a positive sign that I'm committed to my regiment, that it's not just a pose or a momentary flight of fancy. So what do I do about botching my Monday wake-up? I carry on as usual, try to make up for the lost hours by working even harder today and get up at 4 a.m. tomorrow! Tally Poems Written: 293 Submission Tally: 47 Rejections: 17 (10 tiered) Acceptances: 0 Poem written today: "Sleeping Late" Music track (unmixed demo) completed "Global Rain." Two poems drafted this morning: "Honeysuckle" and "Small Self-Portrait." The first poem came after taking a bike ride yesterday and seeing honeysuckle everywhere. Also, I had a brief but troubling encounter with a "fugitive" man who struck up a conversation with me in the park. The second poem, "Small Self-Portrait," is about 8 lines long and I wrote it mainly to fill up the rest of the page in my notebook. Some Stats Writing: 291 poems written since 3-19-20. Probably about 35-40 typed and submitted. Submitting: 45 submissions. 16 rejections. 0 acceptances. 9 tiered rejections. 7 standard. Geeze, Daniel, no acceptances? I thought you were good at this! Well, I'm only submitting to the toughest markets right now by design, so you know how that goes... Since May 3rd, I've been getting up at 4 a.m. each day to work on poems and I'm determined to write a poem each day, type up a draft each day, and make a submission each day. I'm interested to see what comes of this push, foremost in terms of whether or not it seems to make my poems better. I've been feeling inspired lately and I want to make the most of the creative energy while its available! I'm also working on some music tracks and prose pieces that I hope to release and/or publish soon. Meanwhile, I'll probably post more blog entries like this one, just keeping a tally of my trek. Once my energy is expended, I'll almost certainly go back to tips and reviews... I'm seeing good work out there on social media and in the literary journals and 'zines. Keep it up! It's deeply inspiring. Meanwhile if you want another set of eyes and ears for your work, hit me up through one of the buttons below. The editing and critiquing services have been working out extremely well. I've had absolutely zero complaints or dissatisfied customers and have dealt with scores of individual poems. So far, I've heard nothing but enthusiastic praise and many poets have become repeat customers. If you want some help, just click one of the buttons below! Categories All The title's a bit misleading, since what I actually want to talk about is not so much a conflict between prose and poetry as the differences in imagination that are involved. What started me thinking about this was a recent poem I wrote called "Walking to Church" which involved some deep and quite personal memories. As I was writing the first draft of the poem, I realized I might be able to write effectively about the same memory in prose. I didn't think it would be better in prose, but I wondered what kind of images the imagination might choose for a prose piece, and how the same memories might be expressed in totally different ways, almost as if by different people. Plath's "Ocean 1212w" is a spectacular example of a poet doing a better job in prose some of the trademark poetic imagery. In this case, Plath's childhood memories of the Massachusetts coast, so vital to her poetry, find a fuller expression of lost innocence than even the best of her poems. Personally, I've never tried to consciously engage with the same theme in both prose and poetry, but I think I'm going to try it. Maybe you should too and if you find out anything interesting et me know. Also, if you've already experimented with doing this, please let me know. Nothing makes me happier than growing and learning as an artist. Which brings me to my last bit for this post: why this blog is so seldom updated. Well, the good news is it's because I'm writing! I've been on fire creatively and eager to cover as much ground as possible. As such it's been tough to keep up with poetry tips and reviews of other poets, though I'm still reading a lot every day online and elsewhere. I'm aware of the work you're all doing and posting and it's inspiring. So, the blog may take a bit of a turn and I'll yack about my writing and submitting experiences until the creative fires inevitably dip back down and I'll go back to more reviews and tips. I'm still open for polishing, critiquing, and editing -- just click a button below or email me at writerdan@mail.com or pitchblackpoet@yahoo.com Categories All |