“I usually say separate the speaker from the poet, but you cannot separate the fact that someone actually had to write that speaker into the poem.” – dimitrireyespoet.com
So you’re taking a poetry class because it sounded more interesting than your run of the mill Shakespeare (nothing against the big guy, I’ve gotten more than enough Shakespeare in my day) or you really like writing. Maybe it’s a solitary practice for you or you’re considering a career that involves creative writing. But then, you enter my class or a class with an instructor with a similar philosophy and the instructor says, “Poetry is a community, it’s of the heart. And because of this, this class is largely based on participation.”
What are you to do if you’ve never spoken about poetry? How are you supposed to describe the color of a poem, or the sonic quality of a poem? How do you describe how the poem speeds up or slows down? This blog is to who you that even if you’re a new poetry reader, everything you need to explain and interpret a poem is right in front of you. Here are 10 Ways to Talk About Poetry.
1. The Concept
Firstly, ask yourself what the poem about? What is the speaker trying to convey? Is there a lesson to be learned? Is there some sort of plot twist? What turns are happening? What are those sensations of emotions that are kind of turning the tide of what this poem is about? You could like it you don’t need to like it but it’s still worth talking about?
The best thing is to answer these questions as a list and know you don’t have to have all of the answers. But if you are able to answer a fraction of them, you are closer to fully understanding the work.
2. The Speaker
Also answer these in a list form.
The speaker: is it male? Is it female? Nonbinary? An object? Human? Animal? An idea?
You also want to pay attention to how the speaker is speaking. Is their diction different, meaning do they sound like they’re speaking from a certain place, whether that is geographical location, time period, etc?
If you are unfamiliar with what the speaker is, please watch this quick video from my channel and/or read the blog.
3. Point of View
Try to identify what the point of view of the poem is? Is it in the first person, second person, or third person limited, omniscient, or objective? This is important because the POV changes the perspective of a poem so if you take into consideration the way in which the speaker views the poem, you can identify how the speaker funnels the poem through their eyes. For example, in a first person poem, if the speaker is recalling a situation, we only have the speaker’s thoughts to consider, and our information regarding the situation rests solely on the speaker’s perception. If this same situation was expressed in a third person omniscient point of view, we can assume that the 3rd person narrator knows the situation from every aspect.
4. Diction
Pay attention to how the speaker is speaking. If the speaker is using ‘git’ instead of ‘get’ or are at a supermarket pushing a ‘buggy’ instead of a ‘shopping cart’ for example, we can trace this regional dialect to the southern region of the United States.
5. Stanzaic Formation
Stanzaic formation has lots to contribute to how the poem feels. Read the blog about 9 Types of Poetry Stanzas and check out the video to learn more.
6. If it’s Freeverse, Why?
How can you justify this poem having this freeverse formation? There are examples with my writing like in You Left the Neighborhood or Pegao, where I favor spaced out phrases in a sporadic pattern because they are memories and that’s how I feel they come in. The contrary is seen in Tité. It’s in couplets and it appears cleaner, everything is happening exclusively within the couplets and feels easier to read since it is so close to the way in which we are already used to reading from left to right without dramatic spaces.
7. Emulation/ Dedication
It’s good to know if the poem you’re reading is coming from another work. This way, you’d be able to weigh the similarities and differences. It’ll help reveal poignant pieces of the poem. For example, my poem, “Our Daily Becoming” published in Entropy Mag, was after Adam Clay’s poem by the same name. The apparent differences will be in the content, though the form and some of the language is comparable.
Read both poems by clicking on the pictures
Entropy Magazine
Poets.org
8. Punctuation
Is there punctuation? Is there no punctuation? All these punctuation marks just don’t signify the ending of a thought or a transition, they also choose to speed up the poem or slow it down.
9. Aesthetic Appearance
When you look at this poem does it appear to be tight on the page? Are all the stanzas pushed toward a left margination? Are the line lengths small are they long? How much white space is there on the page? Different textures can create an airiness or heaviness in the poem. I speak about this when we consider line breaks in poetry and you can view the #2 point in the blog Line Breaks in Poetry to learn more. Whose different textures give an airiness or a heaviness to a poem.
10. Know About the Writer
I usually say separate the speaker from the poet, but you cannot separate the fact that someone actually had to write that speaker into the poem. A good thing to do is to know the poet for the sake of knowing where the poet is coming from. Knowing about their background and interests allow you to see why they’d make a character a certain way. The writer’s experience is an influencer in the way the character is produced and handles their own history, emotions, and experience.In short, as the reader talking about poetry, you just have to ask why? Poetry is succinct enough that every word counts and it is up to us to interpret its meaning.
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