“The only way to get the true sense of an emotion or event is to ask the poets. Their jobs are to scrutinize the processes of an ecosystem when others cannot see the forest from the trees.” – dimitrireyespoet.com
Disclaimer: This post isn’t JUST for college students!
As a poetry professor, I saw a lot of different poems and even though I was hired to teach them, each poem taught me something. Whether the poems needed extensive work, some work, or were on their way to being good enough to submit (after some begging!) I saw undergrads generally make the same mistakes and thought I’d share them. So after seeing the beautiful and the poetically grotesque, here are 6 Beginner Poetry Mistakes that many undergraduates do.
1) The Time Capsule
This is a problem that stems from the school system and how much poetry is in the curriculum. Unless a student explores poetry themselves or has an English teacher that pushes the envelope of the common core, many a poet’s experience of poems in school are Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Frost, and William Shakespeare. And to that effect, they end up feeling like the language from these time periods make up the most poetic poem. Often times, I have to remind students that It’s been A WHOLE 400 years since William Shakespeare has played Hamlet in the Globe Theatre. So even if we are to give a nod to the poets of yestercentury, there is no need to practice our D&D rhetoric whilst thou moot a pome. You don’t need to request permission to speak the way you do! The way you speak is just fine.
2) Poetry Rap
Your poems don’t always need to rhyme— or at least not on every other line. The most standard rhyme comes in the ABAB format or limericks that many of us also learn as children; think “Roses are red/ violets are blue” or “There once was a man from Peru.” Poetry itself is music, so rhyming is great when it is unexpected and there are so many different ways to rhyme. Aside from the regular rhyme [drip, trip] there’s the half/slant rhyme which can be done in a number of ways [trudge, begrudge] [wonton, carbon] [ponder, porter]. And aside from that, it can happen in different places of the poem besides the standard end of the stanza. Just know that you aren’t limited in your rhyme pattern. The following is my poem, “Kyrie 4’s” published in the app Poemquest. Click here to listen to the poem.
3) The Done and the Title-Less
I speak about this often, and honestly, at this point, it may be a pet peeve? *insert shrug emoji here* Basically, without a working title, that’s one less thing the reader can use as a tool to help figure out what is going on in the poem. A good title helps carry a poem into understanding and could even create more clarity for it’s reader. You can hear more important rants about the title on my other blogs like 5 Tips for Writing Poetry.
4) The 11th Hour Writer
I was always able to tell if a student wrote a poem the morning that a poem was due. As an undergrad, you can write a paper that you are completely disinterested in and write it off as an objective stance, but it’s different if you’re penning a poem. There is a missing element that is supposed to move the reader. A poem wants to have the reader invested, and a reader can’t commit to the poem unless the writer commits first.
Silly errors are another easy giveaway. With the succinct nature of poetry, every single letter is important and it’s easy to make a mistake when one has to worry about words, punctuation, and syntax. They all need to be explored and reviewed for improvement before submission. Always!
5) The Copy Machine
The objective of each poem is to add to a conversation. The only way to get the true sense of an emotion or event is to ask the poets. Their jobs are to scrutinize the processes of an ecosystem when others cannot see the forest from the trees. Some students would bring in poems that felt very cliche’d and recycled. Poems that compare passion to roses and love interests to a midsummer’s day feel overplayed. But— cliche’d work known by many can be remixed into something new.
6) The Overly Passionate Poet
Lastly, this is a point that I have to keep making myself aware of every now and again; not every poem needs to be overly angsty or lusty, angry or proud. Though poetry is cathartic, there’s a middle ground where the poem takes a turn and something is learned. If you are a POC poet following me that are actively writing through their traumas, the following is especially for you. It isn’t necessary to make every trauma an elegy. If you’re reading this post, you are doing the work— part poetry and part reality— where both of your lives meet. I urge you to celebrate your existence and to turn those elegies into odes. Life is the greatest teacher, and you’re stronger from those experiences. Poetry is a tool to pick apart the feelings, events, and outcomes of life. After these elements are sifted, you make the choice as what to do with them.
Remember: You are always in the creative process. Watch the video below to learn more.
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