(c’mon)
muse for hire
uninspired?
all i need from you, Erato, are your pretty words Thalia, just lend me all your exclamation marks and Melpomene and i will ring like Polyhymnia's verses twirling letters like Terpsichore that shine bright in Urania's sky
when you have an idea, run with it.
(let’s just make a run for it)
take a concept and
(don't look back)
drag it out, carry it along, coax it out with semicolons and em dashes
you hold complete control over language, bend conventionality and forms to your will (don't you like the way they/i/you wrap(s) around your/my/their finger?) make the text convey what you want it to say
the means justify the ending so forget what you have been told—
for poetry is not putting the square block in the circle hole
and although the words should sound from your lips just as they flow from your pen
a thought is worth more than the vulgarity of speech
embellish it, exaggerate and most of all—create
when i write, it's all at once -- it's a deliberate attempt to make something tangible from the abstract
and i like it to be pretty
i like it to be oh-so-pretty.
words, oh, words
will never want to leave the page
they belong there, they're intended, it's all intentional, it's all meant to be you are creating reality, you are creating today you are creating tomorrow, you are creating yesterday
why stop there?
why stop there?
such a simple design
why?
write with a purpose but don't you dare stick to it go with the flow let the current of inspiration carry you carry you to the way the stanzas will cascade down your sheet of paper
be it lined, blank, hotel, recycled, perforated, borrowed
it's your sheet of paper
it's your canvas
hidden in your poem's combination of letters spaces and punctuation is the feeling you have when you write it
be vague, be specific, be whatever it takes to take your idea and run with it be alone with just your thoughts and in the silence, create create
you're making something out of nothing but in all reality, it's everything poetry, to me, is everything. i breathe it, seethe it, bleed it
maybe that's why it's so hard for me to write about my own writing process
it just comes naturally i have a thought i think my thought i write i polish i finish
revising, i hate revising why must art be subjected to this "correcting?" who could tell davinci to put a smile on the Mona Lisa? who could tell picasso there's something wrong with his images?
it seems to me so stuffy, so snobby, so pretentious i can hardly stand it it's just depressing, really. Holden would certainly agree. does everything really need to be improved? i like my poetry the way it is -- that's why i created it this way. i don't do drafts. drafts are just unfinished works to me if i don't like what i have as a "draft," i will scrap it completely and start anew
drafts i don't do drafts. they're an unnecessary step in the process from start to finish and that's what you want to get to, isn't it?
you're just building the bridges to get to where you want to be (you can burn them later if you'd like) so what if one bridge is flimsy, so what if another isn't as pretty
oh but it should all be pretty it's art art is pretty
at least when i create it because i want it that way i like it pretty, so i make it so there's simply no other explanation i have no other reasoning other than the fact that i like pretty words. i want my poetry to be pretty. so i make it pretty. it can deal with ugly images and ugly ideas but them poem itself will be oh-so-pretty it will be the golden child the parents carry along with them and beam with pride whenever others say "what a pretty little thing," what a a pretty little thing.
it is for no other reason than because i want it to be.
and i think—oh fuck it, i know—that's good enough for me
i don't know how to write an ars poetica and i don't know what the hell i'm doing to do for this but it's got me thinking about my writing process more than Crumb's documentary sure did.
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