Nothing is lamer than an attempt to force a narrative, political opinion, or a buzz word topic into your poetry. Unless you are passionate about it and extremely competent, the result will come across as tacky, and importantly, it won’t be impactful to the reader. I care about a multitude of issues, but I only put to paper the poems that come to me naturally. I am never happy with the results of forced poetry. After a month or two away from the piece, I find myself cringing at how obviously contrived my work was. Of course, I am critical of my normal poetry, but it is not in the same way. I had a few ‘forced’ poems that I could have included in my books, but I cut them all as I no longer feel what I supposedly felt when writing them originally, and upon reflection I don’t think I ever felt that way…

Poetry is just words on a page.

Anything beyond that definition risks falling into a philosophical or literary debate that would amount to such an abstraction of the beauty of the artform as to render it pointless. There are no rules. No restrictions. No limits to what you can and can’t, or to what you should and shouldn’t do.

A lot of this book will help you to hone that expression, giving you tips, tools, and tricks to make it more evocative. But that is all just make up and window dressing. Expression is the key. Some people gravitate towards rhymes and structure, others to free-flowing verse, others still, to long form paragraphs or books, crafting each line with meticulous care. It is all just writing. It is all just words on a page. It is all just poetry…