Poetry Writing vs. Poetry Analysis

Writing poetry is much more difficult that writing about a poem as it requires more attention to detail. With fewer words, there is less room for error or confusion in the message that one is trying to convey. In writing poetry the last few weeks, I have found that even the slightest alteration in wording or sentence structure can change the meaning of the poem. Furthermore, the way in which I phrase words can mean entirely different things for multiple readers. When writing an essay about a poem, however, one is much more able to interpret the meaning of the poem for oneself. In reading poetry I have always found that it is important to take yourself as a reader outside of the interpretation of the poem. I find that I must look for the original meaning that the poet intended and as a result must dig deeper in the word choices and phrasing that author used. The exercises of writing one’s own poetry certainly reinforced this belief because if a reader was to interpret my work for an academic piece I would want my original intention to be obvious while also flowing well. I certainly found a new appreciation for the works of the great poets because I realized that creating an original, meaningful and succinct poem to be difficult. Not only because I had difficulty controlling my flow of ideas into one poem but also because there is such a vast number of topic to choose from. Even once I was able to find a topic to my liking, keeping the ideas to a minimum proved difficult. Poetry is an art that few can master which was quite evident in these exercises.