Poetry doesn’t have to make sense. That’s part of the beauty. The books I’ve read on how to write poetry recommend reading a lot of poetry to become better at writing it. That advice makes logical sense which is why it doesn’t seem to work for me. I have been able to find so little poetry I enjoy reading. They say one should spend a lot of time editing. I generally don’t. What is the point? They talk about writing for the reader. I believe a writer should write for their own reasons and if someone else finds it worth reading, that would be great. I write to explore what is in my brain. When the words appear on the screen, then I know. When I start writing, especially with poetry, I’m not always sure where it’s going. We can discover together. Some people do crossword puzzles. Some people do Sudoku. I write. I leave you today with a couple of those explorative poems:
Poem 8
Death of innocence
The end of childhood
Becoming an adult
Who said, “it’s a good thing”?
To escape from it all
Some go to the mall
We can try, but can’t have it all
Cleanse your mind
Banish the mundane
The alternative is to be insane
Poem 9
The sweetness of a mountain meadow
Life is more than looking out the window
The music of a mountain stream
The song of the forgotten
A patchwork of emotions
The life of the unexpected
Not a life of making plans
The allure of the unknown
The seduction of the soul
The ecstasy of the new
The anguish of the forgotten
The stream as cold as an ogre’s heart
The window becomes the mirror of life
We all have a song
Sing it so all can hear
With it, life becomes clear
Pete's Wisdom 