On Revision

I used to think I was a fast writer, but I've realised that only applies to a small percentage of my poetry, and I have a large collection of failed attempts. A good deal of the writing I have been doing lately involves going back to my files and revising the old poems, the ones where I feel there is a spark that I really want to turn into a successful poem, even if the first attempt was pretty dire.

The worst advice I ever read was not to revise. Granted, this was in a book which was more about writing poetry as self expression/therapy than about writing as literature. Even so, I can't agree. The author seemed to think that to revise was to deny the initial emotion that led to the poem. In my experience, the opposite is true. I remember an occasion when I took a poem to my small workshop group and was met with somewhat blank looks. "What are you trying to say?" one group member asked. I launched into an impassioned defence/explanation of the poem, and she replied "well, why didn't you say so?" And so, I revised the poem so that it did say what I intended to say in the first place.

And that, in my view, is what revision is all about. To make the poem more of what it set out to be.

I am gradually getting round to revising my NaPoWriMo poems. It's more than just a tweak here or there. There are not many that satisfy me just as they are, but quite a few where I have a sense of an underlying story, mood or feeling that I want to unearth, which may mean discarding a great deal of the poem and starting again.

For this one, I initially abandoned all but the title - and I rearranged the words of the title, too - but then some of the initial story found it's way back in. I'm not done with it yet, but it is a lot closer to being a keeper than the original. I even managed to fit in a word from Readwritepoem's Wordle - veer. I also considered using paean, debonair, and twist, but in the end I didn't.

The last line confused my face to face poetry friends here. I was thinking of French flags, and various other countries, but "red, white and blue" made them think American. I think that's a little sad. There are few enough colours in the world - why should these be appropriated by one country? But since that's the way of it, I will probably find another way of expressing the ending.

(Both versions since removed from this post - expired! Contact me if you would like a copy)

Revising and Rewriting

Last night my small poetry group met and I took along half a dozen or so of my less abysmal efforts from NaPoWriMo. It was interesting to go through and re-read them. Some that I didn't like much at the time are growing on me. In some cases, I realise that small alterations have the potential to make a large difference to the quality. Some that I liked initially seem less interesting now.

One of them is essentially what Ted Kooser describes in his excellent book The Poetry Home Repair Manual as an anecdotal poem. He describes the form as
This happened first,
and then this
happened; then this
and this; this happened next, then this
and this and this,
and then - you won't believe it -
THIS!

Well, mine isn't quite like that, but almost. But we all agreed that the poem had a good title -
The Blonde Ambassador's Daughter.
(Even the title needs changing, being a little ambiguous, so it will henceforth be the Ambassador's Blonde Daughter)

I have a whole new poem in mind to go with the title, using one or two elements from the original in their barest essentials only. Does that count as revision?

An extra treat this month - since one of the group's members couldn't come, we are having an extra meeting next week at her new flat (a New Zealand term for apartment). And then we have book plans to work on.