Okay, so you want to write poetry? Read this!

Erica J Kingdom
May 19, 2023
6 min read

So, you've either clicked onto this post because you're a) interested in writing b) interested in writing poetry or c) you want to try your hand at writing poetry . Allow me to tell you what I know and I'll even throw in some examples from my own work to help out! I know, I'm nice. Seriously, let's get on with it!

Through this blog post, I want to write a poem with you to show you the process that I go through when writing some poetry. I can give you some tips, tricks and helpful tidbits to assist you in writing yours!

Theme

Before we get into the technicalities, there is something I need to stress to you. You need a theme. When I say need one, I mean if you're going to publish poetry that you adore and want to do well, you need to experiment and see what you write about.

For my piece I want to write about the theme of towns and moving towards the city - so my journey will be the theme.

Poetry writing tip:

Whilst thinking of a theme, you need to consider if the are any objects you have seen, think of, can look at, that may help you in your message. I want to illustrate the journey using some graffiti for inspiration whilst I went walking. You are a poet, wordsmith and need to look around you to gather information and inspiration.

I do a lot of my work on word documents, so I will be using a word document for my work and you can use whatever makes you happy and keeps your soul going, write it no a tree if you want. Paper, is after all, dead trees, so I guess we are all technically writing on dead trees.

If you don't know what you want to write about, consider something you have a perspective on or freewrite for a little bit. I'll be here and you can still follow along with this guide!

Currently my document looks like this:

When you've got the theme down and understand some symbols you want to incorporate. A lot of my work revolves around a metaphor. For example my poem Dreaming Spires revolves around my visit to the Story Museum there. I wanted to use the rich history of Oxford as a metaphor for the city of stories and to showcase its literary heritage and how alive the city seen as 'dead' can be.

Form

Second up, form. There are quite a few forms of poetry that I can tell you how to write, but experimentation with it is something that I really heavily encourage. I want to give you a few of my favorites forms in this part of the blog post. I also want to show you how I chose a poetic form. Here are some of my favorites and why they aren't right:

Blank verse

This has a specific form consideration: Iambic pentameter (ten syllables per line and the normal English speaking rhythm) and the most important part of this form is that there are no rhymes at the end of the lines. I love writing this form personslly, I tink this is a tie between this and the next one. This form has specific and fun considerations that I love.

Free Verse

Free verse is pretty much how any poem is written without a specific form or set of boundaries to work in. I write most of my poetry in this form because I don't like adhering to a set of parameters with my art. I want to write this form so I can show you what can be done without limits.

Visual Poem

This is a very visual form, hinting the name. Like free verse, there aren't really many rules with this, except that there is a need for it ot be art. Maybe it can be a specific thing, like a poem about a shoe showing someone tying their shoes, or a poem about glasses having glasses (which is my visual poem, if you want to read it, you can here). This poem can't be read very easily, so I won't be choosing this, even though the very limited experience with this type of poetry has been fun. It's more for people who love art and I can't draw for the life of me, so maybe I can write another poem in this form if you want me to!

Sonnet

Sonnets come in many forms and can be about literally anything, even though the most common form of these tend to be poems about love, loss and other forms. There are so many types of sonnets, but two of the main ones I know of are Shakesperan and Spenserian, which I will give you the difference in a second.

Shakespearian	Spenserian
Normally rhymes at the end of a line and drvided into three stanzas containing four lines and the third has a dramatic change (volta). The final two lines introduces a change/a new way to look at the poem. One of my favorite examples of a Volta in music is here	Variant on the Shakespearian sonnet and has an interlocking rhyme scheme. This has the same form factor with an interlocking rhyme scheme and ending with a couplet.

Acrostic Poem

This poem has a word search type feel to it. What I mean b that is every single line starts with the first letter of the word or phrase. One fun thing I love to do is write prose poems in this way because you can make random capital letters in it. I

From giving you these explanations, I've found I want to write a Shakespearian sonnet and a free verse poem.

Language

The language used within a poem can say a lot. you need to know that your narrative or poetic voice is true. if you're going to write a poem from a child's perspective, then you should use child language. if you're writing from an adult, then you're doing something different. Language informs meaning which informs the choices.

For example because I want to write a poem about the changes from small villages to big cities and incorporate the theme of journeys, I might want to describe the desolate lack of life in the small village an the bustling place of the city. I could use images that I selected in the first phase.

Language in poetry, though, is very weird. You can make up words, change their spelling and creatively make a hundred different things with them. When I did a university assessment in the module, my spelling issues weren't an issue as long there was justification for it. For writing poetry recreationally, though, you don't need to write a justification for it. I say this to show you the blue sky dreaming you can do with the poetic forms.

Having finished a first draft, this is my first draft and I'm going to edt the final poem using the other steps in the guide. This is what the poem looks like

Rhyme

Rhyme is something you should consider after writing the poem because I subscribe to the newsletter of 'you can't edit a blank page' and I decide to just write and consider whatever editing is later, but if you want to perfectionist it, go ahead, it's your poem. There are a few types of rhymes:

Slant rhymes: these types of rhymes are where you need to say something in a specific dialect to make it rhyme together.
Whole rhymes: This is where they rhyme perfectly ('bad' and 'sad').
Half rhymes: This is where the word partly rhymes of half rhymes (blood and thud)

one of my poetry writing tips if you want a specific rhyme scheme is highlight the specific rhyme schemes you want to illustrate with different colors, The first one in this image is written in yellow and the second one is in green. If you're like me and aren't a walking rhyme zone, then you can, ironically, use this to help you.

Rhythm

Rhythm is the combination between the syllables of a word and the way it flows in the sentence. For example if you have a line made up of three syllable b words: that would count as a rhythm. A fun fact is that humans, in the English language, talk using Iambic pentameter which basically means ten syllables per line of poetry for some forms, as discussed earlier. If you want a specific. rules for forms, then you need to refer back to that section. If you need help with rhythm to want to give your poem a particular one, then here is the perfect resource.

Following this process with the Sonnet

I want to write a story about having experienced the large city for study or for whatever reason and I want to give an attitude in this sonnet of 'I am glad that I did it. but at the same time, missing the difference of the smaller village. Having lived near a big city and hopefully studying far away from home I'm going to have to confront this feeling very soon. As you can see in the poem I've written, I've made sure to give the problems and a solution in the final stanza. This is how you should approach a poem - detail it and then address it.