Analyzing and Creating Poetry

Writing about poems, I think, is a bit challenging. What is this poet trying to tell me? The words and their arrangements, structures and conventions are the only clues. The beautiful thing about writing about poetry is that as long as you support the words and conventions of the poem, your interpretation can't be wrong. It's a puzzle that can be solved in so many different ways.
The same thing you may ask yourself when writing a poem- what am I trying to tell my reader? You must also accept that as a poet your reader may not interpret your poem exactly the way you intended it to be interpreted. It's neat to think that your writing may mean something different to someone else and still make sense!

The difference between writing a poem and writing about a poem is that when you write about a poem, you are trying to excavate a deeper meaning. The words, metaphors, alliteration, structure, tone and all the other things poets like to use must be taken into consideration. And you must make sure your argument is clear as to why you interpret the poem in a certain way. When you write a poem, you are trying create the meaning with words, conventions, structure, but you already know what that meaning is, now you have to word it poetically.

Writing about Shakespeare's sonnet 116 informed my own poetry in a number of ways. It inspired me to write my own sonnet! I took note of the use of metaphor, alliteration, and rhyme scheme and used it in my own poem. I found iambic pentameter to be a bit overwhelming and decided to try it in the future after I practice a bit with it first. Writing my own poetry informed me that it is challenging to find the right words to fit when you are following a specific structure, especially with rhyming and iambic pentameter. Metaphors are also really fun to play and come up with, but I already knew that. I know I could have made the meaning flow a bit better in my first person poem. When writing about Shakespeare's 116, the theme flows throughout and that is something I must practice a bit more on this particular poem.

I think that in the future, I will have my students write about a poem with the same style as the one I assign them to write. For example, I will have them write about a haiku and then have them write a haiku. This way they can analyze the conventions of the particular poem, and then use that knowledge when they write their own.