Please feel free to forward this newsletter to other interested parties either as a link to the site (preferable) or, if you desire to reach not only beyond the box but into history, by printing it out and handing it around, posting it in coffee houses, libraries, universities, and anywhere else you may decide, desire, or conspire.
This is a community newsletter and all members of the community are invited to submit ideas and content for it. While we may not be able to use every idea or contribution, we will keep track of them and visit them for inspiration and direction during the creation of each issue of the newsletter. Message from the Editors
Editor’s commentary
Pugilist
Critique and the Creative Process
We all know that Neopoet.com is a vibrant community dedicated to highlighting work of emerging and established poets, writers, and thinkers. We know that but, at times, we may forget just how important these actions can be. We’ve all had the experience where something we notice for the first time becomes something we suddenly notice is all around us. Be it a word or a type of tree or a car or anything else. Suddenly your mind is focused on it and your senses seem to seek it out.
How can the creative process be any different? Creativity feeds creativity. It causes it to grow and to expand and to mature. If all we desire is to create in seclusion then all we will create will be variations of the same theme. If, instead, we set our work out for comment, critique, and, if required, complete destruction, we are forced to view our work with open eyes and a brave spirit. We are forced to consider why we embrace or shy from techniques and practices and styles and genres. We are forced to pause and to consider “is this really what I want to say?” And it is this first step of self-editing that compels us to improve our art.
Of course, this cannot be a one sided relationship. Unless we are compensating someone for their insight and advice and time, we will find folks less willing to invest it all in us. And this is where it becomes an exponential relationship for the growth of our creativity.
Consider this. If someone gives you advice on how to make a task better, you can improve at the rate of their advice. If, however, you must teach someone to repeat a task you are doing, you must now consider all the interactive components of the task and relay the order, the emphasis, the importance, and the end result. You must be willing to give an exact description of what you mean or be willing to follow behind them and fix everything they do. You will find that you not only can do the tasks faster and more skillfully, but that the next task become easier as well as your mind is forced from old pathways and build new thought and desire.
Providing our fellow writers cogent and effective critiques is a perfect example of this.
If you read a work for enjoyment and leave it at that, neither the reader nor the author will profit above a presentation and reception of the work. While there is nothing wrong with this, there are plenty of venues that provide a critique free audience. If you read the work and express what you enjoyed and why and what you feel could be improved and why then you have spurred your own creative process and you have provided a fellow writer with the tools they need to improve.
This all boils down to a basic point:
Inspiration is not the end of the creative process. Writers unwilling to give and receive constructive critiques are limiting themselves and are abandoning the community of artists.
So, what can you do?
Read outside your comfort zone.
Dare to offer a critique
Make a difficult suggestion
Write in an uncomfortable style or genre and ask others to tear it apart
It’s how we can all improve, both as individual artists and as a community.
Announcements and Blog posts
Announcements
The Mentoring Program:
The Mentoring Program was introduced on January 30th of this year. This program enhances the workshop aspect of NeoPoet by providing an additional avenue for members who are seeking extra guidance from other poets on the site.
The relationship between a mentor and protege is personal and complex; an individual opportunity that you will not find anywhere else. A mentor can help you learn new types of poetry to expand your boundaries, offer general suggestions for your work, or answer specific questions that may assist you with your writing skills.
More information may be found by selecting the mentor’s name to review their individual profile. Once you have found a mentor you believe may be a good match for you, a request for an application to begin a quality experience with that person may be made by clicking on the “Request a mentor relationship with username” link from their profile.
Remember, each mentor has a limited number of openings! Don’t miss your chance to take advantage of this unique opportunity!
Here are a couple of Blog entries that caught our eyes:
To All Of Candlewitch’s Friends
Submitted by poewriter58 on 20 May 2008 - 5:13pm.
Candlewitch)(cat) is to undergo surgery this Thursday?Please wish her a safe day and a speedy recovery?She is very dear to me?I will keep you informed of her progress
I know all of your good wishes and prayers will be with her as will mine
Be Well Cat?love ya? Chrys
Back at school today
Submitted by Barbara Writes on 20 May 2008 - 2:37am.
Really enjoyed my time off from school, though not long enough still tired. ?I really enjoyed the time spent here, I Wiil participate as much as I can between my classes.?Here is where I come when I need a break between my studies.
Under The Pale Moon
Submitted by purplemoondoll on 9 May 2008 - 8:57pm.
Again this is very much a work in progress, spinning in my head right now. I have posted it here and will sleep on it for a few days and who knoes maybe this will develop. If anyone has any suggestions please feel free - I feel this could be really good but it still needs some work. Things have settled down now following a few very hectic weeks so hopefully I can get back to writing on a regular basis.
New Talent
Sleepless Dream by Beezle
Sometimes when I close my eyes, I see us holding hands. We head along the ocean shore, we’re walking in the sand. We lay down by the water and I have you in my arms. We lay until the sunset ends and then we watch the stars. Your head is on my shoulder as you lay in my embrace. you’re humming softly as the moon illuminates your face. I whisper then a silent prayer while looking to the sky, “Lord please don’t let this moment end, please keep her by my side.” I hold you until you fall asleep and then the stars are gone. The darkness of the night becomes the morning light of dawn. Awakened by the crashing waves, I gently take your hand. We head along the ocean shore, we’re walking in the sand.
External Poet
Tumps
Don’t ask him the time of day. He won’t know it, For he’s the abstracted sort. In fact, he’s a typically useless male poet. We’ll call him a tump for short.
A tump isn’t punctual or smart or efficient, He probably can’t drive a car Or follow a map, though he’s very proficient At finding his way to the bar.
He may have great talent, and not just for writing - For drawing, or playing the drums. But don’t let him loose on accounts – that’s inviting Disaster. A tump can’t do sums.
He cannot get organized. Just watch him try it And you’ll see a frustrated man. But some tumps (and these are the worst ones) deny it And angrily tell you they can.
I used to be close to a tump who would bellow ‘You think I can’t add two and two!’ And get even crosser when, smiling and mellow, I answered, ‘Your quite right. I do.’
Woman poets are businesslike, able, Good drivers, and right on the ball, And some of us still know our seven times table. We’re not like the tumps. Not at all.
Editor’s Commentary by Kieran
The poem I chosen for you folks this week, is by the wonderful Wendy Cope, entitled “Tumps”.
The reason I chose this was, basically because it’s so incredible true! When I first read this poem I thought to myself “This is exactly how my girlfriend must think of me!”
I feel myself I’m a great advocate of humourous poetry, through my own work and in in showing off others, such as today. I feel that in this day and age we need more fun in our lives what with everything going on in the world.
So I shant write more, who needs to! Enjoy the poem, let me know what you think, and if you have any suggestions for the next issues in regards to external poets selected poem (Any suggestions for a name or this section would also be good!) please let us know.
The Week’s Most Popular Poem (by votes) By rider68
Artistic Imagination
Artistically brushed are puffs of velvet tufts, Melded of shimmering starlets, like jewels to a serene canvassed sky, Simplistic strokes give play to silken trees Offering shelter, to night owls looking down On you and me,
By suggestive touch, catkins, defuse silver Light, bellowing through thoughts of moon lit trees, Flickering of opal white, drenched like tears, splashing to streams of Serenic blues and greens,
And magically and so cleverly, a little is left, where thou eyes are laid to rest, Calmed by drifting mists, of imaginary thoughts, that this tranquil piece, allows you to be, Take a look and comment on this poem here:
This week, since there hasn’t been much action in terms of discussions on the forum, I thought I’d just link some choice poems by some individuals. The poems below aren’t in any order:
awake to it silent and freshettes wound with loose casual grace like rainbow laces holding up bodices or hair in a ponytail
i gather mine with guilt and parlance i’ve made some in my time hewn together words of hate or anger sewn them now in haste
try to control
its all about control the bow make it neat make it fancy we are an organization of tidyness
no matter how its stretched its control angry and beastly
i sigh now seeing my handiwork like wax seals burst open with new emergences Facebook Human Pets Piczo Diaryland My Space and others
there is no hiding no holding back what people have inside them
time for that reign is over
the new era has begun
kick open the doors of atrophy and absorb the new apocalypse
Editor’s Note - Pugilist
I don’t write in free verse often but I do appreciate it quite a bit and I have to admit for Editors’ Choice I went looking for an Orgami poem. Why? Because I love that he writes in half-dreams. It’s not just randomly making things up, it’s taking reality, turning it 90 degrees to the left and skewing it on its Z axis by 13.72 degrees.
Or, simpler, it’s like peripheral vision. Look straight at it, nothing, catch it in the corner of your eye, wow.
Read the original work yourself and provide your own color commentary:
Then, by all means, drop us a line at Newsletter@Neopoet.com. While we might not be waiting with baited breath, we certainly would welcome any comments, suggestions, input, monetary bequeaths, rare objects d’art, large piles of bold, or even a kind word, should you not be in short supply.
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