About workshops

Workshops on Neopoet are groups that meet for a certain period of time to focus on a certain aspect of poetry. Each workshop participant is asked to critique all the other poems submitted into a workshop. A workshop leader helps coordinate -- they set the agenda, give participants feedback on whether their submissions and critique are at they level expected of them, and after the workshop is over, give feedback to participants. 

To join a workshop, first find one that is of interest to you. Once you have found the right workshop (and verified that it is open -- you can find this out in the description below), you can apply to join the workshop.


Join the Neopoet online poetry workshop and community to improve as a writer, meet fellow poets, and showcase your work. Sign up, submit your poetry, and get started.

The Complete Poem- Start to Finish

Status: 
Program description/goal: 

Description: A workshop devoted to the mechanical construction of a poem.

Leader: wesley
Moderator(s): Rula

Objectives: To discuss the development of a poem from initial draft through a correction phase to a polished work.

Level of expertise: Open to all

Subject matter: Participants will be asked to submit the rough draft of a poem of some length (maximum 200 verses). Following, corrections and emendations will be incorporated based on commentary. Discussions will include aspects of a poem from elemental structure (exposition, complication, climax and resolution) to the use of meter, rhyme, metaphor, simile and more. Special emphasis will be spent on proofreading- an under rated craft in our field. We will attempt to create a methodology for suggestions. The discussion will begin with proofreading.

Length: 
30 days
Number of participants (limit): 
15 people
Skill level: 
Date: 
Tuesday, January 14, 2014 to Friday, February 14, 2014
Short description: 
This will be a participant driven workshop. Detailed commentary will be vital.

Comments

Count me in.......stan

You are in Stan. Thanks for joining

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Where can i get the enrolment form?. Sorry still quite new so I am still finding my way.

Just click on the "workshop" tab at the top of the page. Then click on" find a workshop". This will then give a list of workshops underway. Click on this shop and read the syllabus. Below the syllabus it will say whether the shop is still enrolling, underway, or closed. This is how you can find any workshop as well as what the given workshop entails. I am not involved in running this particular shop, but all you need to do is ask to join on this thread and either Wes or a moderator will get back to you. You should know that if the shop is still open you will have a good bit of catching up to do................stan

I've just added you. Please have a look on the main comments and conversations. Don't hesitate to ask if you have any questions.
Welcome to the workshop

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

this looks to be a ripper! And just the thing for those of us (mea culpa) who sometimes just vomit on the page and expect it to be art.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Hi Wesley, this announcement has come at an appropriate time, when I would like to work on the : Boy! it smells so good" i had posted and which drew some objective criticism.

raj (sublime_ocean)

William
Mand
Raj
Welcome on board

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I'm looking forward to it!

Allow me a few words concerning the Workshop before our actual discussion begins on the 14th.
The Elf has said at times that I can be a bit dry and analytical.

Guilty as charged.

The mechanics of poetry has always fascinated me. Vocabulary, grammar, poetic form, meter and rhyme is, in a very real sense, how my poetry gets written. It is a curious joy to me and comes, if not exactly easy, without undue struggle.

The emotional is more difficult for me.

This Workshop will be about both of these aspects of poetry; the ability to use the mechanical structure inherent in good poetry to create an emotional well.

Each participant will be asked to submit the rough draft of a poem. It is important that this draft be the first and only of the poem to be used as the commentary on “where” the poem should go is the crux of our goal. No particular form is required. Whatever suits the poet’s fancy is acceptable, from Shakespearean sonnets to verso libre. I ask only that it have some length that we have more to talk about. Meter, rhyme and more is up to the poet.
Through these conversations we will discuss not only structure, but more esoteric subjects as simile, metaphor, metonym and irony.
In other words… all the working parts of poetry.
The first subject we will broach is what I consider to be indispensible to the writer of any sort and that is proofreading.

We will begin there.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Count me in..

I'm working on one right now which will likely work well for this shop. So I'll get to kill 2 birds with one poem lol........stan

If this means I get at least 8 comments on one poem then you have my full attention.. Count me in!
Sometime during the year I must have a look at those long pieces I have put on your other workshop,
Yours Ian.T

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

Haven't been around much but I still exist.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

Time to start thinking.

The tools of the poet are nigh infinite.
If one collects them diligently throughout life, they will not be mastered on the death bed.
We must ask ourselves how many of these tools are necessary?

Enough to build a house.

If you were to give me a few dozen two by fours, a hand saw, a hammer and a box of nails, then tell me to build you a lovely home… how well might I succeed?
However, if you give me a line of credit at Home Depot with no limit… I could build you a mansion.

If I knew how to build.

And there is the rub. Having all of the tools does not mean we can build, but if we have no tools then the subject is moot. We will not build.
The poet requires two things as any craftsman does. One, the tools with which to build and two, imagination or to use the term I have expressed already… emotion.

So what is the poet to do?

First of all, begin learning about the technical tools of the poet and never stop adding them. Not so that we may write technically flawless poems, but that we may do what Faulkner said when we compose—

“… when you write, just write. Don’t think. Just write.”

In this way is the emotional served, but if we have no tools… vocabulary, grammar, an understanding of how poetry works… then we will produce naught but confusion. If the tools are ingrained in our psyche we will write and write what we want to have read.
We will manufacture art.

In my first conversation of the fourteenth I will discuss my perspective on proofreading our work. I welcome everyone else’s take on the subject.

In fact I will insist upon it.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I think using the builder for metaphor of a poet is a bit inaccurate because most of the time he is working off the blue prints drawn by another and is thus creatively bound by the ideas already envisioned. Now there Are some builders who do more than just follow others' leads but the profession which more closely resembles poetry is architecture. He has the vision of what he wants and also the knowledge or tools to know how to go about constructing a solid structure. A good one also sees the project through from conception to design and then completion.
I'm now done nit-picking lol..........stan PS hmmm........builder or architect. The right word is the difference. Somebody should do a shop on that lmao

As you can see... imagination is my downfall.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I wish to let all participants know that, due to preoccupation with work, there could be long spells when I would not be able connect with the workshop. Due to this constraint, if my being unresponsive is likely to be perceived by fellow members as my being ill mannered and casual, I would prefer to opt out of this workshop rather than be misunderstood.

Regards and best wishes for the Workshop to fulfill its objectives...

Raj

raj (sublime_ocean)

Come when you can. Do NOT opt out. It simply means you will be catching up on some reading. If you gain ONE (and only one) new thing from the shop it is worth the time for you and me.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Ok Wesley...you are right..even one new thing learned always helps...

raj (sublime_ocean)

Understand the assignment. I see you listed climax and resolution as things to be analyzed. Should this.poem tell a story? Where such elements are present? I am thinking of taking some individual poems and creating this one using various parts of.them.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

This is good for everyone to hear. When I explain this outside of a strict storytelling venue I describe it as a speechwriter does.
Exposition- tell the audience what you are going to talk about.
Complication- talk about it.
Climax- make your most important point or points.
Resolution- tell the audience what you talked about.

Another way to look at it is this.
A good poem starts at a small, tight little point and then expands from there until it is large, expansive.
Then it brings it back to that small, tight little point only to find the small, tight little point is subtly changed.

Every good poem, from the smallest haiku to the largest epopee, needs to be organized loosely or tightly on these lines... if... the logic is to be clear. Remember that when a poem is being read it is not the poet being judged, but the reader. Therefore what is "clear" to one reader will be gibberish to another. We must choose our audience carefully and then construct the poem to be understood by that audience. Not everyone will comprehend the points we make. That is alright, but without a "forward going" organization- no one will understand.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

we now starting the preliminary discussion part of the shop?

I'm sorry that I am joining late due to some family commitements. I hope I am not too late.
Stan, as I understand from what Wesley stated earlier, the official conversation shall start on the fourteenth, so this is only a warming up I believe.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I'm just airing out some of the thoughts in my ever wandering mind. Ya start a shop and all ya do is think of it... and think of it.. and. hmmm.
Just saw a commercial that explains why I write poetry.
Science, law, engineering, these are all noble pursuits, but poetry, beauty, love, romance, this is why we pursue them.

Then they quoted Whitman, a poet I don't much care for, but it ended marvelously-

"... but the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse."

Just thinking out loud Stan, just thinking out loud.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Comment as you will... I must begin... it's a curse, this impatience.

Proofreading is the reading of a galley proof or an electronic copy of a publication to detect and correct production errors of text or art. Proofreaders are expected to be consistently accurate by default because they occupy the last stage of typographic production before publication.

For those unfamiliar with newspaper jargon, a “galley proof” is an early print of a page attached to a large wooden frame. The page has over-large margins for the purpose of writing corrections alongside the page. The printer then incorporates these changes and prints again… hopefully but once.

Let me offer a perspective.

An artist friend of mine paints with oil and work chiefly off of photographs (he has yet to paint me thankfully). Though he is like a proud father (a simile) when they are completed, the man is positively rabid (a personification) about denying this before he is satisfied with the work. He simply will not allow it to be seen by human eyes, until it is precisely what he intended it to be.

A poet is an artist. That one would slave as a Greek on a Roman Galley (simile) to produce literary art and then release it in even a slightly flawed form always boggles my mind (if I knew what a “boggle” was, this might be a metaphor).

As a game to occupy our anxious minds, until the shop begins, I invite everyone to proofread this comment. I have allowed a number of mistakes; some obvious, some objective, some deliberate tricks.

Count them if you dare.

I fully expect someone to find at least one more than I intended.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

An artist friend of mine paints with oil and work[s] chiefly off of photographs (he has yet to paint me thankfully). Though he is like a proud father (a simile) when they are completed, the man is positively rabid (a personification) about denying this before he is satisfied with the work. He simply will not allow it to be seen by human eyes[,] until it is precisely what he intended it to be[.]

 

P.S.   I just put what is needed to be added or deleted between the square brackets.

Hope it works this way.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I can find more, but thought I'd give a chance for everyone to participate.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Well here goes!

An artist friend of mine paints with oil and works chiefly off of photographs(.) ( He has yet to paint me thankfully ). Though he is like a proud father (,) ( a simile ) when they are completed, the man is positively rabid ( a personification ) about denying this (.) Before he is satisfied with the work, he simply will not allow it to be seen by human eyes, until it is precisely what he intended it to be.

My "attempt" at prof reading! However I think I would be inclined to miss out "Before he is satisfied with the work" because it would make more sense without it. ( unless I've got it all wrong ). Lol

Love Mand xxxxx

Everything is interpretation.
... and "proof" needs two "o's".
I have never used commas before a parentheses. Neither is incorrect grammatically, I just don't like, an, abundance, of, commas.
Good go at it.
Do you have a rough draft ready?
Also, be sure to check out Ian's poem. You will be hard pressed to find proofreading work there. I think he must have a software program... it's nigh on flawless.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Thanks for the correction - I haven't had time to write a new poem but I have an old one that might do the trick - would that be o.k? I've looked at Ian's poem - I notice that many of the commas and full stops are missing. Is that part of the proof reading?

Love Mand xxxx

Ian didn't punctuate and it seems you don't like that either. I think it leads one open to confusion, but that's a style choice.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

would be ee cummings

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I agree! An example would be stanza ten in Ian's poem, which I have punctuated.

I was so shocked that I burbled, “hey,
how come you are thinking in my way?
Where are you that you can talk to me”?
“Waiting for you to set yourself free”.  

Without the punctuation it is difficult to know who is talking in the last line! On the other hand to much punctuation can clutter a poem - so perhaps the middle road is better.

Mand xxxx

I don't see punctuation as cluttering the poem. This is a good example, Mand.

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

for corrections to avoid confusion with intentional use of parentheses.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

We need to talk first about how to proofread. Like how to read first 'gestalt', get a total feeling for the poem, and what to watch out for in subsequent readings.

Something I would dearly love to see in this workshop is an agreed format for proof-reading corrections.
Stan has an effective one, where he names stanza and verse then offer suggestions.

I tend to quote the line in question then offer suggestions [in square brackets].

If we could agree on a formant for correction/suggestions I think it would be invaluable.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

The main problem I have with proof reading a new poem of my own is that I tend to see what I meant to write instead of what I Did write. But then if I revisit a write which has a bit of age on it the typos and such jump out like a squirt in the eye lol. Maybe I should post on a delay.

A suggestion which might make commenting in this shop easier for all would be for the writers to innumerate each stanza and line. It would make it easier to offer And make corrections and changes.....stan

Also, being a workshop, we are not just talking about proofreading our own works but others as well. As to enumerating (sic) each stanza and line, that would only be necessary with epopee, most poems are so short it is not hard to count stanzas and lines, the number would be a nasty distraction.

Remember Wesley's magnum opus "ÇAÇÔ, Man of the Morning Star"? That absolutely need line numbering, but in his first postings of it the numbers appeared at the beginning of the lines and that was horrible. He fixed it in later postings, thank goodness.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

His morning star series is where the line numbering came from. I noticed that one of the requirements for a shop poem here is that it be lengthy but not in excess of 200 lines. I guess we'll see what lengthy means to a lot of people..............stan

one of my definitions of poetry is saying the most in the least possible words.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I decided to be a poet. That's pretty brief. or.......two roads diverged in a yellow wood;and knowing I could not take both;I Iooked down one as far as I could; ............which is the best poetry? ........

can be anything from haiku to epopee.

Maybe I chose brevity just because I am lazy. [grins[

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

just picking on you and those who think the briefer the better. You are right to an extent ....."two roads diverged in a yellow wood "....or "I came upon a fork in an autumn colored wood". Frost is often pretty brief but seldom Spartan...........stan

The first question is: "To proofread or not to proofread". It is a valid question.
Strangely, I think many poets simply do not proofread. Partly because it never occurs to them and partly because they believe they do, but don't. The latter meaning they believe they actually look at the poem, but do so in such a cursory manner that it serves no purpose.
For example, many will think that proofread means to look for punctuation and spelling flaws. In my comment above I played a trick. "... work(s) chiefly off of photographs..." draws one to the obvious flaw with the missing letter, but then there is the tendency to miss a grammatical flaw. "Of" is unnecessary in the sentence. A bit redundant actually.
Proofreading means looking for everything.
I agree with Jess that the poem should not be analyzed first. The emotional impact of a piece is the priority and one can only read a poem the very first time... once.
Do so. Then begin to analyze.
If a poem is numbered it makes pointing out suggestions easier, but having numbered a large piece manually (there is no software to do it in a poetic format) I know how time consuming it is. The larger the poem the more necessary it becomes. If a poem is separated into stanza that will help.
Jess' form of quoting the line then bracketing the suggestion works for me.
In the meantime Jess, if you've the time, a small instruction text concerning the revision button might be called for. Hopefully we will be using it a lot this workshop.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

soon.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

about the 'chiefly off of..."thing. I thought it needed a native's eye. :)

Seems that no one is willing to point out your mistakes, though you've mentioned they have been all intended.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

about the 'chiefly off of..."thing. I thought it needed a native's eye. :)

Seems that no one is willing to point out your mistakes, though you've mentioned they were all intended.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

When I write a poem I have my rough draft it is then proofread to the hilt but as Stan says I sometimes see what I wanted to write and not what I actually have written

I can say until lately I had gotten slack proofreading but I realized my error in that the quality of my poetry had drastically declined

just my first thoughts after a quick read through

JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

If proofreading bars posting until a poem is written in the absolute best way it can be written, then few poems would ever be posted. Although changing a single word or phrase might help a poem tremendously, that change and improvement might not be evident to the writer for a long time. This is why I go back to even my earliest stuff and review it. Sometimes fresh eyes see what should have been obvious but wasn't.
But one thing I have been given to understand. If you decide to submit a poem for publication the spelling and such better not have mistakes or the poem will be tossed out of hand.
Good thing the original draft for this shop's poems are expected to be imperfect because that's my forte and some of my keyboard letters are sticking lately lol...........stan PS can't always rely on spell check because it says ya'll is a misspell half the time.

We shall see how many lines I can produce without droning on....I am glad we have thirty days

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

I too agree with Stan, Seren and Jess that proofreading one's own work is tough. I have sometimes read a line over and over for YEARS and heard in my head one word while another, inappropriate one was on the page all along only to be suddenly discovered in a fit of insight.
Punctuation stands out for me quite easily, but grammar, correct rhyme structure and most of all emotional intent do not. Like Stan I go back and go back. The older a poem is the more likely I will be able to work a good proofread.

To the workshop-
I don't want to wait on submissions. Let's continue this conversation here in the syllabus throughout as we bring up new subjects and don't hesitate to reference those submissions here. It is the conversation on how we make a poem that is our chief goal, so I would very much like to see comments on the site of the poems themselves as well as here in general discussion.

Please everyone weigh in on proofreading, your personal attitudes and how you do it.

When I come back I want to start a conversation concerning vocabulary. Words are a poet's "bread and butter", so this is an important subject when "manufacturing" a poem.

Go ahead and submit your rough drafts when you have them.

Let's be polite, but very open and honest in our comments. Perhaps, a little more honest than usual and everyone try not to take offense. A little thicker skin here in this shop could translate into a learning experience.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I admit I'm not a good proofreader. It's due to my nature. I know it is not good, but I usually rush to post as soon as I finish, thinking it is the best I can do. However, I am trying lately to read it a few times before submitting.
As for vocabulary, it is my biggest problem as English is my second language. I always like to use new words and here I fall in troubles. Sometimes it's not the right word, or it just doesn't fit where I've used it, but what gives me a relief is to know that I am among my friends and in a safe place :)

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

should we submit poems now?

.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Well I learned something new today, that proof reading isn't just about correcting spelling mistakes and punctuation errors.

I can't say I'm an excellent proofreader, but I'm always reading stuff, looking out for what I can edit to make it feel better. I'm sort of obsessed with going over new poems until I'm satisfied with what I've written. Another interesting thing I do is, when reposting a poem elsewhere, I find myself changing a line or two, just because I feel it makes a poem better.

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

is it?

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Nothing wants to spew out onto the paper...lots of emotions and nothing comes out

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

Of all the tools available for a poet to use, this could rightly be called the foundation.

There are many reasons to increase one’s vocabulary, but in my mind the greatest is avoiding repetition. Reiteration, of course, is also a tool that can be used to effect, but simply using the same words in close proximity to one another cripples a poem.
In the English language we have a problem not experienced in languages descending from the ancients; such as Hebrew or Modern Greek. English, as tongues go, is quite young.

The language referred to as Old English dates back only to the 5th century becoming Middle English in and around the late 12th. Early Modern English morphed into our modern language in the late 17th century, so what we use today could be said to be but three hundred years old. No wonder we borrow so many words from other dialects.

The threat of repetition is as valid in short poetry as long. In short poems repeated words are obvious due their closeness and in a long poem so many words are necessary it becomes impossible not to repeat ourselves endlessly.

Been there, repeated that.

Thus it behooves us to utilize every word we can comprehend.
Now a disclaimer. I freely use rare, uncommon, archaic and obsolete terminology in my poetry. I love my vocabulary and play with it regularly. However, there is an abundance of common expressions to aid in verbosity.

So how do we increase said vocabulary?

First of all- read voraciously. Not only do we expose ourselves to new terms, but reading “reminds” us of words we are not using. I’m a little obsessive, but I never read without my desk dictionary. There are few things that bother me more than coming across a word I have never seen and not being able to ascertain its meaning.
It also vindicates our use of certain words. An example is “amain”. It means an excessively violent reaction; berserker and when I first came across it I considered it a little over the top. Then I read it in Time magazine and heard Josh Elliot use it on Good Morning America. Obviously “someone” thinks of it as common terminology.

Next, use a thesaurus. It not only helps us to replace a word with another, but also exposes us to massive lists of other words. Usually I am aware of about ninety percent of the words in an entry, but the other ten percent are new words added to my vocabulary.
In your comments to the workshop submissions try to help the poet eliminate that repetition that is not deliberate (some of it will be) and offer your thoughts here on what vocabulary is to you and your poetry.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

a vocabulary, filled with colorful words and phrases, trying to make it elegant is a task all in itself. I use online dictionaries quite a bit, google is my best friend.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

Few things are as likely to drive me to abuse as someone complaining of not understanding a word. Internet dictionaries are not as complete as the huge 2 volume Oxford I use as my standard, but they are only a click away and they have the advantage of being up to date on modern usage and recently coined words.

I recently coined "argumunition" for material I find that could be useful in an argument. I doubt it will catch on.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

That is excellent! My spell checker said I spelled it wrong. I love that.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

An epiphaniptic word!

Alone we shall find our ways into worlds of never imagined discoveries

How about sharing more of your thoughts here. I shall add your name to the participant's list if you would like to.
Please let me know

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

yaay! yes definitely

Alone we shall find our ways into worlds of never imagined discoveries

Please try to catch up the major comments and submit a poem of considerable length to find out what changes might improve it and how.
Thanks for joining

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I have read almost all the poems
finished reading the lessons first
and will try to get a new poem in but may have to
resort to using an old one for time conservation
feels good to be a part of something other than
housework homework etc lol
thanks

Alone we shall find our ways into worlds of never imagined discoveries

Even my polished poems get looked at again and changed.
Post away.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Hello everyone! This workshop has captured
my interest immensely and upon reading
your question, Wes , of vocabulary
what it is to me, my poetry, I had to say
I have always wanted the ability to draw
beautifully drawn visions from my society within

after 4 years of art class in middle school and jr high
I quickly realized I wasn't good at it but
I was good with words, weaving webs
of whimsically woven tales.
have been a bookworm all my life and
loved to gain as much knowledge of all words

I learned to draw those visions of within
not using pictures but words to create my movie,story
my reality
sorry for going on and on but this is
a subject I love and have a lot to say about

too much?

Alone we shall find our ways into worlds of never imagined discoveries

You are most welcome to Neopoet. Will look forward to see your craft with words..

raj (sublime_ocean)

Welcome, Preciouslyset. Poetry is another form of art as well.A poet is also an artist.I am quite new to Neopoet too but I can already see that our friends here can impart a lot of wisdom from poetry as we share our feelings and our imaginations.I will be waiting to read your works. Come, share them with us. Join us in this journey of learning.

Alid

As promised, I have posted a write in the workshop. The theme is the same like "Boy! It Smells so Good" to portray the struggles of an amateur like me. I appreciated the strong critique from You, Elf and the likes, took it in my stride and now came up with this one

raj (sublime_ocean)

Ever wonder why so many of the better poets are a bit long in the tooth? I would suggest that one reason is the older one becomes the more extensive their vocabulary gets. This not only helps avoid close repetition but also makes language use more specific...........stan

At last we have found it Stan! A use for old age.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Vocabulary, well there's a good start to go with poetry.
We use the bastardised English which has so many foreign words in there that I don't think the great Bard himself would be able to make sense of todays works.
As to pronouncing the words well here we have in the UK at least 30 accents, then you take all the countries that speak their own English, it becomes without another language the tower of Babel all over again.
The net should have a series of spoken words so that people can hear the dialects from all over, to appreciate how some poets can write so differently.
That will do for today, tomaruz zerman will be confusd, as I prat dez words some moor,
Yours Ian.T

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

I have often wondered what dialect they are using.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

If everybody would just speak proper English like we do in South Carolina this would not be a problem.......stan

I like your humour Stan!

I notice that as a fist piece in this workshop we have poets such as yourself, putting out works of complex forms of poetry.
From your Epode, to Rula's Sonnet then the normal poem from Stan of couplets.
Should we not learn to check normal poems first, then on to complex poems such as yours, where we can learn easily.
To dive into the deep end when learning to swim is bad news, lol..
Yours as always Ian.T

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

This is a complex workshop, but not a fascist one, choose the poems you feel able to give worthwhile feedback on and leave the others.
I am sure Wesley doesn't want to limit postings to starting with
"Jack and Jill went up the hill"
progressing to grand epopee. This is an Olympic level workshop, work at your own pace, Ian.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Jill came down with half a crown
and it wasn't for fetching water
La La,
Yours Ian.T

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

These are two of the most important and most woefully under-used tools on Neopoet.

The 'Edit' tab.
When you first post a poem you will see 3 tabs above the title 'View', 'Edit' and 'Unpublish'. You will receive feedback, hopefully offering suggestions for changes. If you choose to make any changes click on 'Edit' and it will take you back to the page where you first posted. There you can edit the poem. But this is most important! Remember to save those changes back to your computer, either replacing the original poem or saving it as "[title] rev 1" or 2 or 3 etc. The two reasons for this is that one, Neopoet is not archival, nor intended to be, it could crash or be closed. It is entirely your responsibility to backup your own work.
The second reason is that often you may receive a flood of suggestions and you need to keep your original poem intact in order to avoid losing your original vision in the face of other people's (well intentioned) suggestions. Called "throwing the baby out with the bathwater"

The 'Revisions' tab.
When a poet has revised their poem, either based on their own thoughts or other's suggestions you will see two tabs above the title 'View' and 'Revisions'. When you click on 'Revisions' you will see the changes made compared to the original. Often it is a long list. I normally click on the first and the last to see the changes, but if you have made a particular suggestion you can click on the date after you made it and compare it to the most recent version. This is how those of us that care can see how a poem progresses, and whether or not the poet is listening or not.

I need to stress here that there is no obligation whatsoever to make changes based on people's suggestions, although I consider it polite to give a reply in comments about why I did or did not make a change.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Your observations are good. I do use the Edit key quite often as you may have noticed while reviewing my writes. Your advise to back up the posts on Neopoet is absolutely spot on. I have lost content which I was not careful to back up before the Neopoet website crash...

regards...

raj (sublime_ocean)

By the way, I use a fifteen pound Webster Dictionary published in 1967, so it fits my style. If I need modern usage I always have the internet.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

technical clarification Jess. Thank you.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I have got to as many of the poems for workshop as I could tonight I am really enjoying the process its giving me more time to improve my critique and see how others go about their craft, I will comment further tonight I'm buggered

The quality of the work so far is outstanding, well done everyone

JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

I will reach the rest of the submissions tonight. I'm really tickled at how well some of this is being proofread.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

is in. Have at it, the grammar is awful as usual. This is a very rough copy.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

if we are allowed to oft. revise and change, or should we wait for a specific stage?

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

go with it while the spirit is upon you.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

are you saying that the participants can now go ahead with their edits or do we wait till you give a go ahead after your round of proof checks for punctuations..etc?

raj (sublime_ocean)

There will be ongoing subject that will invite you to revisit the poem again and again. Like my next comment.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

In my last workshop we talked about the difference between “rhythm” and “meter”.
Rhythm is the final product. It is how the poem “flows” for the inner ear. Meter is how we describe this flow.
All poems have rhythm whether one likes it or not. It can be pleasant to the ear and allow the poem to be easily read or it can be inconsistent causing us to stumble through the piece.

In a strict form such as a sonnet, we are given a very particular meter to use, but even in verso libre if there is an inconsistent “flow” the poem will be an uncomfortable read.
Consistent meter IS poetry. Please note I said “consistent” and not “particular”. It matters not what meter we use so long as it is little varied throughout giving the reader the opportunity to relax in his/her perusal.

However, meter is not the only aspect of “structure”. A poet is in his/her way a painter and the appearance of the poem on the page is vitally important. This is often described as the placement of line breaks, but it comes down to “what does the poem physically look like”.
A poem that is slap dash on the page is not inviting to the reader.

In our ongoing revisions let us look not only to the metric construction of the poem (consistency is the by word), but also the physical appearance of the poem. Does it look like a poem or simply prose with an over use of the enter key?

Let us “invite” our reader to read.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I think one of the major advantages of free verse is being able to use the visual structure of the poem to reinforce the content. I'm sure there's a tech term for this but I call it form punctuation. a sample of this would be :
Quarry often unsuspecting
.......unaware perhaps of being passed over
.......in favor of another mark
.......whose end is
...............................sudden
(please disregard all the ........., as using them is the only way I've been able to post this with the desired spacing)
This is from one of my earliest free form poems titled "The Hunter". The entire visual effect of how this poem is posted mimics the random motion of both a hunter and prey. A rhyming poem with such varied line length and placement would not work.BTW I used one of my own poem excerpts only because I'm unaware of any other poem which uses form punctuation to this extent, not to draw attention to myself.........stan

It would really assist the participants if everyone would post the shop title with the poem title. Makes it a lot easier for lazy folks like me to find the shop poetry on stream............stan

makes it easier, Stan. All the workshop poems http://www.neopoet.com/workshop/view/13516

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

Though I think the spacing works with any sort of poem.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Not every poet uses rhyme and in fact the style of rhyme commonly used today did not enter into poetic tradition until around the 15th century. However, rhyme has been a part of poetry always and likely preceded the verse. Like sounding words were easier for Paleolithic man to remember and thus imperatives such as seasons and locations were not forgotten.

Rhyme is an echo of a sound, sometimes simply the vowel or consonant, sometimes a combination of the two. Strictly speaking a rhyme usually involves a constant and a variable. In authentic /perfect rhyme a vowel or vowel consonant sound (the constant) is preceded by an unlike consonant sound (the variable). An exception to this is rime riche in which the words are identical in sound, but different in spelling and meaning.

A rhyme can be monosyllabic, also known as rime suffisante (go/slow), double syllabic (bubble/trouble) or triple (gunnery/nunnery). They can be placed at the beginning of a verse (initial rhyme), the end (end rhyme) and in the middle (internal rhyme).

Assonance is the repetitive use of a specific vowel sound in a verse. Consonance is the use of like consonant sounds. They are most commonly used in words that hold the stress in a verse, but this is not in stone.

Which brings me to my point. Rhyme is a tool that used carefully can gently hide a sound from the reader allowing it to slip by and around until the poet is ready to drop it like a sledge hammer. The closer two like sounds are to one another, the more pronounced is the “echo”. The farther apart, the more subtle. Sometimes the poet desires to lay into the reader with a strong sound and uses end rhymes in couplets. To quiet this sound without eliminating it the poet rhymes in alternating verses.

“… and out I call before I fall.” This is a thrown brick.

“In a solitude of the sea
deep from human vanity.” (Hardy)

This is somewhat hidden in a multi syllabic word that carries the rhyme.

There is more to rhyme than I will try to cover in one discussion. After other topics I will return to this. I would like everyone to start thinking of rhyme as percussion or bass in your “song” and ask yourselves if you want a strong sound that drives the reader’s emotions or a more subtle method of “tickling” them into the feeling.

Both are desirable and depend exclusively on the nature of the poem at hand.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

It was truly a good lesson to know about "rhyme" and the points nicely illustrated using examples... regards...

raj (sublime_ocean)

Thank you for that!
I took notes seriously
I love rhyming

Alone we shall find our ways into worlds of never imagined discoveries

Some types of rhyme and rhyme patterns seem more suitable for some subjects than others. One must be very careful when using an AABB pattern in order to avoid the ol' sing song effect. In my opinion the best rhyming poems read naturally enough that the rhyming is hardly noticed. This is much more easily said than done though lol. I'm not going to any more about this right now because I would prefer hearing others' thoughts on this subject............stan

I agree that some poems need to space the rhyming out so it is not overwhelming, but gentle where some (like Mand's almost fair tale piece) can benefit from an obvious rhyme structure. It is an art unto itself.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Have been made....interested to see everyone's take.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

Why didn't someone call me on it?

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I saw it but it takes enough time proofing others' poems. I ain't gonna edit their comments too lol..............stan

When I first started at Neo I only wrote rhyming poetry then I found I had a voice in freeform poetry it really appealed to me and I have pretty much wrote exclusively in freeform BUT it may surprise some of you to know that I am working on a few rhymers lol I am very very fussy with rhyming poetry it has to be subtle so that the rhymes are well masked I am working on one in particular its really coming along well I just haven't had much time to work on it at the moment, I want to thank Wesley for his great comments above I have copied them so I can take them in further and see what I can use in my own poetry

I will be posting my first edit tomorrow night

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

When writing rhyming poetry it's important to consider your targeted audience.A sing song (there should be a better phrase than that) poem in which the rhyme is obvious is suitable for targeting children and young readers. For them it likely doesn't matter that the rhyme is blatant. But I think most people who read poetry prefer that the rhyming be secondary to the message or story. Indeed, in my opinion, to have somebody comment that they hardly noticed the rhyming is high praise. But even if they hardly notice the rhyming, it's still there and still making the poem easier to remember.
Another thing which is hard to avoid in writing rhyming poetry is using worn out rhymes too much in a poem. e.g. :trees-breeze, work-shirk................stan

I prefer the sing-song type. I sometimes feel that the essence of rhyme is to show itself. It's quite brilliant when poets write with rhyme that is hardly obvious, but I don't buy into that. Very obvious rhyme works best for me. I literally love to sing along with it.

And, I also don't buy the argument that it makes the poem easier to remember. Good verse will be remembered if it is worth it. Rhyme may make it easier, but not for me.

Rhyme (well, good rhyme) makes beautiful poetry - and I never see that as secondary to the message. I love most rhyming poetry not because of the message they contain (which, seriously could be written in prose or another form) but because of the beauty of the words (and rhyme)

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

I expect our disagreement has more to do with different interpretation of what I meant by sing song rhyme. Which also amplifies the need for another phrase to describe it. By sing song I mean a poem in which the rhyme overwhelms the poem instead of accompanying it. Like a nursery rhyme.
But since rhyming poetry actually evolved as a means to help memorize oral history/stories I think we'll just have to disagree about rhyme making memorization easier.
Yeah, we need to come up with a better way of describing poetry in which the rhyme overwhelms the poem than sing song. Any ideas?...........stan

Totally agree with Stan. We need a better definition for singsong and rhyme and especially meter do make poetry easier to memorise, distinct from memorable.

True the beauty of the words is a prime consideration for me.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Guess I need to change my ways. We can't go around shocking folks by agreeing too often lol. And yes word choice in all poetry is of prime importance. Some words are just more poetic than others e.g. green-emerald, drop-patter, flow-meander and countless others. There can be times, especially in free verse where brevity is often sought, when the less elegant word choice is the best. But if one has a pretty good vocabulary, why not use it? And if one doesn't why not buy a thesaurus and improve upon your vocabulary?

Now having said that, upon further thought I think the thing I mean by sing song would be better stated as Monotonous sing song.........................stan

Count me in too!!!

Post a poem and read the comments. Welcome.

I agree with all that "sing/song" as a phrase sucks, but whatta ya gonna do?
Rhyming poetry is of course my preference, but I don't think that obvious rhyme is limited to children or nonsense poetry (more on that below).
Sometimes characterization plays a part. Who is speaking? Treebeard in Tolkien? Rhyme is critical. Arthurian legend? Not so much, but it certainly works. Protest poetry... hmmm. Well, maybe not.
The story, characters, the very atmosphere of the poem determines whether rhyme should be subtle, obvious or non existent.
And no, I do not think sing song is monotonous. Read Mand's poem. It is delightful.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

occur, whether initial, internal or by the end of the verse, they give kind of joy to the heart. I don't know why but they do, at least me.Does this entail anything wrong?

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I've done that..I agree with your comment.

Alid

It’s one of those buttons we can click at the bottom of a poem submission, but what does it mean?

Clarity.

It is asking whether the poem makes sense or not.

“`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.”

This is nonsense poetry, but if one knows Carroll he knows there is logic even in this.
Does this mean that all of our poetry must make perfect sense at all times? Of course not. It’s your poetry, you can write anything you care to.
But beware… though not all readers will understand all poetry (there is something to be said for complexity and subtlety), the less a poet’s poesy is understood the less it is read.

Consider this…
“Logic can be described as a way of thinking about thinking.” (Guttenplan)

The poet, if he/she wishes to reach their selected audience, must “think” as the reader does. Read your poem as though you had no background on the subject whatsoever and determine if your language is simply mysteriously subtle or blatantly obtuse. The most beautiful language can still mean nothing. Politicians do it all the time.

Go back and re-read your poem from this perspective and decide if it is easy, moderate or difficult to understand. If it is difficult, you limit yourselves dynamically to those who will read you.
More importantly, not this poem only.
I recently read John Dryden. Excellent poet, but so difficult to grasp I will not read him again. He doesn’t mind.

He’s dead.

You are not.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I can see where nonsense could have a part in a poem. If the poem is covering a nonsensical subject then one would expect some of the same in the poem itself. I don't think I've ever employed this myself but I can see the sense in nonsense.
Now to internal logic. Again an illogical subject might tolerate such but I think that's about the only excuse. Those who seek intense brevity in their writing can often be Too brief in my opinion. There's a thin line between concise and overly brief.
Just a few thoughts of mine on this subject.............stan PS Just saw I needed to edit this comment lol. I guess this shop is working

A poem can have internal logic and still be nonsense. That's why I love Jabberwocky so much. It makes sense to me, although most of the words in it are nonsensical.

It's just like a case of flying pigs. We all know pigs don't fly, that's utter nonsense; but in a poem that exists in a world where pigs are born with wings, it makes total sense and is perfectly logical. Just my thoughts.

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

in my submission to the workshop. Also a flagrant abuse of the language.
http://www.neopoet.com/workshop/poems/neglected-apple

I adore nonsense and dirty limericks. Both can have an interesting subtext. Nonsense does rely on a certain internal logic, which can be invented for the individual work.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

One of my favorites, made absolutely no sense but pulled me in just the same. I am a big fan of Lewis Carroll.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

that there are poets who don't mind if they're read or not, but it is their style or preference to write that way. Sometimes we write something and think it's readable. Others think that it's good if one piece can be interpreted differently by different readers. I think this means there is a subtle message or as others like to call it "subtext."

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

He found complexity in the subtext of "Neglected apple" that I hadn't realised I'd put there and I rather blithely replied that I was glad he picked up on it.

Yes, I have read poets who claim they don't care if anyone read them or not. You know what they all had in common? They sucked.

Good poetry is a most extraordinary act of generosity, a bit like giving little pieces of your soul, that you have with care and skill shaped and polished, to total strangers.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I read what you have confessed above. I wish to add that even if my perception was not what you meant it to be, it still made some sense, did it not? It is just a case of different perceptions by different persons, at least you got a take on the underlying message i could read into..

regards,

raj (sublime_ocean)

they are the kind of issues I constantly immerse myself and I didn't even realise I had written them into the poem.
I thank you for your thoughtfulness and perspicacity.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

and the other five percent are liars.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

In the end it comes down to how the readers interprete the message within the poem itself. Different people, different views...

We have now discussed several aids that help us in fine tuning our poem, but what are some of the tools at our disposal for the actual write?
Imagery, the process by which we paint a literary picture, may have many parts. I would like to describe five of the chief.

Simile is used to denote a specific relationship between two disparate things. Most often using the words “like” and “as”, simile compares two unconnected things to place the understanding of one unto the other such as- “Quido is as strong as a bull” or “the wind was like a hurricane”.
Grammatically the word “as” is used to indicate an exact likeness in the comparison whereas “like” is more general.
E.g. Quido really IS as strong as a bull, but while the wind is fast, is not truly a hurricane.

A metaphor is an implied equation between two objects- “A young man is but a sapling.
The difference is subtle. Similes and metaphors are sometimes seen as interchangeable. However, similes acknowledge the imperfections and limitations of the comparative relationship to a greater extent than metaphors. One way of looking at them is to see a simile as a direct comparison whereas a metaphor is indirect and more broad in its contrast.

One of the most well known metaphors in literature is by Shakespeare-

“All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;”
William Shakespeare, As You Like It.

The Metonym substitutes one word with another associated word. In the instruction “all hands on deck” the word “hands” refers to the people attached to them.
When the White House dispenses a press release it is actually the President from whom the information comes, though Mr. Obama’s name is changed to “the White House”.

Personification (often referred to as anthropomorphism) attributes human characteristics to an animal or inanimate object.

Irony is when the actual meaning is the exact opposite of the literal meaning, often leading to surprising results.
E.g.
Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.
Coleridge, Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Instead of asking you to change your poem to incorporate these tools, I would like everyone to revisit the poems in the workshop and point out where these tools have been used as well as how they might be enhanced to improve the poem.
These discussions can be held on the poets own poem or in the general conversation thread.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I don't know if anyone's said this before but I think you've missed your calling, your teachings are so easy to understand even for the untaught, You have helped me out just with this workshop thank you so much for talking so that even the sometimes stupid can understand lol

Sorry I haven't been participating much I will endeavor to be more active in the conversation

JC x

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

... in a long, long while.
Thank you my friend. Thank you very much.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

If the participants take away but one thing from this workshop I would that it was "proofread".
Poets I have read who consistently had typographical errors and misspelled words throughout their poetry have, in this workshop, given me poetry I can find no flaw in.
We talk of meter, metaphors and rhyme, not typos and sloppy spelling.
I am impressed and satisfied in this respect.
Well done.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Thanks for the compliment. Coming from a workshop leader and a knowledgeable person like you, your compliment works like tonic for me.

raj (sublime_ocean)

I second that Raj

We can't thank you enough for your time and attention Wes!

LOve Mand xxxx

Metaphors, simile, metonymy and irony are all rhetorical devices designed to describe and thereby persuade the reader to view the subject with a particular perspective.

Allegory and hyperbole are also rhetorical devices at our disposal.

Allegory is a device by which characters, places or things represent ideas or personalities in a past or present societal reality.
E.g. King Arthur surely did not truly exist, but is likely a compilation of many men who led the Celts in their heroic stand against the Saxon hordes in the fourth century. Therefore Arthurian legend is allegorical.
Although a very useful tool for the poet it does occasionally pose some risk.

Some decades ago a political scientist wrote a treatise explaining the allegory in A. A. Milne’s “Winnie the Pooh”. His arguments were compelling. He argued that the stories were satirizing the present state of British politics (ala Gulliver’s Travels). At the end of the book, however, he essentially said- “just kidding”. His point was to show that sometimes a tale is just a tale.

Hyperbole is used extensively in poetry. It is an exaggeration to aid in making a point.

E.g. “The day is hot as Hell.” Meaning that the day is rather warm, but likely not as hot as Hell.

Which of us have used hyperbole or allegory in a workshop poem? “Chinese Song” seems hyperbolic and allegorical as Weirdelf’s poem appears to be allegorical. Look in on the other poems and see if they are perhaps allegorical or hyperbolic and come here to tell me what you found.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

This is really informative. I'll come back with the examples from the submitted poems.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I think I am done with all the edits based on comments and suggestions of co-participants and have posted my poem. From you as a workshop leader and Mentors too, I would very much appreciate if you could provide ratings on a scale of 1 to 10 for various aspects/elements, such as, Punctuation, Meter, Theme, Title, Internal Logic, etc.. It would enable me to identify areas for improvement. After all that is the objective of participating in a work shop isn't it? Once again I thank all who have guided me through this workshop with their comments, critique, encouragement and appreciation. It has been a very satisfying experience to take dips in this Olympic Pool ... regards,

raj (sublime_ocean)

In the meantime, what are your thoughts on punctuation? That will be my next subject and you can start a conversation. We have many poets who do not use it deliberately. What do you think of that?

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I do not.

Our first subject (there are many to go) was proofreading. The poems in this workshop have been wonderfully void of flaws of this nature.
I am pleased and impressed, but what about the comments?
We are not only poets... we are writers. Why would a writer allow anything he/she writes to be published without it being precisely what they want to be read.
Why would we not proofread our comments to the same level as everything we write? Why would we not "write" our comments?

We are artists. If we exert energy producing an oil of quality, we should exert this same energy in our pencils.
Everything, virtually everything, we write is part of us.

Proofread all that you write.
Everything.
Every word has worth.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

In my opinion a perfect poem would have such word usage and rhythm that the words themselves would supply the pauses and stops. But I've never written a perfect poem. So what is one to do? Use punctuation only where it suits them? Always use punctuation as if you're writing a letter? Use No punctuation at all?.......A real problem. I started out using hardly any punctuation and no periods. Over time I find myself using more. One thing I know from limited experience is that a publisher will likely demand full punctuation . So maybe the question is if we should always write as if the poem is going to be published. But even then, does one punctuate as you write or write first then punctuate? I have usually written first then gone back to add punctuation. I do this because for me the punctuation hinders the initial writing. The problem with doing this is going back it's not always obvious which punctuation mark (if any) should be used at the end of each line...a comma?, a period? maybe a semicolon?
I'm sorry I have more questions than answers on this subject. Hopefully somebody else will have all the answers lol............stan

I admit that I do not know enough about language skills and the finer points thereof. Yet, because we are now discussing about the need for punctuation, it tickled my mind to know if use of punctuation is essential or not essential and I took recourse to relating it to our common experiences, which perhaps may yield some clues.

Punctuation in language is akin to the difference between unkempt and groomed hair or say the difference between regulated or uncontrolled traffic without a regulatory mechanism to guide all who thoroughfare so everyone knows where to pause, proceed or stop, else it can create a chaos rather than smooth traffic.

raj

raj (sublime_ocean)

Here are my thoughts.

“In written English, punctuation is vital to disambiguate the meaning of sentences. For example, "woman, without her man, is nothing" (emphasizing the importance of men) and "woman: without her, man is nothing" (emphasizing the importance of women) have greatly different meanings, as do "eats shoots and leaves" (to mean "consumes plant growths") and "eats, shoots and leaves" (to mean "eats firstly, fires a weapon secondly, and leaves the scene thirdly").
Larry Trask.

This is a touchy subject for many poets. There is a popular style in which only the words are relied upon to deliver the message. This is known as Scriptura Continua. It was the nature of the written word in Ancient Greece and continued in various changing forms through the Roman Empire to Medieval Europe.
However, punctuation began in Egypt and was used by Euripides in his plays to indicate emotional changes by the actors.
My perspective is this:
When someone reads our poem we have a distinct disadvantage. We are not there. We cannot lead our audience through the work. We are helpless with no tools to dictate how the poem is read save one.

Punctuation.

The poet actually has a favoring circumstance over the painter or the sculptor. It is a benefit shared by only the composer of music.
The actor or musician is physically present when presenting their art. The painter can only produce the art and leave it to his/her audience to determine how it should be viewed.
However, the composer has musical notation that describes in great detail precisely how the music should be played or sung.
The writer shares this distinction.
Through punctuation the poet may dictate how the poem is read. Without it, he/she is at the reader’s mercy. Placing the words precisely in a very specific order may have a mitigating effect on this trauma, but it is woefully limited as the above examples demonstrate.

How many of the poems in the workshop have used punctuation judiciously and how many, absent punctuation, have succeeded in manipulating the reader effectively?
What are your thoughts on punctuation?

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I use punctuation a lot, and I totally agree with you on how it guides the reader through a poem. That's exactly how I explain it to myself and to others.

Without punctuation, all I see are lines of words with less order than they should have.

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

Punctuation is an art.
I believe it's the most vital tool to steer the reader the directions the author wants him to go with the verses. however, I think structured poetry could benefit more from punctuation than the free-form does, though not necessarily always. One the other hand, even some free form poetry could be a hard bite if not well punctuated.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Punctuation, the bane of my life I know what it is I know how to use it in others poetry and I can see obvious places that there need to be a pause or stop but I find it hard to put it into my own poetry for better effect, I am having trouble putting punctuation in my lilies poem I have made one edit but I know I still haven't gotten it right, it been a very difficult poem to punctuate any and all help would be appreciated.

I think that its a great tool when used properly I have seen poems murdered by punctuation giving it the sound of something garbled and messed up, I think its why I am so sparse in my use of it, I am cramming as much as I can into my head before I give a fuller critique of the other poems

thanks for the instruction people :)

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

Not. One. Period, Jayne. :(

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

:(

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

I think punctuation is for the benefit of the reader, especially if they are not familiar with poetry. Otherwise it may seem like one very long sentence to them.That is my own opinion..

Alid

Hi Alid,

I totally agree that punctuation is very important BUT in saying that I have read poetry with no punctuation whatsoever and they have just flowed off the tongue effortlessly they have been of differing forms, though I have to say in my personal preference for free verse I have found many writers that write without punctuation and they never fail to move or arouse some emotion in me and in my mind the words just have a natural rhythm that well is amazing, to truly write like that is a skill and an art.

I am hoping with this workshop I can learn and improve my punctuation skills I have already learnt much I am now trying to implement that :)

Kind regards JC

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

You know what? We keep discussing punctuation as if periods, commas, apostrophes and all these other marks are the only punctuation in poetry. But, especially in western classic forms, There is a whole other layer of punctuation : the physical form of the poem itself. Is not the gathering of lines into stanzas a form of punctuation?
And the arrangement of lines into nearly equal lengths helps to punctuate the rhythm and rhyme. Even the pattern of rhymes could be considered a punctuation which reinforces the flow of the poem.

One advantage of free verse is the freedom to let the actual form of a poem enhance the subject of a poem. And isn't this another form of punctuation? I often see a single line or even word isolated by putting it in its own stanza in order to add emphasis to the poem eg.:
In the middle of all the confusion
he finds himself

alone

which leads him to the wrong conclusion

Just a few thoughts on the types of punctuation not often considered.............stan

I guess the way I write some of my free verse and blank verse etc. is punctuation its the ending of that thought or half thought, its just the way I write I don't actually set out to write short lines and one word lines but I do it a lot, I guess that's the way my brain works, and again I will say I am having hells own trouble putting punctuation in my lilies poem its being a real pain...

There are times when I write in a way that is stilted in the line formation, hmmm you have given me pause for thought Stan

love JC x

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

When ever I pause for thought I go to sleep. Yeah going back and adding punctuation can be a real pain. Should this line end with a comma or apostrophe. Or nothing.......maybe a semi colon? My poem also gave me fits and I Still not sure I have it right. I think sometimes others can punctuate another's poetry better that the writer can. Maybe because the author read the poem as he/she wants it to read even without punctuation...........stan

I have just finished my second edit with Wesley's help I am still not sure of a couple of things as per punctuation I will address it again in the coming edits, I find it easier to help with others punctuation than I do with my own don't know why it is but it is.

JC x

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

I wonder if Microsoft is reading these debates and realize how tough it is becoming for folks to use punctuation. If they read and find a way to auto-punctuate just like they have done with spellings and for grammar with red n green underlies, they would be doing a great service to us folks here...lol...

raj (sublime_ocean)

Write a letter.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Yes. As my discussion on "layout" on the page, stanza breaks, line breaks, words by themselves are all indeed a form of punctuation that guides the reader. I believe we should use every tool, absolutely every tool, we have at our disposal.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I don't know how to break my poems into stanzas!
ever
I honestly write in one continuous
line after the other bc that's how I think

1 continuous thought written down
how does one break it into stanzas?!
I desperately crave the knowledge of
how to do so properly
all input is appreciated

Alone we shall find our ways into worlds of never imagined discoveries

I checked out some of your poems. You do break them up into stanzas. What do you mean by "how to do so properly?"

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

Think of a stanza as being a complete thought. As such one can consider a stanza to be like a completed sentence or paragraph. If you are writing more than one verse on the same thought then wait until the thought changes then begin a new stanza. Hope that helps a bit.............stan

Ian here, I know I is precious to many,
but it's the other Precious that asked about Stanzas LOL.
But I learn something new each day, now my thoughts are racing away and will not stop till I sleep ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzz

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

Guess I got in too much of a hurry trying to catch up after a week away. Thought one thing and wrote another lol.............stan

Loves you no matter how fast you are travelling.
Who said you slowed down as age crept in LOL
Yours Ian.T xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

Stanza need not be uniform in size. Four lines, five lines or two, we can comfortably break anywhere we want. Stan's thoughts are good. Consider the stanza as containing a complete thought and move to the next. Some poets use enjambment (carrying a thought from one line into the next unbroken) between stanza, but I think it causes the poem to be confusing. We tend to stop for a moment at the end of a stanza, but if the thought goes on it can trip us up.
Another thing to help you practice is to use a specific poetic form. For example, do the simplest possible- write a quatrain (four lines of poetry... remember a single line of poetry is called a verse) that comes to the end of a thought at the end of line four, then write another one on the same subject, but coming from a slightly different perspective.
Then do it again.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

i see.. maybe i am wrong...i'll check on this. thanks for the update..

Yours truly,
Alid

It’s time to up the ante. This is the Olympic Pool after all.

Most of the poems submitted are considered polished drafts at this point and I would agree. I would like to take the opportunity now, with these poems before us, to explore and recognize aspects of our poetry not often considered.

The first is Phonaesthetics.

Phonaesthetics is the art of producing sounds that are pleasant to the ear. Poetry is a phonaesthetic artform. Metric organization, rhyme, alliteration and other techniques allow the poet to produce language that is lovely to be heard.

This is known as Euphony.

At the same time the poet may employ Cacophony which are sounds deliberately designed to be harsh and unpleasant. For instance, the poet describing gun fire in battle may use words such as “crack” or “bang”. These are cacophonous not only because they attempt to depict unpleasant sounds, but rather they are cacophonous because they actually “sound” harsh.

Euphony is generally produced through the use of vowel sounds over consonants. The longer the vowel sounds the more pleasant to the ear.

More on that in a moment.

“Moon” is considered euphonic compared to “tune” which is slightly less so due the sharp sound of the “t”.
A word that utilizes consonants may be considered cacophonous depending on the number and “brilliance” of the consonants. “Cacophony” itself is somewhat harsh.
When addressing this subject many people will choose as beautiful words that have a beautiful connotation. “Sky” is a slightly harsh word, but many will call it lovely because of what it represents- possibly a lovely, blue sky.

Phonaesthetics is concerned ultimately with the “sound” the word makes.

“Mellifluous” has a soft, rolling sound and is generally considered euphonic.
Oddly enough writers of the past several decades (some very well respected) have determined that “cellar door” is the loveliest phrase in the English language.

Go figure.

Another way of creating a euphonic sound is through the use of long and short vowels. Not their pronunciation, but the fact that some vowels actually take longer to pronounce than others. “Door” will create a “longer” sound that say, “skip”. The use of long and short vowels rather than accented syllables constituted the meter of poetry in Ancient Greece.
As an example I dare to present a stanza I have attempted to produce “euphonically”.

It is in catalectic anapestic tetrameter.
“Would that I knew of a moment sublime.
Would that I heard once a mockingbird’s rhyme.
But there is naught that’s divine I recall.
I know of only the proof of my fall.”

Determine if your poem is meant to be “melodious” or “brittle” and look to the very sounds you are creating. In this way we can manipulate what our audience “hears”.
I invite you to read my recent blog that quotes J.R.R. Tolkien on the subject.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

You have opened a new chapter in my mind. Too late in the night to ponder. I will take a look at it when the mind is bright.

regards,

raj (sublime_ocean)

you denying the existence of long and short vowels, Wesley, I'm glad you have come round. It is the prime reason why people from the southern States of America have so much trouble with meter, their accent is influenced by French, which uses long and short vowels, rather than stress, for meter.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I have always said "the best way to learn something is to teach it." These workshops help me "to come around" to so many things it is mind boggling. I may actually learn to write poetry someday.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Phonaesthetics; that's one topic I've had my eyes on for a while. I read Tolkien on his languages, and he said his aim was to create languages that sounded very beautiful. He definitely was a master of his game, Tolkien. The opening lines of Namarie stand out as one of the most beautiful lines of poetry I can remember,

"Ai! laurië lantar lassi súrinen,"

I believe phonaesthetics plays a key role in making poetry "work".

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

I agree that Tolkien is a master of the technique. I read the Lord of the Rings over and over just to hear the words in my mind. I don't know how any human being could sustain such a thing over one thousand pages of prose. Of course as your example demonstrates he did create multiple languages so complex they can be used to communicate... beautifully... phonaesthetically.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Are we now to be evaluating the poems for the different types of language used and comment? I am getting back into the swing of things...my arm is healing for the most part, as long as I am not doing a lot of heavy lifting or overusing it. I can type now for a little bit without too much numbing or tingling in my fingers.

Keep Writing,
Carrie

"Quoth said the Raven, NEVERMORE"

I will be discussing aspects of poetry we don't often approach. I would like everyone to look at each other's poems as well their own and find those concepts, how they are used, how they might be used more effectively or whether they are absent.
I hope everyone isn't worn out and can offer some insight on what they think of some of these concepts.
Yes, I would say our poems are for the most part finished, but I want the participants to try and recognize more in their poetry than they usually do.
In other words... a more "complete" poem than they have previously seen.
I decided to run this particular shop because there are so many component parts of a poem that are regularly neglected and this gave me the venue to broach them in a little detail, so that they might actually be used in our poetry. Things like phonaeshtetics never get talked about and, along with the other ideas, I believe them to be important to our art form.
Go look at your poem and tell me if it is euphonic or cacophonous... please.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

and "cacophonic" read almost like medical names.

This last conversation is a bit hard bite. It needed many readings to be digested, but I'm happy you've insisted the assignment to be done.
I've never regreted reading your conversations, though sometimes lengthy, yet always informative and useful.
Thanks a lot for the time and the effort to shed a light on this topic.

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

I will go over my poem and see where they are used tomorrow night I will post my thoughts I also need to take some of this in ...

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

I just got back from out of town and came upon these new words above which describe what most good poets do instinctively. And I find my mellow mind chortling on near definitions so here goes lol.
Cacophony - One who uses consonants in a false manner
Cacaphonic - one who converses on the phone while using the bath room
Phonaesthetics - One who designs phone to be pleasing to the eye
Phonanesthisizing - Putting people to sleep by use of pleasant droning while on the phone
Euphony - Accusing a person of not being what they present themselves to be

Whew! I'm almost as glad to get that out of my system as you are to get done reading such nonsense lmao.

Now on to a serious question. I know there is a name for words which sound like the thing they represent such as "murmur", "crack", "sooth" and so on but Who can tell me what that name is?...........stan

do you mean "onomatopoeia"?

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

BINGO.............stan

....are a really funny guy.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Ambiguity (Latin, “driving both ways”) is an image, phrase, word or idea with an unclear or ambivalent meaning. It will signify more than one thing.
A pun or a double entendre is ambiguous.

For example, the word “light” could mean it is brightly lit inside, a lamp itself or it could mean that something is not heavy.

To quote William Epsom, “The machinations of ambiguity are among the very roots of poetry.”

Ambiguity causes poetry to become richer with meaning as if the very verses were “branching out” taking multiple roads that the reader must consider simultaneously.
The downside of ambiguous language is that when used haphazardly it creates confusion.
As with any of the tools of poetry it must be applied with conscious care.
“Ambiguity that muddles is bad. Ambiguity that magnifies is good.” (John Drury)
Where have we used ambiguous language in the workshop poems?

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

does ambiguity in poetry produce what some call "dark poetry?"

❤❤❤❤❤❤

Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words
........Robert Frost☺

Please follow me on Instagram
https://instagram.com/poetry.jo?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

The easiest way to describe it would be "saying one thing and meaning another". We could write something humorous that taken another way would be dark or the other way around.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

And here I was thinking that ambiguous meant something was capable of being interpreted in more than one manner. Example : she has a complexion like a peach." does the speaker mean splotched with yellow and fuzzy or smooth and soft?................stan

... where once again I let someone else to explain this most recent subject.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I will just say thank you for a great workshop.
I noticed that a lot of our poets learned many things, I thank you for all the work you have put into this.
I know how busy you must be, and what you have done here means a lot to the Neopoet site, where it has shown the excellence of the teachers here, and I notice that there are quite a few more joining in.
Thanks again, Yours Ian.T

PS:- The discusión‎ will carry on with your Blogs, and a compilation of some of your explanations...

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

So just to be certain I've got it right, you now want us to each do an analysis of our own poems? That should be pretty interesting............stan

... and if time permits, the others. Let's try to point out the most obvious uses of the concepts in all the poems (there are a few, so I don't expect everyone to visit every poem. Perhaps our own and one other).
Also, make note of where any of these concepts could be used to greater effect. For example, "Chinese Poem" is possibly an allegory not intended. How could he have used allegory to expand and tighten the poem's purpose?

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I'll see what I can do over the weekend..........stan

We will be closing this workshop shortly, but before we do I would like to discuss… what we have discussed.

I believe this is known as “rehash”.

I have always felt that anytime I worked with a teacher if I could walk away with one new thing then the time was well spent.
If you walk off with but one thing… let it be the “proofread”. If you will take the time and effort necessary to produce the sort of art being made here, then please make it intentional.

One of my teachers once told me that “every word has worth”.

Let it be so with your poetry, your comments, your emails. You are writers. Let nothing written by you be merely thrown to the “page”, but let it be a true representation of who and what you are as a poet.

Next, let us continually increase our vocabularies. Words are our lumber. We cannot build without a preponderance of it. We require nails and glue (structure, rhetoric and rhyme), but without lumber we simply stand about the work site with power tools and wait.
Personally, I don’t want to build birdhouses.
The tools of the poet, as any artist, are quite literally infinite. If you spent the rest of your days searching them out you would find many, but by no means all.

Collect them as you go.

Meter and rhyme must be first. Without meter a poet produces a stumbling language. This is true in prose as well, but to the poet, who can do without rhyme, a lack of meter is a cancer.
Metaphors, simile, metonymy, irony, allegory, hyperbole, imagery and ambiguity are the power tools I spoke of. An old boss of mine never stopped saying that “without the right tool, you cannot do the job.” I find it true in every aspect of my life each day. There are so many tools left to discuss we would need a plethora of workshops to scratch the surface.

Collect them as you go.

Phonaesthetics is simply the art of listening to our own language and determining if it accomplishes what we want it to. If the poem is violent, is the language also? If we write the love song, is it ugly? Does it “sound” harsh or gentle?

And perhaps most important is that little box at the bottom of our submissions- “internal logic”. If the poem makes no sense to anyone but the poet… who will read the poet’s next poem? Write to your audience but take care that the audience knows what you write.

If anyone has questions about what we discussed in this workshop or anything else concerning poetry, the NeoPoet Mentor Program is prepared to offer insight from a dozen different perspectives. Do not hesitate to contact me.
I am at your disposal if you may put me to use.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

Before you close up.

I am going to make a concerted effort over the next few days to record readings of all the poems in the shop. It's a big job but I think invaluable to hear ones work in another's voice, especially as regards the phonaesthetics.

If anyone has it together to record using Vocaroo, Soundcloud or whatever please help me out, message me which poems you will record so we don't double up. I will start from the end of the list and work forward.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

except my own. Would anyone be so kind? I would love to hear it in another's voice.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I'll do yours. I would love for another person to do mine too, besides Weirdelf.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

I will do yours and Jess's later on tonight when its quiet :)

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

Jess,

I will do one when I work out how to use SoundCloud :|

I will work on it now

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

It is just not archival.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I am still up working on your reads I will give Vocaroo a go thanks Jess.

hugs JC x

Thanks for Vocaroo its much easier to use thank you ! I will post your readings in the next couple of hours no sleep here its too hot.

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

I want to thank everyone for giving me the opportunity to broach a number of subjects not often discussed. The poems this workshop produced were impressive due to their truly polished nature and I hope everyone walked off with at least one new perspective on his/her poetry.
If anyone has further questions concerning these ideas or others, please remember that the NeoPoet Mentor Program is ready to help in any way possible.
Please do not hesitate to contact any one of us.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

author comment

I have said it before and would like to say it again that it was a pleasure and learning experience for me, with good takeaways in the form of useful suggestions from fellow participants and of course your prodding us on with some useful lessons on various elements of poetry. I agree with what Jess has suggested in his comment below that it would be good if you could post all lessons put together to serve as general guidelines for students like me. I can appreciate how much effort you have willfully made for this workshop which is indeed very commendable.

Regards,

raj (sublime_ocean)

You've been great, insightful and very inspiring. I think everyone here appreciate your honesty. I, for one, feel honoured to have you as a mentor.

Alid

One of these days I hope to get a comp which has not lost audio so I can hear all of ya'll. In the mean time thanks to Jess and others for reading and recording all these poems.....And I'd also like to thank Wes for holding this shop. It has given me a new perspective on a lot of the details in writing.......................stan

this has been a superb workshop, one of the best ever. I would love to see it become a resource. If you would be so kind as to assemble and edit your various topic descriptions in this thread into one document and post it as a Forum all Neopoet would be eternally grateful.

Thank you Wesley, you are my hero.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

After all this praise being heaped upon him we will need to buy Wes a bigger hat ..........stan

right there, stan but how about we just grant him the title" Wise One" instead.;D

Alid

(c) Neopoet.com. No copyright is claimed by Neopoet to original member content.