To the poem born

[K]

We are poems ourselves
Conceived from emotion.

We are all born poets
Yowling or uttering

Our brutal stages of advance
Dazed from the drop

We find our voice, or not;
From there, images flock

Like birds of Assisi
Or flail as spoiled pigeons would.

[GrimDad]

Well K, I really like the Guidelines For Improving Your Poetry Writng that you put in Thank You Grimsby. But I do also think that variety is good, so personally I do happen to like 'Green Grows The Grass O'er My True Love' as well as many other varieties of writing style.

[K]

Hey Grim,

Indeed, as I said it's difficult not to sound a pompous prat, as if I'm a fount of poetic knowledge! I'm certainly not, but those guides did help me realise what is involved in writing poetry.

Surely if you were to tell many of the greatest artists throughout time something like that they would have ignored it

I'd say every "well known poet" from Dante to Simon Armitage, studied the structure and "rules" of poetry, it is a fine art. As I mentioned they then created their own rules, but not before grasping the fundamentals. I certainly don't think it is enough to write what you feel. Sure for a personal journal entry, not though if you are to present the poems to a wider public and expect them to relate.

Yours pompously
K