Finding Your Flow: Poetry Edition – Written by Gwen

Poetry offers profound personal and deeply expressive outlets for sifting through emotion and probing intricacies of language and fragmented identity. Many aspiring poets struggle mightily to find a voice that pours out freely and eerily reflects their peculiar personality traits. How exactly do you tap into poetic flow anyway?


Begin with things that stir your soul deeply, and every poet starts as merely a voracious reader. Immerse yourself deeply in a slew of eclectic poetic forms like free verse haikus and sonnets with narrative flair. Notice deeply whatever reverberates intensely within you. You admire the unflinching candor of confessional verse pretty much? Do you feel inexorably drawn to rhythm and frenetic energy that reverberates from slam poetry performances so intensely everywhere? Do you fancy rigid classical poetry forms like villanelles or sestinas nowadays, with elaborate pre-set rules underpinning them? Preferences can yield vital clues regarding natural style, fairly obviously and surprisingly reveal various underlying tendencies quite effectively.

Your job early on isn't defining style but experimenting freely under loose constraints and without intense external pressure, somehow. Experiment with sundry lyrical styles and tones far outside your usual purview and familiarity. Craft verse with rhyming flair one day, then plunge headlong into wildly associative prose next with almost reckless abandon. You'll start noticing recurring themes and tones that feel sort of right during this fairly playful, deeply personal exploration. This patchwork of practice morphs into your signature over time rather quietly and somewhat organically with each incremental iteration.

Poetry ought to be a natural outgrowth of your persona. Do you possess an introspective nature or exhibit boldly and sometimes seem rather vulnerable? Let those traits surface in your work. Some poets revel in stark simplicity, conveying profundity with mere handfuls of syllables quietly within narrow linguistic confines. Some writers deploy lurid descriptions and convoluted symbolism, painting eerie vistas in readers' minds with considerable skill rather quietly. Only your way exists somehow freely. The more authentic you are, the more natural your words will come.

Finding flow means learning to heed the inner voice even when it subverts conventions and defies established norms quite radically sometimes. Grammar bends quite unpredictably sometimes with eccentric fluidity. Line breaks can jarringly surprise unsuspecting readers with their abrupt appearance on screen in totally new configurations. Emotion can suddenly erupt very dramatically and take center stage with chaotic unpredictability in a flash of unbridled fervor. A style that feels confining probably isn't for you. The right style makes writing ridiculously easy and downright inevitable somehow. Final thoughts swirl deeply inside you as poetic style evolves into a reflection of the inner world. Stay curious deeply and keep writing fervently with brutal honesty. Your flow will eventually find you as much as you stumble upon it over an untold number of trial periods, naturally. Make your poetry reflect your soul deeply, rather than just showcasing skill with words in a very verbose manner.

This blog post was written by Gwen.