Saturday 13 April 2013

I don't like Poetry

                                          

I said that to shock you like my thirteen year old self. The only one in  my class to admit to not liking poetry when asked by our teacher at secondary school. She looked at me in that way that only a teacher can. She didn't ask why and inwardly I wanted to scream I don't like poetry..........

Because I am frightened of it.
I don't know how it works.
I can't write poetry.
It is so powerful and yet can be so concise.

I never know what she thought of me, I never asked. I was too intimidated.

I went through my teenage years reciting and performing poetry, extracting meaning and being moved by its rhythm. The Lady of Shallot, my O'level piece learnt in full, then Wilfred Owen and onto Sylvia Plath but still I could never create it.

At the Chichester Copywriter's Writers' Retreat I met Denise Bennett who slowly and quietly changed my mind. You can read about her here : Award-winning poet Denise Bennett. The workshop was carefully paced and before we knew it, we had all produced poems of such emotion and description that some of us were moved to tears.
Working on several memories, objects and individual time lines I now have three pieces of work of which I am proud. I am taking the suggestion Denise made on board and putting them away in a drawer for a few days before re-working them.  We were introduced to a craft that finally I can embrace so that I can now say-

                                                          "I love poetry."

Planting the Snow Queen by Denise Bennett




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