Poetry

I’ve always wanted to make poetry without words. So I’ve begun to learn about writing in the hope that it rubs off in my life. I want it to invisibly effect me.

Poetry has always been a mystery, and a draw. In recent months it’s totally sucked me in. It’s fascinating and our home library has expanded with a selection of amazing books. I’ve read them quickly, and I’ll reread them slowly. We have access to some very smart and talented people and they in turn have supplied an amazing reading list. The majority of the books I’ve been reading are about poetry, and I’ve done very little reading of actual poems. The idea being to understand how words work and what poems are. I’m learning and liking it.

I don’t want to be a poet. I feel the same about being an artists or a photographer. I really don’t want to be anything. There’s too much baggage with labels and I’d rather simply make things or just think about making things. Labeling anything—and I include poems, photographs or art—seems like a waste of effort. If I’m honest, part of this thinking is the result of some serious self-doubt. I just really don’t think I am an artist or a poet or anything. But at the very least I want to live like I am.

The stuff below is a beginning. Typed into my phone while riding the bus or standing in the subway. I think it’s awful, but with practice I hope to get better.