Published on April 30, 2022

“Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.”

Poetry is the clear expression of feelings, thoughts, or ideas. It is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words. Though writing poetry is a creative endeavor, having a guideline can help you put your thoughts and feelings into words and give a definite shape to your ideas.  

How do you enter the intriguing world of Poetry?

Poetry is not only a dream and vision; it is the skeleton architecture of our lives. It is a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings but laid out in proper, rhythmic order. It is a collection of the right words in the best order. To develop your poetic skills all you have to do is listen to your emotions and thoughts in tranquility. But if finding that inner voice is becoming a little hard, you can tune up your poetic skills by following these tips –

1. Read Read Read 

Reading poetry is a great way to trigger your poetry writing passion. As a start, just read poems from your favourite poet without delving into the layers of meanings. As you read more, the underlying meanings begin to unravel themselves and give you ideas to write one on your own. 

2. Listen to Glisten 

Poetry readings are a fun exercise that nurture the aspiring poet in you. Listening to good poetry is a great way to discover its construction and examine the words’ usage. It is an instructive activity that will help you get familiar with the beauty of rhyme, alliteration, syllable stresses, assonance, line breaks and other art forms that create poetic magic.      

3. Start Simple

Do not obsess over creative magic. Remember, you need to learn to crawl before you can walk. Keep writing and try to improve your writing step by step. Small poems are an attainable goal and are a good stepping stone. Focus on quality instead of just quantity. A simple poem that conveys your thoughts in an impressive way is much better than a rhyme-fest that conveys nothing.   

4. Familiarise yourself with styles

There are many ways and styles to express emotion through a poem. Develop your poetry writing skills by learning how to insert metaphors, similes, allegories, metonymy and other literary tools appropriately. The right rhyme scheme, meter, number of lines, subject etc are what set apart a good poem from a great one. A dictionary and a good thesaurus are your ideal partners as you start off.  

5. Sign-up for Poetry Classes

Many ideas you might have and want to express can be given wings through the right poetry writing course. Poetry exercises help you produce great poetry through the right combination of inspiration, guidance, encouragement and corrections. A poetry course helps you brainstorm ideas and teaches you the nuances of poetry writing. It helps you unlock your inner poet. 

Poetry in America Intensive

Poetry in America Intensive is for poets like you who want to board the flight to literature. 

Join our poetry classes to hop on a literary field trip across America through time, to experience poetry as it speaks to other art forms–music, visual art, dance, photography–and, as it opens new windows on many of the social and political issues of our time.

Created by Poetry in America founder and director Professor Elisa New, Director of the Center for Public Humanities at ASU, and the Powell M. Cabot Professor of American Literature at Harvard University, the Poetry in America Intensive will prepare learners for college-level literature courses in a fun, interactive setting. 

This week-long poetry workshop offers 15 hours of intensive programming, including live virtual instruction and pre-recorded video content, and confers one ASU credit that can be transferred to a college or university of the learner’s choice.