Can’t Sleep #5: On Poetry

Recently, I’ve run into a problem; I’ve realized I’m a shit poet. 

This isn’t just a self deprecating observation, no. It’s the truth. The thing I’ve invested so much time into and the pinnacle of my pride and sense of worth is all bullshit. I’m trash at writing poetry.  

Over all this time, I’ve had a steady collection of poems building up in my inventories, things from when I was just starting out to things I’ve written only days ago. I seem to have adopted not only the flowery poetic influence of Sylvia Plath, but also her philosophy on hoarding work. Her husband claimed that she never threw away a piece of poetry, and treated it like woodwork; if she couldn’t fashion a table from whatever she was working on, she was happy with constructing a chair, or even a small toy out of the scraps. However, as I come to think of it now, applying this to myself might have been a premature decision.  

I am very ambitious. I am also extremely egotistical, and though the marriage of the two often help me in my endevours toward success, it seems that it might impede me quite a bit as well.  

The poet that is me is very impulsive; he is tangy and rapid and excessive in the way he expresses himself. I write poetry when the thoughts in my head are so twisted and so complicated they can’t be explained in a casual conversation with a friend, or even with myself. It is the very reason why I love writing poetry: there is no need for direct clarification. It’s a quick fire of the elementary basis of anything and everything I want. 

I'm starting to think that maybe I was a bit too optimistic. I was too demanding of my audience to follow and understand the complexity of the things I wrote about, especially in the way I wrote about them. The work, the effort put into capturing a moment of my turbulent thoughts were too much for a layperson, and at times too much for even me. I often go back to the pieces I write and try to comprehend the bigger picture, the structural elements, and many times falling flat on my face when I can’t debunk it. 

Why do I write in such an inaccessible way? Simple: it challenges me.  

In the age where anyone with a tumblr account is a poet, I suffer from a terrible lack of inspiration and influence I perceive as worthy of my time. Though I do attempt to draw influence from the sources I find compatible with my high standards, I can’t protect myself from being exposed to such shitty influences, whether it be terrible instagram poets (whom I have tried to get along with in the past, for marketing reasons of course) or just an idiot peer claiming to be a stand up poet and reading “poetry” that sounds more like a lecture about social issues they obviously know nothing about. Oh, and not to mention the music on the radio. Do words mean anything anymore? 

I’ve always been a harsh critic, especially when it comes to my influences and inspirations. But this is real. I’m honestly taking a look at my works and they disgust me. They are cringeworthy, the same emotion that overcomes one when they lay at night thinking of their deepest regrets in life. It’s embarrasing even, because I know that at the time that I wrote all that stuff I thought I was good, very good, and I feel that way now whenever I write something. Can’t I trust myself anymore to have pride in the quality of my work, or am I just an idiot, blinded by the delusion that doing something is better than doing nothing, and therefore quantity has to come before quality? I will not have it. That is such an American, capitalistic way of thinking, and it should never apply to art. 

Too often I find myself taking pride in my productivity. I’m always busy, and I love the feeling of always producing something, being a working asset, a human resource. But art is something so frail and delicate; it has no room for brute and sloppy force. It consists only of feeling, of beauty and grace, and that is what my productivity lacks. That is what this generation of art lacks. And it’s sure to become the downfall of artistic expression.