The D.A. Powell essay was actually
very interesting and informative. It gave names to techniques I had been, but
never realized I have been using in my writing all along. The section of the
essay where he discusses Tristan Tzara’s opinion of poetry we’ve written as
being the greatest mistakes we’ve made Powell says, “Perhaps the first and
greatest instinct of poetry is to mistake, misstep, mishear.” I agree completely;
I whole heartedly believe in accidents of discovery and the “Mondegreen effect.”
Despite the fact that I’ve had too many Mondegreen situations to count happen
to me with music that I “thought” I knew, some of my greatest discoveries in my
own writing have been the result of misreading my own handwriting in my poetry
diaries. In my case, I generally always write my poetry in small cursive so it’s
harder for other people to read on the off chance that there are snoops around
who would read it. As a result of this I’ve have misread my own writing on
several occasions where it turned out for the better.
I think the part in this piece that most related to the issues
we’re discussing in class about paying attention, walking, and writing was
where towards the end of the essay Powell references Rachel Zucker telling his
students to “take the familiar from your work and make it unfamiliar,” when she
says to “revise towards strangeness.” Though I didn’t completely feel comfortable
embracing this notion, Powell’s addition to her advice, “revise toward
discovery,” I absolutely agree with. When we take the walks we have to write
about our thoughts and the sights we see in combination with the fact that we
are obligated to make ourselves consciously aware of our surroundings which, in
this day and age doesn’t seem to happen very often. Because of this, I think we
are naturally forced to start to think about these things in ways that are
different from the familiar. Before our walks I never would have looked at the
creek coming back from to town from my best friend’s house as a, “muddied ribbon,
its faint shimmer faded from years of wear as it vainly (which ironically, originated
as valiantly) struggles to cinch the waist of this legless college town.” However,
in my free-thoughts while I was staring at the creek, I thought about the reputation
of “Chico drunks” and how most creeks really do look like shiny ribbons from
far away and my great uncle Archie a 93 year old marine core raider one of the
bravest men I know. Later when I was looking back at it I thought of something he
used to call the “worthless drunks” he’d met in “his day” and the end result
was the aforementioned line in my notes. Though all situations and ideas were
familiar to me before in some way or another, the form they took in combination
was something strange to me; yet, I liked it. This is the understanding I gained
from the concept of revision towards strangeness and discovery that Powell communicates.
In another section, I love the analogy
he makes about not being able to use an ultrasound on your brain for a poem that
is still developing. Far too many times in my writing experience I have asked
the exact questions to myself that his students ask him if he worries about. Is
this too____ or is this too ____. I love the advice he gives at the end of the
paragraph on the top of page 223 where he says it’s good to worry about tone
and language but, “take these worries on at the time of revision, not at the
time of first vision.” If I had a mantra for poetry writing I think this would
be it. It is far too easy to over think things when you’re working in an
environment where the tools you have to use are as endless as the possibilities
you have to use them, profoundness and vagueness are celebrated, and success is
never guaranteed (despite the fact that it is human nature to strive for
success).
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