Dhruv Adam Sookhoo
Writing to Create
This article is the product of an open brief and for a writer that's often the worse kind. When the page is white and wide, and you've got to come up with a line, a word, a phrase to express something important. This is some folk's idea of hell. Yet if you are compelled to write, to record, to capture and release the truth of the day's events or perhaps the truth of your life's experience it is vital method of emancipation for you and for others who share similar contexts and perspectives.
If we can be an authority on anything it is our experience. Experience is at the heart of our being and should be at the core of poetry. That is not to say you must experience something exactly or entirely before you can write about it but rather if you are going to build a reality in poetry you should perhaps start with your own:
"Put yourself into a different room, that's what the mind is for." Margaret Atwood*
Your memories of place, people and reactions produce a stock of material that you can draw on, often naturally, when writing and build a different context; a "different room". Everybody has experiences of some kind, and yet not everybody chooses to express them, or if they do not in the form of poetry. This makes poets who can sustain meaningful writing over their life time quite a minority group that exist in a unique position in the wider world. The position they choose to adopt within the community is often dependent on personal politics.
If we can accept that Poets are born, not made - Poeta nascitur, non fit (Horace) - then it's logical to assume that at some point in their life they will be considered 'young poets'. The baggage that normally comes with this label is 'lack of experience' and 'lack of technical ability'. But what must not be lost sight of is that:
"It is life we are trying to get at in poetry'" Wallace Stevens, Adagia*
And although life experience is accumulated over years many 'young' people have had experiences they feel compelled to express. In many cases the most powerful, vivid expression comes through poetry. While it often takes time to fully appreciate the meaning of experience writing is part of that realisation and integration as we:
"[W]rite poems to preserve things [we] have seen/thought/felt both for [ourselves] and for others…" Philip Larkin (Statement, 1956)
In preserving the situation the poet is baring witness to the human truth of the situation:
"To get at the poetic truth it is not always necessary to tell the what-actually-happened truth; these times I lie." Rita Ann Higgins*
"The truth is what is. What should be is a dirty lie." Lenny Bruce*
What is important is that the poem captures truth as it is felt, as it affected life, as it continues to affect life. The living quality of poetry makes any vibrant, truthful, powerful poem valid no matter what the age of the poet. Although the age of the poet will affect the truth felt and communicated.
"My poetic sensibility may not be predicated on the colour of my skin, but the colour of my skin certainly generates my poetry." Fred D'Aguiar, Further Adventures in the Skin Trade, 2000*
Here the word 'colour' could quite easily be replaced with 'age'. Every group and every individual within a group needs a voice if they are to feel accepted or recognised by others and more importantly themselves.
It is important that 'young' poets write because in doing so they are adding an expression of their way of life and their insights to the stock of English Literature. No matter how disparate the perceived position between writer and reader an insightful poem can reach across race, religion, gender, age, sexuality, etc. and speak directly to an individual's sense of understanding and truth.
"If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear as it is- infinite."* William Blake
The imaginary page is never as white as it first appears; our feelings and hopes are under the surface waiting for expression. When we write we are not committing an isolated act. Indeed we are engaging with and embellishing the palimpsest of English Literature. But more importantly for the 'young' when identity is still in flux writing provides an opportunity to having a 'conversation with yourself' and gain a personal understanding of the personal situation so…
"[I]f you have nothing at all to create, then perhaps you create yourself." * Jung
And let your creation challenge the baggage of being a 'young' poet.
Anecdote
This article is based on opinions I have developed over the short time I have been engaged with poetry and writing 'formally'. Though I suppose I have thought along the lines expressed above for longer than that, before and since I started to write. I have had several opportunities to engage with other 'young' poets and established writers at poetry workshops. These are opportunities to discuss poetry in general and yours in particular within a group preoccupied with the same literary form. But perhaps not the same reasons for writing or the same methods, this diversity is often the most valuable and refreshing element of the workshop experience. Although this is not a biography I would like to outline two very useful opportunities that have been afforded to me. In 2002 I came second place in The Christopher Tower Poetry Prizes associated with Christ Church, Oxford and subsequently was kindly invited to the Foyle Young Poets of the Year 2002 prize-winners' Course at the Arvon Foundation Lumb Bank and The Christopher Tower Summer School, Oxford 2003.
I would recommend both competitions to any 'young' poet as they have given me the chance to: link up with other young poets, to develop networks, to understand others' reasons for writing, others' 'styles', etc. all against a backdrop of mentorship. This mentorship often focuses the mind and hones the craft of writing poetry. An example of a workshop task may be to write a poem interpreting a specific theme, or perhaps to try to write within an unfamiliar structure. Workshops are ideal places to discuss and try to improve technical ability. Although the purpose of the workshop environment is often to free up ideas particularly as many inexperienced poets find rigid systems of writing inhibiting. I hope in the near future to produce a pamphlet with contacts and friends I have made through my involvement with the above competitions.
For many of you reading this the first 'big win' was for you as it was for me a pivotal moment. And for those of you who are looking for a 'break' you'll even now recognise the significance of achieving it. The poetry of prizes and prize money is often looked down upon, but any public art form worth maintaining is worth financial support- so apply to competitions they give incentives to sharpen skills. As for personal poetry, that is poetry you write primarily for yourself anyone reading this article knows its necessity and value.
I hope the article and anecdote have been useful, and whether you have agreed or disagreed with a point or indeed all them I hope it has been equally affirming.
*Acknowledgement must be given to Polly Clark who supplied many of the above quotations at the Christopher Tower Summer School in Poetry 2003.
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