Occasionally I get given entirely unsolicited advice about what I should be doing with my poetry, usually recommending how I can maximise engagement or whatever else.
I don’t write poetry for ‘engagement’ or ‘content’. I have a personal disdain for ‘daily poems’ pages and I’ve always valued authenticity over everything. Poetry is expression, connection, protest. As I told a class of children recently, it’s where we can be as creative as we want and forget about ‘rules’.
I share about 20% of what I write, because I find value in sharing and some people enjoy my writing. I also see numerous incredible writers on here and it inspires me to add my voice too. Sometimes, like lately, I have to give myself a kick to share again but I do for this important reason. I remember the first poem I ever posted, I’d already written and published novels but this was a few lines of the most vulnerable writing I’d ever shared. I was shaking! You can hide in fiction and there are parts of my books taken from reality that I keep secret. But this was exposing and voicing an inner part of me that I usually kept closed off.
Over time, posting poems has got me over the fear of sharing my writing and connected me with myself and other amazing people. I find language and what we do with it endlessly fascinating, it’s what makes us human! (It’s also why I study applied linguistics 😅) So that’s why I do it, not for appraisal or validation or god forbid engagement.
I consider myself primarily an author as that’s where I started and that’s still my dream. I am planning to publish a poetry book when the time’s right, but otherwise poetry has become a really important part of my life and it’s how I’m learning to give myself a voice after many years struggling with that. Thank you to those who share too and give support 💛
To those wishing to advise me:
This is poetry, not content.
I’m not marketing myself.
I’m not a brand I want to advertise,
Existing as an enterprise.
I come apart,
expose my heart,
It’s more than pretty words.
Happy Friday everyone 💕✨