Yesterday on Twitter, the poet Kate Clanchy wrote ‘To celebrate #NationalWritingDay …sit down with your favourite poem, let it sound in your head and write a version of it. You are allowed to do this. It’s how most poems get started.’
And I thought it was just me – that maybe it was habit I was getting into, that I would have to grow out of – this reading of a poem and finding I was writing my own version, or at least beginning with an echo of an individual line, or of the form itself. No such thing! I now realise I was doing what poets do – being inspired by and responding to the poetry of others (that is why we must read!) On my recent Arvon course, where Kate was one of the tutors, I had experience of approaching poetry directly in this way. It was very powerful – and all fourteen poems written that day were very different.
What they shared was the thread of connection with the original poem we read together. I realise now, that out there is a whole universe of poetry waiting for our response and that this universe is made up of infinite strings of poems growing one from another – and that being part of it, is what poetry is all about.
In Kate’s words: ‘Poems grow from poems.’
If you’d like to write a poem today then here is a workshop from Kate
Happy National Writing Day!
