Could you guys give me some pointers in poetry writing?

Question

I am a songwriter and musician. I have seen some of the poems in here and they are really good song material. I mainly write Christian/Spiritual songs and wondered if you guys could give ,me a few tips and ground rules you use when writing poems, i.e do they have to rhyme, where do you go for inspiration, do you look at other poets work for inspiration.etc

Thanks Guys,,,,,love your poems :-)

Answer 1

Breath of life
and the beat of my heart
stilled in a moment of eternity

Murmured a word
In stilted silence
Hushed with a kiss

It pines this heart
An aching for the unkown
Latent within my own soul.

A tear and a smile
Sigh thoughts of you
In mood of pictured bliss

The undoing and it is done
And yet I remain
In midst of worldly woes

Near and yet distant remains
He in battles fought
Waged in other climes.

Awaiting and I wane
And I await the coming
He dwells and yet not abides.

A remnant of one I wrote a while back...use it if you wish..or be inspired or disregard...

Answer 2

Poetry is all about rhyme & reason
Flow and tune.
When you are writing a poem,
words have to rhyme and must also match in context. You cannot just put any rhyming words together at the end of a pair of lines without them being connected to the context.

Start with little 4-line poems. See if you can describe a flower in 4 lines. Try adding more lines when u r satisfied. For ex, after the flower, u can talk about a bee. Say the bee has just arrived on the flower. then, continue with the bee hopping away in search of more flowers... here, you may go on to describe the garden & so on...

Poetry is like that. Just let your imagination flow. Read other poets' works for inputs on style and rhyming. Remember what they used when their line ended with love... was it 'above' ? was it 'now' ? Then try to incorporate the word in ur poem.

If there is no rhyme word, sometimes, exceptions are allowed, in the sense that in a 20 line poem, if 2 lines dont rhyme, its perfectly alright.

Another style is to make a particular nth line of each para rhyme, instead of continuous pairs.

Another way is the use of metaphors & similes... as strong as a lion.. he was the King's son

Or alliteration, which means 3 or 4 words in the same line start with the same word... as in He stooped low as a lover, a liar. ( the use of 'L' word as alliteration )

Great poets have described life's great mysteries as well as beauty of daffodils. Just start with it and you will succeed.

For inspiration, just turn your head & spot the first thing... you can write a poem about it. Literally anything can serve as inspiration... the most common being God, Nature, Love , Friendship & so on. But u can write on every day issues too, like hardwork, honesty, events like wars & crime, etc.

Answer 3

They don't have to rhyme.

Christian/spiritual is so overworked now. Those artists all sound the same, and the lyrics sound like they come from a generic 50 cent prayerbook. If this is something important, approach it from a different, more enlightening angle.

*Check out Zao "The Funeral of God". This is good christian music, as it embraces a darker atmosphere and is not overtly or subtlely preachy.

If you're writing for songs, don't obsess over structure too much, as far as the meter goes. It will only frustrate when putting to music, and a complex meter will be almost impossible to write a song around while preserving the meter itself.

Answer 4

Actually, it sounds good when it has a rhyme but let ur feeling always inspires u, go to the open nature & it would help much better & yep u have 2 read a lot, it helps u in be awaring of poets words & subjects & somehow the poems inspire u
good luck :)

Answer 5

Poetry is essentially the antithesis of Metaphysics: Metaphics purge the mind of the sences and cultivate the disembodiment of the spiritual; Poetry is all passoinate and feeling and animates the inanimate; Metaphics are most perfect when concerned with universals; Poetry ,when most concerned with particulars

Answer 6

well here's something simple i try to stick to...

im also a lyricist, stick to your rhyme scheme... like line 1 rhymes with 3 and two with 4, etc...

if that's in verse one then make the other verses the same pattern

and then the chorus, well condsidering it is the chorus it will al be the same anyway but try to stick to or close to the original rhyme scheme...

it's just a little bit, but i hope it can help

=)

~haloguitarist

Answer 7

Write a little before bed, then sleep on it. Wake up the next morning and see if anything comes to you. Your brain usually continues a task while you're sleeping.

Answer 8

you've got to pull from your life, write from the soul, from your heart, from your emotions