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Writing Poetry to Save Your Life: How to Find the Courage to Tell Your Stories
Writing Poetry to Save Your Life: How to Find the Courage to Tell Your Stories | Maria Mazziotti Gillan
4 posts | 1 read | 8 to read
What I hope to accomplish in this book is to give writing prompts that will help you to get past all the outside influences that keep you from believing in yourself and in your ability to write. In order to write, you need to get rid of notions about language, poetic form, and esoteric subject matter ? all the things that the poetry police have told you are essential if you are to write. I wanted to start from a different place, a place controlled by instinct rather than by intelligence. Revision, the shaping and honing of the poem, should come later, and, in revising, care always needs to be taken to retain the vitality and electricity of the poem. Anyone can learn to craft a capable poem, but it is the poems that retain that initial vitality that we remember; these are the poems that teach us how to be human.
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blurb
SomedayAlmost
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Houston, TX, USA: “Erase the NRA” poem I wrote on an NRA press release at 5 am this morning. Not sure this is Litsy-ish, but feel moved to share this tragic weekend. #schoolshootings #erasurepoetry

tournevis 👍 6y
14 likes1 comment
review
Redwritinghood
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Pickpick

An excellent confidence booster. This also helped me to understand poetry better, an area I regret to say that I've often ignored. The book is actually only about 83 pages with the remaining pages being writing prompts. The author has some powerful messages about finding the courage to claim your own unique voice that is valuable not only for poetry but also for life in general.

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Redwritinghood
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"Don't let critics make you doubt yourself. You have stories to tell and you have the right to tell them. Don't believe them when they tell you that you don't. Don't let them stop you from writing because then they've won . . . I say I want to hear your story. Tell me, again and again."
I love this woman already and I'm only on page 23.

Lindy Oooh! This reminds me of Amber Dawn's memoir 8y
Redwritinghood @Lindy I'll have to check that out. 8y
24 likes2 comments
quote
Redwritinghood
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"Poems hide in a place deep inside of you that I call the cave. The cave is guarded by a crow that whispers in your ear in the voice of every authority figure you've ever encountered."
"In order to write, you have to get rid of the crow; you have to push him out of your way . . . You have to enter the cave to find all the stories you have to tell." Whether you write poetry or not, this book has great advice on finding your true voice.

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