poems and song writing

I found it really interesting that John O. Espinoza writes about a new way to piece poetry together with scissors and scotch tape. I think that using multiple methods to create poetry is useful in that it creates new and unique work almost every time. When I first read the passage, it brought me back to why I started writing poetry, and that was because I was writing song lyrics and music. I feel as if the process of writing poetry for songs is much different than writing just for it to be on paper. The symmetry is different, it has to match a melody, and all of the words must carry weight so people know what they’re singing about. Other things that factor in is whether or not you want the song to highlight the voice, lyrics or melody, and that might be something interesting to consider when writing a poem. A bit of role-playing as a writer, if you will. I think this might serve as a prompt for different writing styles as well, since it has such narrow parameters, and may produce some of the best work for someone that has never tried it. Even to combine the two methods of poem writing could produce a new style altogether, as well as stimulate new topics  for even more poems.  This would also solve the problem that Espinoza writes about when he speaks of the words not being able to stand alone because they do not relate to what happens before or after each one. Also, it may provide for more thinking about what gets put into a line in order to accommodate the format. It may allow for more grouping in terms of themes and topics, which may work in terms of more understanding and more seamless transitions between lines.

One Reply to “poems and song writing”

  1. The association between song-writing and poetry is very interesting. I often listen to poems and think if every line and word really matters. Though I am unfamiliar with song-writing, I realize that there are limitations. You claim that one of these limitations or challenges is the difference in symmetry between the poem and the song. Honestly, I found this statement very eye-opening. I don’t generally think of poem as being symmetrical, but I guess I should take a poem’s symmetry into account from now on.
    I love the idea of song-writing and think that it would be a very interesting idea for an exercise or class. As you mentioned, even creating a hybrid of a generic poem and a song would be a cool endeavor.

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