Writer to writer: From think to ink - Gail Carson Levine 2014
M. E.
Poetry country
The initials above don’t stand for ME, but for metaphor and endings. The poets of this world would throw me in jail if I left M. and E. out.
Let’s start with metaphor. Not every poem needs a metaphor, but many have one or two. It’s an important way to help our poems feel poetic. Metaphor means the imaginative substitution of one thing for another. Broadly used, metaphor includes simile, which is when we expressly say one thing is like another. Here’s Shakespeare using metaphor in Romeo and Juliet:
But soft, what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
Not only does Shakespeare turn Juliet metaphorically into the sun, he gives the moon an illness, another metaphorical move, which turns this into an extended metaphor, one that carries through an entire poem or a big portion of it.
Let’s look at the metaphors we’ve already met. In my poem “The River Lethe,” the water that runs outside Cassandra’s tent substitutes for the river of forgetfulness—a metaphor.
And take this line from my poem “Becoming Cinderella”:
I became Cinderella, goo to their granite
She isn’t really goo; they’re not granite. It’s a metaphor. I wasn’t thinking, I should toss in a metaphor now. It just crept in. Yours will too.
Emily Dickinson’s poem that starts, “’Hope’ is the thing with feathers” is an extended metaphor, because hope isn’t actually a bird. But the metaphor is apt, isn’t it? Hope defies gravity, as birds do, and at improbable moments it sings and won’t be silenced.
Let’s take another look at the first two lines of Molly Peacock’s “The Throne”:
When I was afraid, fear took me in,
and gave me a cold seat in her kingdom
There’s no real kingdom, no actual throne. It’s an extended metaphor!
And how about these lines from “The Tyger”:
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears,
I’m not sure exactly what Blake means, but I think the lines are gorgeous. No extended metaphor here, just metaphors.
Writing time!
• You may know the expression “sick as a dog.” But certainly a dog isn’t the only possibility when it comes to illness; dogs aren’t always sick. Think of something else to be sick as, like, sick as a whale that swallowed a submarine. Jot down a few possibilities.
Complete these other simile beginnings with unexpected endings:
• hopeful as
• watchful as
• excited as
• suspicious as
• bored as
• angry as
• thrilled as
Use three of these, or three others that you come up with, in a poem.
• Let’s dare to imitate Shakespeare with an extended metaphor poem. Turn someone you know or one of your characters into an object or an animal. Start the poem with the words I call you. Could be the basket, the shoe, the hammer, the camel, or anything else. As you go along, think of ways this person is like the metaphorical thing. For example, the person who is the basket may collect stuff. She may yield surprises; you dip into her and never know what you’re going to get; she may wear clothes with colors that remind you of the muted colors of many baskets. In your poem don’t mention those aspects of her that have nothing to do with a basket.
• This prompt was suggested by a book about writing poetry, The Poet’s Companion by Kim Addonizio and Dorianne Laux. Call your poem an emotion, like Anger, Grief, Joy, or Impatience. Now write the poem without mentioning the title, but make the reader experience the feeling.
Have fun, and save what you write!
On to E., endings.
Stories end when the problem they present is resolved, either happily or unhappily. Narrative poems may end the same way. Let’s look at the ending of “Ooey Gooey” again:
the train he failed to see . . .
. . . Ooooeey! Goooeey!
A tragedy, and that worm is history!
The ending of a pantoum is settled as soon as the poet decides on the first line. Here’s the first and last stanza of my pantoum, “Departure”:
Farewell.
You just arrived.
I must leave.
Where are you going?
I have become a wanderer too.
I must leave
to bring truth to reptiles.
Farewell.
We’ve closed a circle, and the poem feels complete.
But usually poets have to search for the endings of their poems, and the end needs to belong uniquely to the poem. What we want most of all is for the reader to feel content that the poem has come to rest.
Here are the first three lines of Ogden Nash’s “The Dog” again:
The truth I do not stretch or shove
When I state that the dog is full of love.
I’ve also found, by actual test,
If we didn’t know that final line, we might expect a mushy, sentimental ending, possibly Of any breed, my Spot is best. But the last line isn’t that at all:
A wet dog is the lovingest.
It’s a surprising change of direction, a great way to end a poem. In fact, there’s a name (naturally) for this kind of thing, either at the end of a poem or in the body of it. It’s called the poetic turn. At a poetry reading, when a poem ends in a turn, a surprise, one often hears a sigh run through the audience.
Molly Peacock’s poem “The Throne” ends with a turn, when the arm of the cold throne becomes warm and supportive.
Here’s the ending again of “How Pleasant to Know Mr. Lear”:
He reads, but he does not speak, Spanish,
He cannot abide ginger beer;
Ere the days of his pilgrimage vanish,
How pleasant to know Mr. Lear!
This charming poem ends on a semiserious note with a hint of his death someday. Death is certainly one way to get completion! Seriously, though, mortality is a time-honored subject of poetry.
The sound of the words can make a poem feel complete. If you end with a line full of alliteration or assonance, or if you bring in a rhyme at the end of an unrhymed poem, your reader is likely to feel satisfied.
Writing time!
• Look over the poems you’ve written. Pick one that could use some strengthening at the end. Search for synonyms that will enhance the alliteration or the assonance in your poem. If it’s not a rhyming poem, work in a final word that rhymes with the ending of a line not very far above.
• Write your own surprising poem about a pet.
• Write a poem about a season or a period in your life and end with movement to a new time.
I’ve come to the end of the poetry section, except for a final poem. This is a poem I adore, which celebrates writing. It’s about writing poetry, but I think it covers every kind of writing.
WRITING IN THE DARK
by Denise Levertov
It’s not difficult.
Anyway, it’s necessary.
Wait until morning, and you’ll forget.
And who knows if morning will come.
Fumble for the light,
and you’ll be
stark awake, but the vision
will be fading, slipping
out of reach.
You must have paper at hand,
a felt-tip pen, ballpoints don’t always flow,
pencil points tend to break. There’s nothing
shameful in that much prudence: those are our tools.
Never mind about crossing your t’s, dotting your i’s—
but take care not to cover
one word with the next. Practice will reveal
how one hand instinctively comes to the aid of the other
to keep each line
clear of the next.
Keep writing in the dark:
a record of the night, or
words that pulled you from the depths of unknowing,
words that flew through your mind, strange birds
crying their urgency with human voices,
or opened
as flowers of a tree that blooms
only once in a lifetime:
words that may have the power
to make the sun rise again.