The Agony in Writing a Poem
November 13th, 2007 | by Fhen Macabasag |If one thinks that it is easy to write a sensible poetry (in David Genotiva’s term), well, think again! Paul Engle spoke once, “The most terrible thing for a poet is to be confronted by a blank sheet of paper.”
In my first reading, I was unable to appreciate the idea that Engle wanted to convey in his statement, until recently when I was privileged, likewise horrified, to be one among the twenty fellows of the 4th Lamiraw Creative Writing Workshop.
Engle employed the phrase ‘most terrible thing’ to connote a certain degree of angst and pain in the whole process of crafting and polishing a single sensible poetry. Though the poet, prior in the course of its literary construction, may have an abstracted thought for his/her definite literary work, his/her attempt to illuminate the ‘mysterious meanderings of his soul and of his people,” as Cirilo Bautista puts it, is the most tormenting ‘algebra and fire’ (Jorge Luis Borges’ terminology) scenarios that he/she will face; “music too!” adds Voltaire Oyzon, one of the seven panelists in the said workshop.
Engle’s ‘most terrible thing’ in the act of writing a poem applies not in what to write rather how to write them. Merlie Alunan, a Lamiraw panelist, emphasized the importance of the-how more than the-what. It is imperative that the poet be sufficiently equipped for this job.
To write a poem is to tussle with that dreadful blankness, to compress it and to bleed it and to beat it up until it capitulates to fruitfulness.
It is inadequate that the poet is familiar with the basic rules of diction, grammar and composition — the first level of reality — but he/she must grapple in his/her penetrating mind their aesthetic ramifications (Bautista’s signifier) as well. For instance, the function of metaphor, the types of versification, the rationale for rhymes, and the harmonizing of illusion and reality, once comprehensible to him/her, will bestow to his/her work a distinctive direction and a persuasive excellence.
An open session — from the meticulous critical scrutiny of its panelists (all New Critics subscribers) down to its opinionated fellows — in a creative writing workshop proceeding, in the post-writing period, testifies the significance of the context in Engle’s revelation on the poet’s inevitable dilemma. This session, also called ‘communal textual investigation,’ is the so-called heart of the workshop where the submitted literary works (workshop materials as they are branded) undergoes a ‘communal critique’ (borrowing Bautista’s words), which brings out the author’s strengths and weaknesses.
The quality or convincing excellence of a finished and published poem can only be achieved when, after the struggle in the agonizing poetry-making in its aesthetic ramifications, the workshop material or literary craft gains appreciation and satisfaction from its wide critical readers.
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Fhen Macabasag Fhen Macabasag is a well-rounded Waraynon. His art is his life.
