Poetry Writing Tips: Workshopping

If you're anything like the average beginner poet, it is entirely possible that the prospect of a group of people sitting around a table and not only reading, but critiquing your poetry is an absolutely horrifying proposition. But have no fear! There are many benefits to having others - whether family and friends, members of a creative writing class or social group, or even random strangers at the local Starbucks - take a gander at your work.

Here are some major benefits offered to the poet willing to have his or her work critiqued by their peers:

The poet will notice things they failed to recognize before. As with any type of writing, the familiarity you have with your own work can mask even the most obvious of errors, falsities or contradictions in your poem. Conversely, while knowing what it is you want to convey through your piece is a definite benefit, you can be so in tune with the message that what is obvious to you as the writer is absolutely foreign to your audience. I make mistakes like this many times with my own poetry, to the point where I've submitted non-workshopped poems to literary journals and find them rejected only to realize much later that what I had meant to say wasn't really clear. In one piece, I referred to the subject of the poem in the third person ("she") for the first half of the poem, and referred to her in the second person ("you") in the last half. It is mistakes like these that can be avoided with constructive criticism.

The poet will learn to take risks. It may be that as a poet you have become so comfortable and accustomed to a particular way of doing things that you don't even realize you've boxed yourself in creatively. Throughout my initial years as a poet, I assumed for whatever reason that the first word of each consecutive line of poetry should be capitalized. It wasn't until I reached college and was influenced by the poetry of others that I began to experience poetry where the capitals followed the rules of standard punctuation, or where every word was lowercase and capitals were done away with altogether. For many poets, free verse is the easiest way for them to express themselves in poetry. Workshopping with other poets familiar with traditional and nontraditional poetic forms can teach you how to release different emotions by actually chipping away at or adding to a piece that could become much more powerful or poetic by simplifying or even complicating it.

The poet will learn to cut, cut, cut. Too many poets add unnecessary words. I do it. You probably do it. We all do it. How much space in your poems consists of the words "the," "and," "that," "but," and so on? Chances are, too much. By workshopping with others and even hearing them read your pieces aloud, you learn to hear and see things that are glossed over in the writing process, when the focus is more on "getting it all down" than it is on making the prose sharp. Another trait common among poets is the phenomenon of The Line. If you've been writing poetry for any amount of time you have probably experienced this phenomenon: You're sitting at your desk at work, taking a shower, swinging a golf club, minding your own business, and it hits you - The Line. The Perfect Line you just have to go home and build a poem around. This phenomenon is invaluable to a poet, but can also hinder a poet's work if The Line becomes forced into a place it doesn't really belong. One of the best parts about workshopping your poetry is that fellow poets can usually spot The Line immediately, and if that's the case, it probably belongs somewhere else. True, it may be great, it may be life changing, but save it for a great and life changing poem.

The poet will learn to write better poetry. Simply put, participating in workshops not only enhances your poetry by providing you with constructive criticism of your own work, but it positively contributes to your craft through your own constructive criticism of the work of others. If nothing else, reading another poet's work on a consistent basis, the simple immersion of yourself in poetry, will lead you to become a better, more attentive poet yourself.

The benefits of workshopping are numerous and mutual; the better poet one member of the workshop becomes, the better the others become as well. Don't run from criticism, embrace it. You can't have the flawless poem until you fix the flaws, and you can't fix a flaw until you see it. Workshops can be a positive and valuable part of the poetic process, helping you to hone your poetry to perfection and aiding you in the pursuit of your poetic goals.