I go to school to exercise my left brain, and at home I exercise my right brain. What happens when my right brain is required to work at school? Chaos.
I like to call myself a very artistic person. I make a webcomic, I draw a lot (now these are two separate things, of course), I compose music, I design websites, etc. One thing I can’t do, though, is write poetry.
Rhyming sillyness is not poetry. I mean, it’s a form, but it’s not the form that requires any real effort.
I have “deep thoughts” often, and I try to get them in words as much as I can, but whenever any creativity comes into them, I completely draw a blank. In my weblog, I can easily say what I feel because my feelings can easily be written down through example and analysis. I think metaphors are where I draw the line, though. I can’t say “life is my chariot and I am riding up the mountain” or some stupid shit like that without looking back and saying “…uh… that’s stupid shit.” I know that’s what poetry is – just writing whatever comes naturally – but that self-consciousness is also a part of who I am.
I try to write lyrics for a song. I start with a premise. Hmm, I say, I’ll make it a dark song. I get images of giant devilish figures popping through the clouds, picking up pedestrians and eating them, and lava pours out and sears the earth and buildings collapse and stuff. But how am I supposed to put my “emotions” and “feelings” into words? Definitely not like this:
A devil thing pops through the clouds
And picks up a pedestrian
And eats it
And then lava pours out
And sears the earth
And buildings collapse
And stuff
Yeah. Just dividing prose into verses is NOT poetry. Then again – I really can’t find an example of poetry that I really like. Poetry that I can easily interpret as having a deep meaning and really relating to me.
Think about what I said for just a second. Does that sound like a contradiction to you? “easily interpretable” stuff that has a “deep meaning?”
Starting from that, I start looking at my creative side as really god damn shallow.
I WROTE LYRICS FOR A SONG TODAY. And the only reason that I could get through it was because it was a satirical, Weird Al-type song, and it rhymed. (I’ll post it up later.) It was funny… people laughed… but it wasn’t deep like I would have originally wanted my song to be.
I want to write about how I see the world, what I think of people, what I think of events, how my imagination works – and I want it to be written down like poetry. But that’s just not how my mind works. I’m not very good with words.
Blargh. Maybe that rhyming funny song I made today is a starting point. But it may head me in the wrong direction. Here, I’ll try writing a poem and seeing how it goes.
The sky is filled with a haze
Sand flies across the dunes
It’s all BLARGH FUCK THIS IS COMPLETELY TOTALLY STUPID EVERYONE’S WRITTEN A POEM ABOUT THE SKY AND HOW THE ENVIRONMENT AFFECTS HOW I THINK AND IT ALL GOES SO WELL ALTHOUGH I’M BAD AT INTERPRETING IT AND…
Wow, typing in capital letters is a real way for me to get my “emotions” out.