Trying to Get a Break

[Anonymous No.14330262]

Dear /lit/,

Last month, I finished the manuscript for my book of poetry. 130 pages, 66 poems, all quality, each between 1/3 a page all the way to 14 pages long for one particular poem, majority falling between 1-3 pages. It's a collection of poems going back to my very first written poem to my most recent poems from a couple months ago, written between ages 8 and my current age of 24. I'd say about half of the poems were written over the past 2 years, when I started making a serious effort of writing more consistently. They range in subject from nature to the city to little vignettes to silly word poems to personal experiences, while avoiding anything political or SJW or trite and cliché, each poem having its own unique character, each being different from each other. I have a great title and a really aesthetically appealing cover. I've been sending single poems to online and physical journals and websites and contests, one even being picked up to be published on a website's homepage at the end of this month. Other than that, I'm not having much luck 'getting discovered'. I've emailed about a dozen literary agents with a compelling query letter and 10-page sample, yet to hear back from any of them. I'm starting to do open-mic nights in my local area, and I get good responses, but it's hard to keep up the buzz. I've always loathed social media with all its egotism, privacy shattering, degeneracy, and time-wasting, but I sucked it up and accepted the necessary evil so long as I use it to solely focus on the poetry or anything that pertains to me in regards to performing the poetry or getting it out there and etc., not as my personal vanity project, but I still refrain from using hashtags...for now. I just have an instagram and facebook page as of right now, planning on soon having my own website, a tumblr, and maybe a snapchat for the poetry.

I've messaged small presses via email and social media, still not hearing back from anyone.

How can I break through? My stuff is good, much better than 95% of the work that is already getting published and selling many copies today. I should know. I've had the displeasure of buying and reading dozens of the contemporary works that have come out over the past 10 years.

I'd appreciate any advice, and would greatly appreciate if I could send a select number of anons an ARC of the manuscript to get feedback from, but I'd probably have to blackbar my name or anything that reveals my personal info for right now, because I'm not a complete moron and don't want to get DOXX'd and linked to 4chan, at least not until I'm already out there and have sold enough copies where it wouldn't matter anymore.

Thanks,

-Anonymous

>pic somewhat related, but I think I'm better than him

[Anonymous No.14330323]

Bumping with some of my favorite lines in all of poetry.


Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

[Poet OP No.14330331]

Realized I should namefag to remove confusion in the thread.

Last initial bump.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man

[Poet OP No.14330613]

Oh, well. I tried.

[Anonymous No.14330636]

Kys.

[Anonymous No.14330639]

Kek it's fun seeing a nigger struggle

[Anonymous No.14330658]

DOES IT AT LEAST RHYME?

[Anonymous No.14330665]

>>14330262
Post one of your poems. If you want help it should live and die on your work.

[Anonymous No.14330668]

>>14330639
it's more fun seeing a nigger cease to struggle.

[Anonymous No.14330707]

>>14330262
I hope you're not trolling. You take yourself way too seriously and constantly comparing yourself to some hypothetical "95% of work out there" is a serious cope.

Post your poetry and if it's not better than tiger, then send it to a professional editor

[Poet OP No.14330742]

>>14330639
I'm not black.
>>14330658
80% of my poems rhyme.
>>14330665
Alright, here's one. Wrote this at 12:


If I Were A Tree


If I were a tree
What would I be?
This is a very hard decision
As you can see.
There are Elms and Oaks
Plenty enough for all folks.
Maples and Willows
Beautiful as satin pillows.
There are Weeping Cherries and Pines,
All of which are fine.
Sequoias and Redwoods
Cut down into favorable goods.
But I think I’ll choose one of the most calm.
If I were a tree, I would be a Palm.

[Poet OP No.14330748]

>>14330707
Okay, one more. Wrote this at 19:


Windowpane


Seven blotter tabs is all it takes.
Orange sunshine fills up the mind and splashes over the brain.
Psychedelic externalities turbo-charge perception and amplify sensation.
The morbid dread soon wears off and one becomes amused by reality’s transformation.

The tell-tale rainbow outlines and onion-layered shuttering trails soon kick in.
Your reflexes quicken, your thinking sharpens, your creativity blossoms, your hearing awakens,
Your tastebuds orgasm, and faces look like demons. So strange. Beyond bizarre.
You call its name: windowpane. Lucy is your guide and you her psychonaut czar.

Pleasing paisleys, sublime shades, tints, hues, and values overload you.
High voltage saturation from all edges collecting colors like dew.
Cosmic capillary action pressures up the spectacular nectar
Past patient vectors unto scalar oblivion the prismatic specters.

Metallic goo bubbles conjure from nowhere, as do familiar patterns your memory can mix.
Tricked to make seem still objects scoot across the floor and expose other glitches in the matrix.
Voices and sounds warble and echo, clinging onto gain, sustain, reverb, and delay.
All lights shine greater bright as you pray you don’t melt away.
You marvel at how this fateful soul trek you’ve come across would’ve been just any other day.

Buildings and wayward lanes made into neon amusement parks.
For there’s a spark in the air that’ll take you there. It begins in the brain then pierces the heart.
Fairies and nymphs and other mythic woodland creatures appear real in the dim moonlit forest.
You swear you saw a tree grow legs, uproot, and walk away.
Raindrops you couldn’t tell were true or fake for you’re too crossed to notice.

You feel your cranium frying, turning to goopy oatmeal mush.
Your forehead sweats as you get dehydrated from your internal processors overrun amuck.
Your body becomes wobbly and feels quite like jell-o as you trip all around.
You cast your head to the grass as you try to communicate with the ants on the ground.

Like botched enlightenment, an overpowering life-altering experience overwhelms you.
As if written by God’s will. His hand using you as the quill.
It drives you insane how you might well go mad.
In every bubble, in every knuckle, in every rose a new surprise:
The maddening fractals of all-seeing eyes.

You sense the clock has struck nigh upon the lingering witching hour.
As you meander within the kaleidoscopic glade of crystal flowers.

[Anonymous No.14330754]

>>14330742
>If I were a tree
>What would I be?
stopped reading right there. you would be a tree, moron.

[Poet OP No.14330767]

>>14330754
Well, if you did read any of the rest of it, you'd see the narrator is deliberating on what type of tree.

[Anonymous No.14330777]

>>14330767
>3rd person
>narrator
I am very sorry for your life

[Poet OP No.14330791]

>>14330777
Well, I'd say "I" or "me", but then I'd be accused of being too egotistical or not able to leave myself out of the writing. Whatever, doesn't matter. That poem is obviously in the first person. Take it as being literally me speaking or 'a speaker'. Makes no difference.

[Anonymous No.14330849]

>>14330748
This feels very pseudo-technical and empty and cliched. Like bland metalcore trying too hard.

cliches and empty phrases
> is all it takes
>Fills up the mind
>Onion-layered
>Thinking sharpens
>Creativity blossoms
>Cranium frying
>Internal processors
>Glitches in the matrix
>Amplify Sensation
>Reality's transformation
>Body feels like jello
>So strange, beyond bizzare
>Drives you insane
>Witching hour
>Melt away
>Soul trek
>Spark in the air
>Pierces the heart
Etc...


I did genuinely like these unique phrases though:
>His hand using you as the quill
>In every bubble, in every knuckle, in every rose a new surprise

[Anonymous No.14330875]

>>14330849
>His hand using you as the quill
sounds gay desu

[Anonymous No.14330885]

damn this thread str8 SAVAGE

[Poet OP No.14330888]

>>14330849
Appreciate the feedback. Well, I'm not against stock phrases or words as much as I'm against stock themes or ideas. These things get passed down from poem to poem for a reason. When I do use more cliché phrasings, I at least try to do so in some sort of novel way, or from a new angle.


Here's a freebie.


Wrote this just this past October, age 24:


Jetsam
Everyday so close to throwing in the towel.
They turn their back on you.
Wash their hands of you.
Set you adrift to lighten the load.
Leave you alone in the dark night to prowl.

When your exuberance turns from delight to nuisance.
Your honesty shifts from refreshing to disgusting.
Your relation now an inconvenience.

I long to escape my circumstance fate.
Free myself from familiar circles where I no longer belong.
Make new kin with my passion and fascinations.
Turn my preoccupations to reliable comfort outside the throng.
For my possessions will never abandon me as people tend to.
My romantic memories never tarnish as realities oft do.

Wish I could live within a film.
Want to wrap my arms around a song.
I’d love to lose myself inside a book.
Find some friend who’d come along.


Jettisoned from the rest,
Set to sail solo.
Braving harsher waves
Than any man should have to know.
Escaping from the sirens’ wail,
Avoiding crash upon the rocks.
Finding meaning in isolation,
Seeking lands free from banks and free of clocks.
Patching the line between
How things are and how things should be seen.

[Poet OP No.14330896]

>>14330888
This was pasted a little off.

"Jetsam" is the title and not a part of the poem proper.

[Anonymous No.14330935]

>>14330748
Juvenile alert

[Anonymous No.14330948]

>>14330262
Move to New York or somewhere else on the east coast and find some poets to mingle with and start networking

[Anonymous No.14330959]

>>14330888
>Not against stock phrases
Nigga what business do you have writing poetry if you unironically hold this belief

[Poet OP No.14330964]

>>14330948
I live in such a city already, but most of those types are complete self-entitled, degenerate, and insufferable SJWs who write the exact kind of 'poetry' I hate. Not all, though. Just gotta keep looking around, Regardless, thanks for the good advice.

[Poet OP No.14330975]

>>14330959
Show me one poem that doesn't incorporate in some shape or form at least one instance of a stock phrase or word or concept (that isn't trash). Of course I'm not saying I'd be okay with the whole thing being stock, or even beyond maybe 33%, but actually show me a poem (or a song or a play script or whatever) that is COMPLETELY original.

[Poet OP No.14331064]

One more shorter one. Also wrote this past October, age 24:
Dayseizer
Burn night oil ere dawn’s early light of day.
Swiftly gather the flowers while you may.
Dayseizer, seize quick all my hopes today.


Cross true through blinding light and darkest night.
Bonding charm to keep us close in the fight.
Wayfinder, find my good friends are all right.


Maintain hope and soak up moonlight for me.
Willow hoop woven with feathers and beads.
Dreamcatcher, catch every vision I see.

[Poet OP No.14331074]

One more shorter one. Also wrote this past October, age 24:
Dayseizer


Burn night oil ere dawn’s early light of day.
Swiftly gather the flowers while you may.
Dayseizer, seize quick all my hopes today.


Cross true through blinding light and darkest night.
Bonding charm to keep us close in the fight.
Wayfinder, find my good friends are all right.


Maintain hope and soak up moonlight for me.
Willow hoop woven with feathers and beads.
Dreamcatcher, catch every vision I see.

[Anonymous No.14331096]

>>14330975
I'm not asking for complete originality, but it's a pretty solid rule that the further away from stock phrases you go the better. It's because they're generally lazy and empty. Sometimes, they're necessary and are all that fit. This is sparingly the case.

Pic related

[Poet OP No.14331129]

>>14331096
>poem about women being women

How is that not a huge cliché? It's a worse sin that the entire concept topic is stock than a few phrases here and there.

[Anonymous No.14331132]

>>14330262
Try changing your name
Tenuiqa Black
Chan Ming Da
Exviore Abad

[Poet OP No.14331159]

>>14331132
I actually am fortunate enough to have an interesting name that looks good, so I'm not worried about that. It's a white name but unusual, like a "Walt Disney" or "Xander Boyce"

[Anonymous No.14331169]

>>14331129
writing on a classic theme in an original way is better than writing about a novel theme in a trite way because the triteness obscures the meaning of the new theme, and if it's really that original, expression in trite language won't get it across. If it were original, it would be expressed originally.

[Poet OP No.14331182]

Okay, last one. It's too long for just one post, so I'm breaking it up into two, but it's supposed to be just one work. Wrote this poem this past July, age 24:


Wish I Greatness in My Words
Wish I greatness in my words.
Such pressure to stand alone never have before I known,
With steam escaping, skin cracking, eyes drying, and shouts out to the birds.
Wish I to synthesize an original style all my own,
Unique to me as my hands and bones,
As distinct as my fingerprints, my freckles, my means,
My handwriting, my voice, my wit, my gait, my genes.
An everlasting flair surviving past longevity.
To truly know the true meaning of poetry.

O ye Past Masters, give me strength. Grant me powers weird and wonderful!
Reinforce my iron will, forge my pen mightier than the sword.
Bless my verse with the ability to climb mountains of enlightenment,
To swiftly over the rivers of Doubt and Loss ford.

Desire I my mouth become honey-tongued and my pen turn golden-capped.
Every symbol silvery gilded in magnificence, dripping in dewy pearls, and incensed with sage and rose.
Let me know the best words of cosmic vocabulary, like the treasured splendor of encrusted trinkets.
So too shall my prose wrap up those clothed in awe, like finely stitched sweaters and carpets.

Declare I my works shall have method in’t.
Between rhyme and reason, structure and meter,
Through all these tools and frames let my art speak through the ages,
Echoing in the chambers of time. Tintinnabulation most melodious.

Allow readers to feel my pain, bask in my joy, and meditate on my ideas.
Out over everywhere, they will see with my eyes and hear with my ears.
Both lands naïve and antique. From the West to the East.
Both kinds of writers spellbind, from the best to the least.
From then to now, for old and young, for rich and poor.
For the learnèd and the lay, for the novice and the connoisseur.
From the North to the South. ‘Cross every continent flat and steep.
Enchant my lines to move all folk. Bring them laughter and make them weep.

[Poet OP No.14331189]

>>14331182
Crave I to awaken from my slumber of self-gratifying in juvenile numbers,
Flaunting foolish youthful amateurish brash lack of polish as some grand new poetic fad.
Confusing precociousness for genius, twisting prodigy for excellence, scamming tricks as wonders,
Counterfeiting novelty for timelessness. How pathetic, how wrong, how worthless, how sad.
I say nay. None more. I shall shed away all my mediocrity and transform anew,
Like the butterfly and its chrysalis, the moth and its cocoon. Anon to these I’ll bid adieu.

But I could bathe in the ink of a thousand and one poems,
Would it mean I could absorb even the meagerest of skills and secrets.
If nothing’s original under the Sun, I’ll move to another one.
There will I be free, from cynicism, from excuses, and from self-borne misery.

May I speak my greatest truth. May I promote good thoughts, good words, and good deeds.
May I achieve beauty, wisdom, humor, emersion, brilliance, narrative, expression,
Humility, authenticity, innovation, humanity, and excellence in my letters.
May my craft sit well beside history, literature, journalism, comedy, tragedy, music, psalms, and eulogy.

Grant me the might, O Greats, O Christ, and O Lord Almighty God, and see I do all these things for thee.
All in your name, for the Greater Glory of God, for the Greater Glory of Art, for my Country,
For my City, for my kin, and for me.

Owe I much to the world, and I must live with the thoughts in my head
That my debts shall never be repaid, save only with my remorseful death.
Fear I no great endeavors shall the saints and the seraphim deem worth for my atonement.
My spine shivers and my blood flushes in dread that lost forever shall be all I’ve ever done and all I’ve ever said.

Then, what’s the cure? Only greatness offers the magical elixir.
Chiefly, greatness will present to me a fountain of youth,
My wine of immortality, upon which generations to come shall drink from
And know the name of the vineyard maker who made once their vintage.

Intoxicating words to stimulate the mind, arouse the heart, and release the soul.
Only can greatness achieve my goal.

[Anonymous No.14331232]

>>14331129
You can make broad generalisations like that about anything though,l

>Sonnet 18
Bro it's just about loving someone forever, epic cringe

>Because I could not stop for death
Bro it's just about death

>that nature is a hericlitean fire and the comfort of the resurrection
Bro it's just christianity

[Poet OP No.14331328]

For bookkeeping's sake, here are the five poems I've posted in the thread:

>>14330742
If I Were A Tree
>>14330748
Windowpane
>>14330888
Jetsam
>>14331074
Dayseizer
>>14331182
>>14331189
Wish I Greatness in My Words

[Poet OP No.14332091]

To bump or not to bump

[Anonymous No.14332194]

>>14330262
>My stuff is good
how are you supposed to know that. This is the wrong attitude, you should be extremely hard on your work. You may have good ideas, its hard to say, but that means nothing without mastery of language.

after skimming a few poems, I see the odd skillful turn of phrase but nothing I would come back to. You aren't there yet: your ideas about breaking through at this time are fantastical, the poems you've produced thus far juvenilia.

[Anonymous No.14332205]

>>14330742
If I were a fir would be better

[Anonymous No.14332230]

>>14331159
>It's a white name
That's what I meant, change your name

[Anonymous No.14332272]

I'm a published writer. Here is my advice: you need to go to book fares and meet editors face to face. Cold emailing and the slush pile is completely useless and a waste of time.

When you meet the editors, be chill. Complement them on some of the books they've put out recently. (Do your homework. Only approach places where you think your work would be valued.) And ask if you can send them some of your stuff. Send it to them after the show. Follow up with them once a month.

Do this enough, and if your work is good, eventually you'll get a bite.

>My stuff is good, much better than 95% of the work that is already getting published

Stop with this shit. Nobody cares if you're better than bad books. You need to be better than the 5% of books that are good. Otherwise, why the fuck should publishers give you a shot when they can just hire one of the existing good 5% writers?

Aside from all this, your poetry needs work. It's performative/insincere, as if you are playing the role of the poet rather than just expressing x via poetic form. Your cadence is slightly off in places, too. For a strong guide to prosody I suggest reading, if you haven't already, Mary Oliver's book "A Poetry Handbook".

Good luck.

[Anonymous No.14332319]

have you had single poems published anywhere? featured in zines or whatever the fuck people do with poems these days?

best way of getting publshers interested is having had stuff published prior. just try and get like 3 or 4 poems published this year in a couple of spots and then retry the publishers.

they are looking for low-hanging fruit, basically, and if you look ripe, they'll pick you.

but turning up on the door with a 130 page manuscript is not a publishers idea of low-hanging fruit

[Anonymous No.14332320]

>>14332272
As if i typed "fares" whilst giving writing advice. Fml.

Don't post tired, kids.

[Poet OP No.14332474]

>>14332194
>you should be extremely hard on your work

I have been. Every step of the way, I have been. I should say that compared to the crap that comes out today that passes for poetry, it's good. I only know now it's good today by being so hard on myself and thinking for the longest time it was all shit. I only now have acquired that certain confidence.
>your ideas about breaking through at this time are fantastical

No, what's fantastical is the bullshit that comes out today that is gobbled up passing on nothing but being from an author of color, or a woman author, or being an attractive author, or being a "woke" author peddling in virtue-signaling, while the quality of the writing itself is shit to mediocre. There are dozens of 'poets' out there who have already "broken through" (and all I mean by that is to say have been published and have sold 5000+ copies, not joined the ranks of fucking Keats or Poe or anything) and I just wish to do the same for my above average work.
>>14332205
Maybe that could be the follow-up poem to that one. Thanks for the suggestion.
>>14332230
No thanks.
>>14332272
I just meant that there are plenty of bad books that sell well to really well, so my stuff that is, if not great, better than theirs and has the potential to sell really, really well.

This is only a selection of 5 poems out of the total 66, and I haven't even shared the best ones.

Nonetheless, thanks for all the good advice.
>>14332319
One of them will be published on a relatively prestigious website at the end of the month. I've submitted others to a handful of contests whose deadlines aren't done yet.
>but turning up on the door with a 130 page manuscript is not a publishers idea of low-hanging fruit

yes, but it does show I'm serious about it, and that I've done more than most other poets can do, if not in quality then at least in quantity, and not sparse 3 sentence greeting card tier poems, but fully fleshed poetry.

Thanks for the tips.

[Anonymous No.14332775]

>>14332474
Glad you found it helpful.

But to repeat - publishers aren't interested in publishing someone "good enough" or "better at poetry than an instagram poet". Publishing is a risky business with razor tight margins. They want something that is a guaranteed sell.

So, if you're a new writer, relying entirely on the merit of your work (i.e. not your identity/online presence), then you have to be better than 100% of the other writers out there. If you're only better than 95% then you're a risky investment that will be ignored for an SJW rupi kauer type who the publisher can actually sell.

Also...

>This is only a selection of 5 poems out of the total 66, and I haven't even shared the best ones.

Fuck you they should all be best ones. They should all be better than 100% of the poems out there. Otherwise why are you wasting our time? Why publish poems that aren't the absolute best you can do?

[Anonymous No.14332790]

>>14330262
>My stuff is good, much better than 95% of the work that is already getting published and selling many copies today. I should know. I've had the displeasure of buying and reading dozens of the contemporary works that have come out over the past 10 years.
If you think this and you're right then you won. Do what you can, but don't harp on it. Art is essentially made for the self.

[Poet OP No.14332800]

>>14332775
I get you.

>Fuck you they should all be best ones.

no [FUCK] u


Yeah, I do think they're all good and worth reading, but I'm just saying due to the post word limit, and because I don't want to give out all my best stuff on one measly thread on 4chan, that I'm holding onto some of the bestest stuff.

You sound like you know what you're talking about. If you'd care to throw me some throwaway contact or something, I'd like to keep in touch and, if you'd be willing to grace me the opportunity, send you a copy of the manuscript so you can really rip me to shreds.

[Anonymous No.14332811]

Here's my poetry:
>English verse is just the worst.
I need to learn fucking latin already.

[Anonymous No.14332854]

The Thread I Opened
Inside OP
Gay Poems and Shitty Verse Jumped Out At Me
My eyes I averted as the words took form
Too young am I to lose my sight to such poor form
Into the shredder these poems did go
For not a single publisher read more than I
I am sure.

[Anonymous No.14332875]

>>14332854
Replace 'I am sure', with 'that I know'.

[Poet OP No.14332891]

>>14332854
>rhyming 'form' with 'form'

5/10, needs work

[Anonymous No.14333115]

>>14332891
Fuck you are right.

Thanks OP.

(Sending this poem to my publisher btw, what name do you want to be included in the credits for your editing contribution? )

[Poet OP No.14333132]

>>14333115
Kiss Mai Yass

[Anonymous No.14333214]

>>14330742
If I were a furrie
Which animal would I be
I don’t have the courage of the lion
Great protector of mount Zion
I also couldn’t choose a doggo
Or a furless animal like the froggo
If only I could chose the Sphinx
But al last they don’t exist
So given my acute cunningness
I guess that I could be a hairy China-man

[Poet OP No.14333231]

>>14333214
*furry, not "furrie"
*alas, not "al last"

Change the last lines to

"So given my acute guile
I guess I'll be a crocodile."


Make all these changes and it'll be unironically solid.

[Poet OP No.14333251]

>>14333214
>>14333231
also, add "methinks" at the end of "don't exist", so it reads as

"But alas they don’t exist methinks"

[Anonymous No.14333255]

>>14330777
>check 'em
That's a pretty witty way to say, "samefag."

[Poet OP No.14333295]

>>14333214
>>14333231
>>14333251

Here, I've edited it for you.

If I Were a Furry

If I were a furry
Which animal would I be?
I don’t have the courage of the lion
Great protector of Mount Zion.
I also couldn’t choose a doggo
Or a furless animal like the froggo.
If only I could chose the Sphinx
But alas they don’t exist methinks.
So given my acute guile
I guess I'll be a crocodile.

[Anonymous No.14333728]

>>14330888
Jetsam

I am jetsam because my name is Sam
I didn’t ask to be thrown out
Nor have I made any offense
Yet they’ve sacked me and they beat me
Casting me off into the waters

Now along a muddy river
Where pink dolphins jump ashore
And the savage throw their stones
Hope they get the ones that threw me
And will meet them down the river
Once almighty fast and strong
Turn to flotsam and then sunk.

[Poet OP No.14333773]

>>14333728
Doesn't rhyme.

Simply a, wait for it....'watered down' (get it?) version of mine.


4/10

[Anonymous No.14333848]

>>14332474
>yes, but it does show I'm serious about it, and that I've done more than most other poets can do, if not in quality then at least in quantity, and not sparse 3 sentence greeting card tier poems, but fully fleshed poetry.
it certainly does, i'm just giving you the perspective of what you are up against, industriousness they are not after (yet), an easy sale they are

[Anonymous No.14333855]

>>14330742
can you write as a black person? i'd prefer that as a longtime fan of the ol' BBC from since before it became the cool thing on /gif/

[Poet OP No.14333924]

>>14333855
I wouldn't mind wearing different hats as different character narrators, but nothing so caricature and reductionist as "a black guy", vs. "some guy named David Williams who happens to be black", and certainly not for your sick fetishization kink.

[Poet OP No.14333945]

>>14333848
Thanks for the insight. Yeah, I mean, I'm basically looking to turn the tide. If this gets published and gets big, it could be a paradigm shift. Similar to the paradigm shift that Rupi Kaur did with her shit instapoetry, but this could be in the opposite direction: good, quality, high-effort, novel, thoughtful, diverse in subject, RHYMING, or even, God-forbid, METERED poetry from contemporary poets. People will actually have to try again with writing poetry, because they won't be able to carry on with the same instashit anymore. I have a funny feeling that this exact type of poetry I'm advocating for is what the public is hungry for after all the vacuous garbage that's been spewed out over the past decade. What they want and need but might not even know it.

[saeg No.14334056]

stop with this shit already

[Poet OP No.14334070]

>>14334056
No. And try spelling "sage" right next time. I thought this was the literature board. You'd think people here would be better read.

[Poet OP No.14334129]

Disregard, I suck cocks

[Poet OP No.14334141]

>>14334129
Don't make me become a tripfag. Nobody wants that. Just fuck off my thread if you don't like it.

[Anonymous No.14334185]

>>14333945
i'm gonna have to concur with previous posters, it's nice you have confidence in yourself and everything, but the most likely thing if you get published is it will not be a world-breaking paradigm shift. And then what, will you give up?

All the shit you listed about all the 'woke virtue signalling' crap – i get it, i feel the exact same thing in my lane – but what humans really exchange are the stories about the stories they read.

[Poet OP No.14334206]

>>14334185
>but the most likely thing if you get published is it will not be a world-breaking paradigm shift.
Sure, I know, but a guy can dream.
>And then what, will you give up?
Of course not. I'll be working on the next book, of course. I already have 55 poems planned in advance for that one. And I have 3 more titles planned out after the second book. I'll be at the poetry game for a long time, improving my craft, getting more nuanced and better at my work. I'm only 24. I have a lifetime of improvement ahead of me to make the best poems possible.
>i get it, i feel the exact same thing in my lane
All we can to do is lead through example and hope others follow the same path.

[Anonymous No.14334224]

>>14330262
Good job anon, may Christ be in your heart and I hope to read your book. That's all can say other than could I hear one of your poems? Preferably one of your best.

That cover is horrible though.


Stabat mater dolorósa
juxta Crucem lacrimósa,
dum pendébat Fílius.

At the Cross her station keeping,
stood the mournful Mother weeping,
close to her Son to the last.

This not a literal translation but is purposed to give the greatest replication of the rhyme and feel of the poem. The meaning of the words themselves -- which you may think lose their truth through a less literal translation -- can be generally gathered by with no real loss of value.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHQVtYzjLao

[Anonymous No.14334228]

>>14330331
Were you that anon that said this is one of the finest pieces of literary aesthetic? Or something to those lines.

[Anonymous No.14334234]

>>14330742
>>14330748
>when your 12 year old poem is better than your 19 year old poem
Haha but nah they're both good.

[Anonymous No.14334258]

>>14334206
>a guy can dream
you sure can, and you sure should, just stuff to take on board. let's just say the world doesn't care about industrious, good-quality poetry, why should i read your work and not this ultra kool genderbending eskimo?

[Poet OP No.14334307]

>>14334224
That's not my cover or my book, just an example of a contemporaneous poet. Funny you say it's a horrible cover, because his book is selling quite well.

I posted five in the thread already, and you can find them linked conveniently here:
>>14331328

Also, I probably shouldn't be doing this, but pic related is the cover with title of my book, with my name blackbarred.

>>14334228
No, but I'd agree with the sentiment. It's a lovely, lovely poem.
>>14334234
ayyy, haha. I guess I should've stopped while I was ahead.
>>14334258
Because every poem is different from each other, so there's a wide variety to keep you interested. Some are about nature, some are about the city, some are about love, some are about loss, some are about animals, some are about people, some are autobiographical, some are fantastical, some are about art, some are science, etc. Many of the poems rhyme, but some don't. There are a few "word art" poems where the poem is in the shape of an object, there are some poems within poems, there are some dialogue heavy poems, etc. Some are haikus, some are half a page long, some are 1 page long, some are 2 pages long, some are 3 pages long, some are 4 pages long, some are 5 pages long, and there's even one that's 14 pages long. Moreover, I suppose my real selling point is that it's an anthology of poetry written by a budding poet between the ages of 8 and 24. As you read the book (and it's presented in chronological order with all the poems dated and stated what city they were written in), you see the evolution of the author (me) not only as a writer but as an individual. You watch me grow up into my own through the writing, and I think that's pretty special and nearly unprecedented.

[Anonymous No.14334316]

>>14330742
I like it! :D

[Anonymous No.14334352]

>>14334307
>That's not my cover or my book, just an example of a contemporaneous poet. Funny you say it's a horrible cover, because his book is selling quite well.
Huh, guess the bright colours and childishly reassuring image normieslike a lot.

>I posted five in the thread already, and you can find them linked conveniently here:
Yes I read them, quite good however I would wait at least a year before publishing. Still much to read and advance of your own writings but if you want to just get your name out there for later works that's fine I guess.

Relating to this, have you read any of Wagner's writings?

>Also, I probably shouldn't be doing this, but pic related is the cover with title of my book, with my name blackbarred.
I actually like this but you should delete this post now. Though the font could use some change.

>No, but I'd agree with the sentiment. It's a lovely, lovely poem.
Yes, fantastic. But I also just meant that phrase itself, perfectly aesthetic.

>ayyy, haha. I guess I should've stopped while I was ahead.
Insert relevant tiger poem.

[Poet OP No.14334368]

>>14334352
>have you read any of Wagner's writings?

like....Richard Wagner? Germanic supremacy/anti-semitic stuff?

[Anonymous No.14334401]

>>14334368
>Germanic supremacy/anti-semitic stuff?
Lol, it's not all just that. Most of his writing is on art. And from a man spoken in the same breadth as Bach, Mozart and Beethoven you would think tat has value. Hell even his infamous essay "Judaism in music" I think still has a lot of value. Whether you think he's the greatest musician of the Romantic period, and further the completion of the great musical geniuses doesn't yet matter, any man can see his value.

[Anonymous No.14334416]

>>14334307
>Because every poem is different from each other, so there's a wide variety to keep you interested.
I don't think you are quite hearing me – what is your metapoem? What is your poem about your poems?

[Anonymous No.14334422]

>>14334307
Wait a second where have seen that cover before?

[Anonymous No.14334432]

>>14334368
Is this what normies these days think what Wagner was all about? Just end me God.

[Poet OP No.14334438]

>>14334401
>Whether you think he's the greatest musician of the Romantic period, and further the completion of the great musical geniuses doesn't yet matter, any man can see his value.

Oh, I do. No Wagner means no John Williams, no Yoko Shimomura. The Ring Cycle is a masterpiece, one of the greatest things humans have ever done. I'll need to read up more on his thoughts on art. Though, for me personally, I'd say Tchaikovsky was the greatest Romantic composer.
>>14334416
I mean, if I had a literal metapoem, it would be Wish I Greatness In My Words:
>>14331182

But, as I was saying, my metatheme hook would be as I laid out here:
>>14334307
>Moreover, I suppose my real selling point is that it's an anthology of poetry written by a budding poet between the ages of 8 and 24. As you read the book (and it's presented in chronological order with all the poems dated and stated what city they were written in), you see the evolution of the author (me) not only as a writer but as an individual. You watch me grow up into my own through the writing, and I think that's pretty special and nearly unprecedented.
>>14334432
I was half kidding. But, let's be real, it was a big part of Wagner's ideology.

[Poet OP No.14334441]

>>14334422
Nowhere, because no one else has ever used it before.

Maybe a vision in your head from the future.

[Anonymous No.14334453]

>>14334438
>I mean, if I had a literal metapoem
for a poet, you have a very literal way of thinking

[Poet OP No.14334463]

>>14334453
I'm one of a kind.

I knew what you meant, so I played dumb, giving you the literal answer as well as the figurative one you were looking for. Aren't I generous?

[Anonymous No.14334478]

>>14334463
Wow you sound like a 15 year old.

[Poet OP No.14334483]

>>14334478
Lighten up, nerd.

[Anonymous No.14334514]

>>14330262
>>14330331
>>14330742
>>14330748
>>14330791
>>14330888
>>14332474
>>14334206
Across your posts and your work I am beginning to form the following impressions: you’re arrogant; you probably aren’t notably well read; you have an entrepreneurial attitude towards your creative endeavours; you seem to lack aesthetic discernment, ie you believe a superficial likeness between two artistic works means they have equivalent merit; your view of the world and your experiences are rather pedestrian; you are extremely persistent. All in all you seem to possess virtually every trait necessary to be a published literary figure, the only thing you need to understand is it’s all about forcing yourself onto the medium. You contacted 10 publishers? You need to contact more like a hundred, you need to repeatedly message them, you need to build a social media presence, make a twitter account, contact blogs, keep pressuring them until they believe you’re worth investing the money into making a marketable entity.

[Anonymous No.14334516]

>>14330262
CAN I get a tldr

[Anonymous No.14334542]

>>14334463
haha, fair enough, but seriously. your poem about your poems is one of the things a publisher will use to gauge you and sell you. do you think 'a chronology of writings from a budding writer of high quality haikus and long poems' is as good me being a transvestite inuit who grew up as an orphan with aids?

think about what i'm saying before trying to sound clever

[Poet OP No.14334552]

>>14334514
>you’re arrogant
definitely not. If it comes across that way, it's because I've been (and still am) a self-hating, self-bashing, low-self esteem, unconfident shit all my life, but this is the one time with the one thing I've worked hard on to the point of being good enough at I can finally feel a certain level of pride in, but I'm still getting used to expressing these feelings.
>you probably aren’t notably well read
fair enough. I just don't have as much time as I'd like, but I try to read at least 12 books a year. I used to read a lot more when I was younger.
>you have an entrepreneurial attitude towards your creative endeavours
I mean...yeah, obviously. I'm trying to publish a book to be sold. But, moreover, any artist today basically has to be his own entrepreneur.
>you seem to lack aesthetic discernment, ie you believe a superficial likeness between two artistic works means they have equivalent merit

I mean, to some degree, sure, but it really varies and depends case by case

>your view of the world and your experiences are rather pedestrian

In some ways, yes, in other ways, no.

>you are extremely persistent
I'd say so, yes. When it comes to something that really matters to me and I believe in, such as this.
>All in all you seem to possess virtually every trait necessary to be a published literary figure

Oh, wow, jeez. I hope so. I feel like if my work isn't fully appreciated within my own lifetime that within 10, 50, 100, 200 years after my death, future critics may pick up the work and say "hey, this was pretty good. Shame nobody thought so at the time."
>You need to contact more like a hundred, you need to repeatedly message them,
Agreed. I just have to keep pushing and finding more people.
>you need to build a social media presence, make a twitter account, contact blogs

This I've always hated. My dream was for my work to be so good and so full of merit on its own that I wouldn't have to resort using the modern poison I hate so much. I realize that I'm living in the past with this idea and that I might as well be trying to use nothing but the telegraph to put myself out there, but it's all so alien to me and feels so phony that I've compromised on my "never use social media" values to build a necessary following. I was hoping that others would do that for me so i wouldn't have to. A personal website that I control I'm much more comfortable with, but I'm just starting to use instagram and a facebook page and will eventually branch out to twitter, tumblr, and snapchat, although I hate every second of it and will hopefully stop using them in the future, or hire some people else to coordinate all that shit for me. Cheers.
>>14334516
I just finished a manuscript of 66 poems, 130 pages long, and it's all good. What are novel ways of getting discovered, either being picked up by a literary agent or a press?

[Poet OP No.14334554]

>>14334542
I mean, it's a coming of age story through the medium of a book of poetry. I think that's pretty tantalizing.

[Anonymous No.14334561]

>>14334438
>Though, for me personally, I'd say Tchaikovsky was the greatest Romantic composer.

[Poet OP No.14334563]

>>14334561
Fight me. I'll stick to this to my grave.

[Anonymous No.14334568]

>>14334554
i'm a middle age woman browsing the local bookstore and i see 'a coming of age story through the medium of a book of poetry', i also see '11 reasons why you are fat and miserable', finally i see a book which says 'how i overcame being a orphan with aids by becoming a genderfluid poetry guru' - which book do i take?

i'm not saying you can't do what you do, but you said you wanted a paradigm shift. I'm just trying to discern your goals in advance for you

[Anonymous No.14334573]

>>14334552
>I feel like if my work isn't fully appreciated within my own lifetime that within 10, 50, 100, 200 years after my death, future critics may pick up the work and say "hey, this was pretty good. Shame nobody thought so at the time."

delet

[Poet OP No.14334576]

>>14334568
I'm that same middle aged woman. I see a book with a pretty title and an even prettier cover. I buy it because it would look nice as decoration in my home, and I might actually read it someday, but probably not.

I deleted the pic based on the advice of an anon, but it's safe to say that my cover is quite appealing and eye-catching and people would want to buy the book or at least flip through the pages based on the cover and title alone.

>>14334573
no

[Anonymous No.14334579]

>>14334576
>a pretty title and an even prettier cover
ok, so you do want to be a postcard salesman after all then

[Poet OP No.14334593]

>>14334579
We're just talking about a hook. The cover/title is what gets the foot through the door. Let's not kid ourselves, most people buy a book based on only three things: the title, the cover, and the hype they hear or read around it. Those three things are what trick a person into buying a book. The material found inside the book that the reader is left with is what makes them feel like the purchase was worthwhile or leaves them with a sense of buyer's remorse. I'm saying that my title and cover will stir enough attention get people talking about the book and get people to start buying it, but that the work inside will actually be worth the money they spent and would be worthy of not only reading, but re-reading and dissecting for higher literary merit.

[Anonymous No.14334598]

>>14334593
so you are gonna bag a publisher, and they are gonna bag distribution on the basis of a book cover?

i know you are enjoying your new found confidence, but just attempt a little self-reflexivity for a moment

[Poet OP No.14334602]

>>14334598
>on the basis of a book cover?

On the whole package. On the cover, the title, the work itself, my personal story as the author, and with my image as the author (these latter two I wish weren't factored into the equation, but they necessarily are.) I truly believe that I've got the right stuff for these five criteria.

[Anonymous No.14334610]

>>14334602
sweet, off you pop then

[Anonymous No.14334616]

>>14334438
>I'll need to read up more on his thoughts on art.
I'd recommend his Regeneration writings(at least Religion and Art which is his first of those). I would say every one of Wagner's writings relate to the musical and further artistic in some uniquely meaningful way however as far as his specifically artistic writings prior to Religion and Art go, you can save to after reading the rest of the regeneration writings, considering them to be his last. Probably best place to start after the end (rounding off his later and greater thought) would be The Artwork of the Future.

Just remember that the only English translation is from the 1890's, is very poor and clumsily done. So best to read the original German but if you can't just read the English knowing this.

http://users.belgacom.net/wagnerlibrary/prose/wlpr0126.htm

Another thing to remember is that anti-Wagnerist professors have admitted to changing his English translations meaning in some areas key and others not to make him sound for the worse.

>Though, for me personally, I'd say Tchaikovsky was the greatest Romantic composer.
Bruh, Tchaikovsky is literally famous because he was able to carve out his own unique value and character in the shadow of Wagner, such as with ballet. Williams and Shimomura are degeneration's of what art should be. As with all times and ages in we have reached a peak of knowledge, it is always followed by an eclipse of stupidity. And that is impressionism expressionism and even Jazz which were the result/influence of Wagner's genius. The promethean fire which they could not handle and even Wagner realised later in his life.

[Anonymous No.14334618]

>>14334552
That’s the thing though, you’re currently sitting on a fence, and on one side is “success” and on the other is “integrity”, you can either embrace aesthetics for aesthetics sake, become a persistently miserable artist who probably makes no money and gets no recognition but is fully and utterly dedicated to his work, reads hundreds of books and writes thousands of poems no one will ever read outside of family and friends. Or you embrace the hustle, embrace your entrepreneurial side that has rubbed a lot of people in this thread the wrong way, you say “I’m the best” and you start building a persona that can be marketed. That is the state of the biz and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise, it stopped being about skill, or rather the skill set needed changed, around WW2. You think you’re gonna send a poem to a junior editor who probably went to an Ivy League school and is drowning in debt earning 40k a year living in a London shitbox and they’re gonna read your poem and feel so blown away they’re gonna say “wow this kids really got something” and go to their boss with this? Hell no. They’re gonna be getting thousands of submissions and for each one they’re gonna think “how can I market this?” and suddenly a poem about homosexuality written by a Muslim man is very appealing. Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying it’s an SJW conspiracy, I’m saying most people don’t buy new books strictly for pleasure, a large part of the buying experience is about creating a self image (see: Society of the Spectacle) and being interested in the queer experience or the integration of Islam in a progressive Western society, these are hot topics, which means they sell books. If you want to make it on aesthetic grounds you’ve got to be as good as Emily Dickinson or Keats.

[Anonymous No.14334620]

>>14334441
No, I have seen that cover before!

[Anonymous No.14334631]

>>14334514
Except the one thing he does not have is spirit, an ideal in which he follows religiously. This has been the basis for all artistic "great-men".

Op read said Religion and Art as well as Wagner's On Poetry and Composition: http://users.belgacom.net/wagnerlibrary/prose/wlpr0139.htm

Both the most disparaging as well as encouraging thing you will read as a young poet.

[Anonymous No.14334635]

>>14334618
exactomundo

it's not ideology that makes people wanna buy eskimo orhans with aids poems, it's the sheer fact the story is TANTALISING, as you say. the story about the stories inside is tantalising.

if you wanna write gift shop poems with a pretty cover, that's fine too, but you said you are looking for a cultural paradigm shift, and that's not it

nothing wrong with doing it for the love of aesthetics either, but if you are imagining the worlds eyes turning to look at you, you'll be disappointed. it's a lonely game

[Anonymous No.14334639]

>>14334563
Bruh calm down, just refer to>>14334616

[Anonymous No.14334644]

>>14334576
>I deleted the pic based on the advice of an anon
Well done.

[Poet OP No.14334651]

>That’s the thing though, you’re currently sitting on a fence, and on one side is “success” and on the other is “integrity”

A battle I've been fighting all my life. I've been trying to have my cake and eat it too. I of course want to keep my integrity, and would even be willing to lose everything for it or die for it, but I of course want success, not just for myself, but to spread excellence and goodness and cheer to the world. It's a tough struggle.

>>14334618
>as good as Emily Dickinson

kek, that shouldn't be too hard

>or Keats.

that's much, much harder

>>14334620
The photo is from someone's cooking blog I'm allowed to use, although I bumped up the contrast and softened the focus. Otherwise, it's never been used for anything before. You're probably thinking of a different cover/picture. Many of these things look very similar.
>spirit, an ideal in which he follows religiously
Sure I do. I have several.

>Op read said Religion and Art as well as Wagner's On Poetry and Composition

Will do.

>>14334635
Like I said, I want both. Just like work by Shakespeare. It was for everyone and every time. High class, low class, the emotions, the intellect, for humor, for drama, for romance, for violence, or the stock, for the novel, for the significant, for the superficial, for the past, for the present, and for the future.

[Anonymous No.14334663]

>>14334651
>Like I said, I want both
that's fine too, it just requires that you stop treating this thing idealistically, and look at it realistically. you are aiming at something hard, so it requires you looking at your work objectively. self-doubt and self-congratulation are both equally delusional. what does the project objectively need in order to fit your terms? maybe this particular project won't realises this balance, that's a lifeswork, but it's a start

[Anonymous No.14334667]

>>14334651
>You're probably thinking of a different cover/picture. Many of these things look very similar.
True enough, the font is also similar Deleuze's books cover font.

>Sure I do. I have several.
I have read very little of your art so am judging by the slither you have provided. From what I can tell, there is a sentimentality of the mundane(except for your based child work), I don't see the expression of any great spirit in its full dazzling display of awe. But of course you are still young and under 25.

[Poet OP No.14334678]

>>14334663
>maybe this particular project won't realises this balance, that's a lifeswork, but it's a start

Exactly. It's a start, and I won't be satisfied until it's at least a real published book and I've sold 5,000 copies of it as my starting goal. It doesn't have to move mountains or start a zeitgeist, (although that'd be awesome), but I do want it to be published with an ISBN and catalogued in the Library of Congress and to sell at least 5,000 copies.
>Deleuze's books cover font.
Never heard of him. I just played around with fonts and I wanted it to pop out nice, so I played around with different colors and layerings.
>I don't see the expression of any great spirit in its full dazzling display of awe

Drop me a throwaway contact and, if I can trust you as one anon to another, I'll send you an advance reader copy of my full manuscript and you can see all it is I have to offer.


Same offer extends to any other curious anon out there. Drop me a throwaway email and I'll send you the (name-censored for privacy) manuscript via my throwaway email.

[Anonymous No.14334694]

>>14334678
>it just requires that you stop treating this thing idealistically ... maybe this particular project won't realise this balance, but it's a start
>Exactly. It's a start, and I won't be satisfied until.....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
ok i take it back, you don't think literally. you really are a true poet

[Anonymous No.14334701]

>>14334694
This is sweet.

[Anonymous No.14334847]

>>14334307
i hate to bump this thread, but i just have to tell you you are absolute dogshit. As a person, you have your head so far up your own ass you'rll be eating shit for a month.
It's this particular remark of yours that triggered to say this btw:
>Funny you say it's a horrible cover, because his book is selling quite well.
His book is selling well because his poems are INFINITELY better than yours, not because of the cover.
I've noticed you complain about the 'muh sjw politics, muh minorities' shit; the reason they are getting published, first and foremost, is better their poetry is again miles better than yours, and secondly, because they have stories to tell--stories that haven't been told before. What can you, a white man, bring to the table that hasn't already been done a thousand times better? (Don't answer, it's a rhetorical question.)
In conclusion, you're poems are dogshit, you are dogshit, and I pray to God you never get published

[Anonymous No.14334866]

>>14334651
>Shakespeare
Anon...that just isn’t going to happen. I mean that sincerely it’s like saying you want to be the next Michael Phelps, it’s such an astonishingly unlikely scenario that I can already say without even knowing you that it’s statistically impossible. It’s statistically impossible to even be in the top 200 best writers nowadays. There are simply too many distractions, to write as well as these people did requires an obscene amount of dedication, it requires being completely submerged in the entire culture. You need to be breathing literature, your friends need to also be extremely gifted people with whom you can debate your passion. There’s a reason art was in abundance during the age of aristocracy, for practical reasons it’s extremely helpful to never have to worry about money in order to dedicate yourself even more fully. I have a cousin who’s an artist, whom I believe is very talented, and me and my siblings fully finance their life, pay their rent, everything because we believe they’re talented enough that the only way to preserve their integrity is to never have to worry about success. That’s how ruthless it is now, this cousin of mine paints 8 hours a day, every day, and even in their mid thirties they have so much room to improve. You have to understand that our society is not one that can tolerate idealism anymore, it’s a consumer culture through and through and you simply cannot afford to better yourself and make money on the way because these are becoming diametrically opposing paradigms. The best you can do is sell out now and try to buy your soul back in your 40s. Even as a novelist you have a better chance because a novelist can put all their energy into a single really good book and perfect their entire pitch around that book and sort of “game the system” essentially tricking consumers into eating high quality writing. But a poet is doubly cursed because poetry is about the whole package, you’re selling yourself, not your poems. Your best bet is to go and do something “noteworthy” like start a foundation for rape victims in Yemen and then hope to win a Nobel prize. But thinking you’re just gonna show up and turn the whole system upside down, when thousands before you have been destroyed by the thresher of corporate capitalism, is absolutely foolhardy.

[Anonymous No.14334883]

>>14334847
I mean he isn’t a good poet by any measure, but if you think women or minorities have anything to contribute either, you’re wrong. The human experience is incredibly banal and ultimately a suburban rich white kid and a young girl from a war zone in Syria who had to trek hundreds of miles to survive are still FUNDAMENTALLY going to be the same, they’re going to have the same outlook, the same trite talking points, I know this because I’ve spent time with these people, it’s all the same shit over and over again. Stop romanticising victimhood.

[Anonymous No.14334957]

>>14334883
fucking retard. it's not about their 'outlook', or the 'trite talking points', it's about their life. A rich white suburban kid is going to write about different shit to the Syrian girl soldier, and you are deluded retard if you think they will be treated the same in the business today. Poetry publishing is more interested in publishing minorities because they have different experiences--that haven't been published before. If we did a race-reversal, and black people had dominated our Anglo-Euro history, then white people today would be getting published for being minorities. See how it works?
If you want to use your white man privilege (and im saying that as a white man btw), go into prose, not poetry

[Anonymous No.14334981]

>>14334957
>different shit
Except they don’t. That’s what you’re failing to grasp, you’re arguing that diversity has innate value. That a different perspective is somehow worth appreciating, but this is not the case because there are no different perspectives. It’s all the same shit over and over. Case in point here’s a poem from the author of helium, it’s always the same shit over and over. If the races were reversed I’d be arguing the same shit. The problem is life is unfair and sometimes you suffer a lot, I myself grew up poor and disabled minority, but I’m not delusional enough to think this gives me any kind of insight into the human condition besides being a free pity sponge for others.

[Anonymous No.14335031]

>>14334883
>>14334957
lads don't start turning this into a political debate. point is sensation rules. left wingers want to shout about how they empathise with the stuff, right wingers shout about the cultureal degeneracy of it all.. at the end of the day it's about the consumerist cycle of sensationalist images, and how OPanon can eek out a meagre (fantastic) existence as a poet (world-historic-collaborator)

[Anonymous No.14335137]

>>14334651
>>as good as Emily Dickinson
>kek, that shouldn't be too hard
>>or Keats.
>that's much, much harder

I'm starting to doubt your poetic sensibility. Dickinson was far superior to Keats (not that fair, since he died with only 25)

[Poet OP No.14335797]

>>14334847
>His book is selling well because his poems are INFINITELY

I disagree. Lol, dude can't even rhyme and he has no sense of meter, and all his poems are the same stream of conscience gimmick. Some of it good stuff, but not great.
>the reason they are getting published, first and foremost, is better their poetry is again miles better than yours
simply false. Like I alluded before, maybe 5% of them are better than me, but certainly not the ones that are selling the best. Ironically, those are some of the worst.
>I pray to God you never get published
Pray hard, because it's probably gonna happen, I'm sorry to tell you.
>I mean that sincerely it’s like saying you want to be the next Michael Phelps
Haha, no it's not. I'm not saying I will be anywhere in the same league as Shakespeare, just that I aiming for my work to have the same sort of universality in it.
>it’s such an astonishingly unlikely scenario that I can already say without even knowing you that it’s statistically impossible.
Writing a solid poem that could be enjoyed in its current time as well in the future by most people because it relates to the human condition and doesn't lean on divisive identity politics or woke virtue signaling is "statistically impossible"? I disagree.
>It’s statistically impossible to even be in the top 200 best writers nowadays.
I disagree. Especially for nowadays, because most of the new ones suck and don't even try.
>The best you can do is sell out now and try to buy your soul back in your 40s.
Never. I'm going to be exception to this rule or die trying.
>is absolutely foolhardy.
Game on.
>>14334883
>I mean he isn’t a good poet by any measure
I disagree.
>but if you think women or minorities have anything to contribute either, you’re wrong.
I also disagree. I have nothing against woman or minority writers, I just am against the idea of a poet being a woman or a minority or some other SJW checkbox to be the only reason why anyone would ever buy their work.
>FUNDAMENTALLY going to be the same
lol, funny, but you're wrong. Yes, many basic universal things will be true, but there's enough difference in individuality for who people who are the same sex, same race, same class, same zip code to lead exceptionally different enough lives.
>I know this because I’ve spent time with these people
The modern digital era is making more and more people homogeneous to a certain degree, but they're all still vastly different people. I'm not saying they're all work buying a book from, but they're definitely different enough from each other.
>>14334957
^this
>have different experiences--that haven't been published before
And, again, I have nothing inherently agains this, but I just want the poetry to be good, no matter who it's coming from, good enough to be on the same shelf (literally and figuratively) of the great poets and writers who've come before,

[Poet OP No.14335821]

>>14335797
...but most aren't and most of that quality is overlooked just so their mediocre or shit voices can be shoehorned in their for "diversity's sake"
>white man privilege
kek

but, anyway, yeah, like this same discereptive isn't to also be found in prose, or in fucking any realm of any modern creative industry. They've literally become biased against whites, males, straights, Christians, etc. for their opposites, instead of treating everyone equally like they should.
>>14334981
But you as an individual might have a certain experience about whatever, rock-climbing, cooking seafood, playing hide-and-seek with a cousin who'd later pass away, camping one weekend and being attacked by a bear or, perhaps, in a hopefully novel and relevant way, being a disabled minority, that no one else has ever quite put the same spin on in a poem before.
>>14335031
this guy knows
>>14335137
hahahaha

She couldn't rhyme, She had mediocre Meter, many Poems were Quite similar thematically, and she'd Randomly capitalized Words for No reason. So influential. I will say that writing over 1500 poems within a lifetime is quite an impressive benchmark in terms of barebones prolificness, though.

Keats was one of the greatest of all time, definitely, and he did it all by 25.

[Poet OP No.14335837]

>>14335797
>>14335821
Pardon my typos and sloppiness and such. I just woke up.

[Anonymous No.14335839]

>>14335797
>lol, dude can't even rhyme and he has no sense of meter
Oh dear god, I already know your poems are going to be insufferable. You probably think contemporary poets haven't already mastered and then dispensed with formalism in their unpublished volumes. Have you read Dan Schneider? That's exactly who you sound like.

[Poet OP No.14335852]

>>14335839
>You probably think contemporary poets haven't already mastered and then dispensed with formalism in their unpublished volumes.
Correct. The supermajority of them definitely have not.
>unpublished volumes.
oh, work no one's even seen? What are you even talking about? In terms of books that actually exist and are out there, I contend that no, they definitely have not "mastered and dispensed" of rhyme and meter, not even close.
>Have you read Dan Schneider?
Nope.

[Anonymous No.14335856]

>>14335821
For you to dismiss Dickinson over your autistic infatuation with meter and rhyme leads me to 2 possible conclusions: 1) you're a dilettante, or 2) you're trolling. It's possible you might be both. After all, you have the gall to say "I want the poetry to be good, no matter who it's coming from," and then put up poems you wrote when you were 8 years old. It's sad and cringeworthy. Delete your posts and end your life.

[Poet OP No.14335875]

>>14335856
I'm not dismissing her. I was half kidding, but I'd certainly be much, much more impressed with her if she did incorporate rhyme and meter in her work.
>It's possible you might be both.
And it's possible you might be both: 1) a more, and 2) a loser.
>and then put up poems you wrote when you were 8 years old
I've only put up one poem from when I was 8, and it's good.
>It's sad and cringeworthy.
projection
>Delete your posts and end your life.
you first

[Poet OP No.14335876]

>>14335856
I'm not dismissing her. I was half kidding, but I'd certainly be much, much more impressed with her if she did incorporate rhyme and meter in her work.
>It's possible you might be both.
And it's possible you might be both: 1) a moron, and 2) a loser.
>and then put up poems you wrote when you were 8 years old
I've only put up one poem from when I was 8, and it's good.
>It's sad and cringeworthy.
projection
>Delete your posts and end your life.
you first

[Anonymous No.14335879]

>>14335875
>i was only pretending to be retarded lol
It's like you can't even hear yourself

[Poet OP No.14335882]

>>14335879
Regardless of how good she was or wasn't, I contend that trying to emulate Keats is much, much harder than trying to emulate Dickinson.

[Poet OP No.14335889]

Wait, disregard that. I suck cocks.

[Anonymous No.14335935]

>>14331074
As an editor, if I ever read the word "ere" it would all be over. I might skim the next few lines out of inertia, but I'd "next!" that poem pretty hard. Why? Because fuck archaisms and fuck you for thinking you're special and can pull it off. No one ever can.

[Poet OP No.14335947]

>>14335935
It saves me a syllable so it works with the structure I set for that poem. I'm not trying to sound fancy.

You sound like a shitty, bitter editor.

[Anonymous No.14335982]

>>14333728
Liked it better than OP's

[Anonymous No.14335989]

>>14335947
I'm not trying to be bitter. I'm trying to tell you that your work is neither unique nor good. It's the same tired poems I read thousands of each cycle, and it wouldn't get a second look by anyone on my team. Please don't get defensive about it. It's not personal. Your poems simply aren't ready yet.

[Poet OP No.14336022]

>>14335989
I disagree. Even if you don't think that one fits the bill, or, the other four, I have 61 other ones, and I don't know what standard you're comparing them to, but compared to the top-selling instapoetry garbage that sells like hotcakes it's definitely much better. Balls to you and balls to your team.

[Anonymous No.14336230]

>>14335947

I myself am a poet and playwright. I studied a lot of metric and form, to the point of suffering with nightmares about the subject (I don't write in English, and in the language I use the main verse form is too short; the longer form I use didn't have much prestige, so it was an agony for me when I decided to discard the celebrated form and opt for more space - it's autistic, I know, but I couldn't help it).

My advice: between using archaisms, or cutting out the most appropriate words for a particular verse, among other sacrifices, always choose to sacrifice the metric. I'm not telling you to do this all the time, and I'm not telling you not to try to find solutions, however, if you don't find a solution that doesn't deform the original thought/image, or if you have to use inappropriate language (and archaisms really sound bad when you are trying to be serious), always choose to sacrifice the metric.

Another piece of advice: worry more about the imagery, about metaphors and similes, than with form and sonority. All of these things are important, but that which generally captivates attention and is most memorable, what most inspires Dickinson's description:

>“If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?”

Is the imagery.

[Poet OP No.14336293]

>>14336230
Sure, imagery and diction are very important, but all these things are important. I don't accept that meter and rhyme and matters of form must be sacrificed for the functions of theme and imagery. When it can be helped, these elements should all work, to help each other and build up the poem as a whole. That poem in particular, Dayseizer, is a very imagery-filled poem.

[Anonymous No.14336342]

>>14335821
I think celebrating human experiences is an ultimately banal and trite form of artistic expression. I am far more interested in superlative technical mastery coupled with exquisite taste. A poem from some rich Englishman who grew up in Surrey writing about his first crush, but written in a masterfully creative way that brings the very words on the page to life, with care and attention to every syllable, is worth a thousands books about unique life experiences. I think the problem is some people are so bereft of taste that art has to serve a purpose, whether to bring attention to the disenfranchised, or dismantle existing stereotypes and power dynamics. Art as a means instead of an end is a fundamentally cancerous byproduct of post industrial hyper capitalism where all things that were ends are now means to power, the only legitimate end.

[Anonymous No.14336404]

>>14330262
>a dozen
babymode

send more, keep sending. rejection is part of the job description

[Poet OP No.14336416]

>>14336342
I don't see why we can't have both technical mastery and innovative expressions of unique experiences.
>>14336404
Will do. It's just hard because so few agents are accepting anything poetry-related at all vs. other manuscripts.

[Anonymous No.14336472]

>>14334866
Not op but
What’s the name of your cousin? Where can we see the art?

[Anonymous No.14336536]

>>14334552
>I feel like if my work isn't fully appreciated within my own lifetime that within 10, 50, 100, 200 years after my death, future critics may pick up the work and say "hey, this was pretty good. Shame nobody thought so at the time."

[Anonymous No.14336556]

>>14330613
As a word of advice to being charismatic or dealing with people, never do shit like this, it looks so pitiful, weak, and desperate. Always wait for a response, and if you don't get a response, just move the fuck on or bump, don't bemoan it like a child. Grow up, and learn how to fucking operate a conversation.

Good luck on your book tho.

[Poet OP No.14336651]

>>14336536
What? If anything, this is a self-deprecating comment that implies my work wasn't good enough while I was around, but after growing 200 years in seniority it might end up being not great, not good, but "pretty good".
>>14336556
I was playing the meta-4chan game. I was willing to accept that to be my final comment and having the thread die, and to me, seeing that as the final comment of crushed hope amuses me. And thanks, anon.

[Anonymous No.14336711]

>>14336651
> was playing the meta-4chan game.
>I was only pretending to be retarded

You ever get tested for NPD Anon? Did you know that Lucifer got thrown down from heaven at the speed of a lightning bolt? I'm not saying that'll happen to you, but it might.

[Poet OP No.14336716]

>>14336711
You're implying I'll ever reach heaven? Doubt it.

[Anonymous No.14336740]

>>14334552
>I try to read at least 12 books a year.
>I'm better than 95% of what's out there.

How can you know what's out there if you only read 12 books a year?

Madness.

Your verse has weak cadence. It is bloated, full of redundant words and tautologies. You adore cliche and prosaic, inelegant, phrasing. (It reads in that self-satisfied mediocre way that Russians call poshlost. You seem uncultured.) Your vocabulary also appears quite limited; you are not specific enough with your word choices. (This makes your poetry read high level and uninspired, much like the hallmark greeting card types you hate so much.)

You desperately need to read more. And, having done so, to write more.

I've indicated some of what I mean, below, against the "Dayseizer" poem you posted earlier:

>Burn night oil ere dawn’s early light of day.
"Burning the night oil" is a cliche.
"early light of day" is a cliche.
"dawn's early light of day" is tautological.
Ere is an anachronism.
>Swiftly gather the flowers while you may.
"swiftly" is unecessary and inelegant.
"the" is unecessary.
Ends on a contextless preposition. (While you may...what? Swiftly gather the flowers while you may gather the flowers? This is empty and portentuos!)
>Dayseizer, seize quick all my hopes today.
Clumsy, prosaic, language.
"all" is a redundant. (The phrase "my hopes" already implies all of them.)
"quick" is redundant. (You cannot seize something slowly.)
"today" is redundant. (you've already established it's a dayseizer.)

>Cross true through blinding light and darkest night.
"true" is prosaic/common
"blinding light" is cliched
"darkest night" is cliched
>Bonding charm to keep us close in the fight.
"bonding charm" is tautological
"bonding charm to keep us close" is also tautological
Ends on a contextless preposition.
>Wayfinder, find my good friends are all right.
"good friends" is tautological
"are all right" is prosaic/inelegant/common language.

>Maintain hope and soak up moonlight for me.
"maintain" is redundant
>"soak up" is prosaic and inelegant
>Willow hoop woven with feathers and beads.
I like this.
>Dreamcatcher, catch every vision I see.
"every" is redundant
"I see" is redundant

I guarantee if you read more you would not make the above poshlostisms.

Aim for a book a week.

[Anonymous No.14336760]

>>14336716
I'm implying you're an arrogant puke. It's going to be what fucks you over in the long run despite any skill you might have.

[Anonymous No.14336819]

Am I the only one who thinks OP really sucks?

[Anonymous No.14336827]

>>14336819
He's not good or bad, just meh. Forgettable.

[Poet OP No.14336857]

>>14336740
>How can you know what's out there if you only read 12 books a year?

I meant 'book' books. I've read about 30 poetry books this year.

Poetry is filled with so-called tautologies, redundancies, inelegant phrasing, or 'unnecessary' phrasing. It's to emphasize a certain mood or a natural way of thinking or speaking. I appreciate the feedback, but you're being a bit too anal about it, in my opinion.
>While you may...what?
While you're alive and able. Before you're dead to not do things anymore. To SEIZE the DAY and go after opportunities you won't be able to in old age or in death.
>"all" is a redundant. (The phrase "my hopes" already implies all of them.)

Again, it's emphasizing the strong desire within in a commitment to the totality of the wish.

>"bonding charm" is tautological
No it's not. There are charms that are without a direct personal bond to others.
>"bonding charm to keep us close" is also tautological
It's a follow-through of the sentiment. I don't care if it's a tautology in this context.
>Ends on a contextless preposition.
"fight" isn't a preposition.
>"maintain" is redundant
No it's not.

"hope and soak up moonlight for me."

Does that make sense to you?
>I like this.
Oh, thank goodness.


Again, I'd rather critique be overly critical rather than not critical enough. Still, I believe you're being overly pedantic, and not giving enough credit to the imagery, the flow, the word choice, the rhyme, etc.

>I guarantee if you read more you would not make the above poshlostisms.

>Aim for a book a week.

I'd love to read more, but I've been intentionally quite selective and self-limiting in terms of what established and quality poetry books to read from, as to not be overly influenced with my own style and to stay as original as possible.

>>14336760
If I'm coming off as arrogant in this thread, I can assure you I'm definitely not overall, and it's only because of the flood of mediocrity I've been exposed to in ways of contemporary published poetry works that has pushed me to feel confident in saying I'm better than a large number of these 'poets'.


>>14336819
This is 4chan. I'd be disappointed if nobody said I sucked and tore me to shreds.
>>14336827
I disagree.

[Poet OP No.14336864]

>>14336740
If you want to shoot me a throwaway email, I'd be happy to send you the full manuscript so you can tear me apart more thoroughly and see the full gamut of what I have to offer.

[Anonymous No.14336885]

>>14336857
Are you really so narcissistic to argue against critique?

You lack the self-awareness to be good at this. Poetry requires introspection. You have none.

[Poet OP No.14336895]

>>14336885
I don't disagree with the crux of the critique, at least not most of it, just that these sins are egregious enough to take away from the overall quality of the work. I would disagree with that.
>You have none.
I disagree.

[Anonymous No.14336928]

>>14333214
>>14333295

If I were a furry
Which animal would I be?
I don’t have the courage of the lion
Great protector of Mount Zion.
I also couldn’t choose a doggo
Or a furless animal like the froggo.
If only I could chose the Sphinx
But alas they've all gone extinct.
All my life have I ran
from my fate as a chinaman.

[Anonymous No.14336933]

Serious question, why don't you just upload it to Amazon KDP? You would immediately "publish" your book, and nowadays self-publishing is very popular

[Anonymous No.14336944]

also op not gonna lie you sound like a totalll faggot

[Poet OP No.14336947]

>>14336928
Not bad, not bad. Oh, sorry, don't mean to be redundant.
>>14336933
If nothing gives after a year or two of stumping, I suppose I'll have no other option, but I really want to try to be traditionally published by a press, big or tiny, somehow.

[Poet OP No.14336951]

>>14336944
Your opinion on this matter means very much to me. Thanks for your user engagement. You must be an expert in faggotry.

[Anonymous No.14337024]

>>14336947
Who are the "big" poets, the ones who are alive and publishing? I don't really know any poets besides Robert Frost

[Poet OP No.14337049]

>>14337024
No, mostly dead.

I'll list what I consider 'The Great Canon' and I'll add an asterisk next to those I've read:

*Homer (810 B.C.)
Sappho (580 B.C.)
Pindar (522 B.C.)
Virgil (70 B.C.)
Horace (65 B.C.)
Ovid (43 B.C.)
Kālidāsa (360)
Yamabe no Akahito (700)
Li Bai (701)
Du Fu (712)
Rudaki (858)
Ferdowsi (940)
Omar Khayyam (1048)
Peter Abelard & Héloïse (1079),(1095)
Nizami Ganjavi (1141)
Shota Rustaveli (1172)
*Rumi (1207)
Saadi (1210)
*Giacomo da Lentini (1210)
Guido Guinizelli (1230)
Dante Alighieri (1265)
Petrarch (1304)
Giovanni Boccaccio (1313)
*Hafez (1315)
Geoffrey Chaucer (1343)
Kabir (1440)
*Suleiman the Magnificent (1494)
Meera (1498)
Torquato Tasso (1544)
*William Shakespeare (1564)
John Milton (1608)
*Basho (1644)
Alexander Pope (1688)
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749)
*Thomas Chatterton (1752)
*Phillis Wheatley (1753)
*William Blake (1757)
*Robert Burns (1759)
Friedrich Schiller (1759)
*William Wordsworth (1770)
*Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772)
Lord Byron (1788)
*Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792)
*John Keats (1795)
Alexander Pushkin (1799)
*Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803)
Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806)
*Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807)
*Edgar Allan Poe (1809)
Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809)
Henry David Thoreau (1817)
Walt Whitman (1819)
Charles Baudelaire (1821)
*Emily Dickinson (1830)
Paul Verlaine (1844)
*Oscar Wilde (1854)
*Arthur Rimbaud (1854)
Rabindranath Tagore (1861)
W. B. Yeats (1865)
Rudyard Kipling (1865)
*Robert Frost (1874)
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875)
Kahil Gibran (1883)
William Carlos Williams (1883)
Ezra Pound (1885)
Siegfried Sassoon (1886)
*T. S. Eliot (1888)
Wilfred Owen (1893)
E. E. Cummings (1894)
*Langston Hughes (1902)
*Dr. Seuss (1904)
Pablo Neruda (1904)
W. H. Auden (1907)
Dylan Thomas (1914)
*Charles Bukowski (1920)
*Allen Ginsberg (1926)
Maya Angelou (1928)
Derek Walcott (1930)
*Shel Silverstein (1930)
*Sylvia Plath (1932)
Seamus Heaney (1939)
*Jack Prelutsky (1940)
*Billy Collins (1941)

[Anonymous No.14337053]

>>14337049
I'm just asking about alive ones because the alive ones can serve as a guide as to which publishing houses and types of poetry will publish your stuff

[Anonymous No.14337057]

>>14337049
No Phillip Larkin and Carol Ann Duffy? Tsk tsk

[Poet OP No.14337081]

>>14337053
The contemporary ones who I've read and I think are worth a damn, who come to mind anyway, would be:

Annabelle Fuller
Savannah Brown
Rudy Francisco
Sarah Kay
Nick McRae

>>14337057
I'm not familiar with them. I'll add them if you think they're worthy and belong. I also forgot Ted Hughes. I shall revise for future postings, thank you.

[Anonymous No.14337127]

>>14337081
oh yeah dude, The Whitsun Weddings is great. I'm not much of a fan of Duffy, but she's still good.
Also, if you haven't done so already, go through lists of prestigious poetry awards and read through the winners (and long/shortlists if they list them). So like to start with, check the list of T. S. Eliot Prize wnners and go and read Three Poems (Hannah Sullivan), Night Sky with Exit Wounds (Ocean Vuong), Jackself (Jacob Polley), etc... And study them! Don't just read them casually--or rather, do that the first time, and then--make fuckloads of annotations on what makes them so good. Reread them over and over, learn from then, hopefully you can use what you learn in new poems and revising old ones.

[Poet OP No.14337164]

>>14337127
>And study them! Don't just read them casually--or rather, do that the first time, and then--make fuckloads of annotations on what makes them so good. Reread them over and over, learn from then, hopefully you can use what you learn in new poems and revising old ones.

I'd love to, but I'm so afraid of having my unique voice washed out into somebody else's. Wouldn't it be better advised to simply learn from myself and rough it out through a book or two or three and then, only after finalizing my personal style, branch out to learn from others? One of my personal prides in my writing is that (besides the fundamental classics) I've avoided being a carbon copy of other poets.

[Anonymous No.14337324]

>>14337164
Except anon you don’t really have a unique voice, at least not from what I’ve read here. You have some skill but definitely not a unique voice and definitely NOT a voice so unique it’ll get washed out from studying others. Imitation is a very big part of talent development. Saying your unique voice will get washed out is a bit like when fatties say they don’t want to exercise because they’ll get too shredded.

[Poet OP No.14337339]

>>14337324
I'm just saying I'd rather my technique be sloppy around the edges but voice recognizable vs. having advanced technique but using the same tricks and stylings as others.

If you leave me a throwaway email I could send you the full manuscript. Otherwise, you'll have to take my word for it.

[Anonymous No.14337346]

>>14330262
I'm the best American poet of all time, AMA.

[Poet OP No.14337400]

>>14337346
How are you speaking to us from beyond the grave, Mr. Frost?

[Anonymous No.14337452]

What do you expect to achieve by writing poetry? No one reads it anymore, the entire industry probably sells less than 10,000 books per year, if you don't count people who are dead and can't even appreciate book sales. Why not write about a boy wizard or superhero in a cape

[Anonymous No.14337462]

>>14330262
>much better than 95% . . .
No it's not. In your commercial context, since you want to make money off retarded people, how "good" your works are is determined by their market share retard. You're only in the top 5% if your sales is in the top 5%, and you're definitely lacking in literary skill to sell that much in the first place.
You were born decades too late to be considered "good" even amongst only contemporary literature. Maybe after you grow old and die, some people will realise you weren't such a retard after all.

[Anonymous No.14337485]

>>14337400
Frost is busy taking it up the ass.

[Poet OP No.14337583]

>>14337452
>What do you expect to achieve by writing poetry?

Art, self-satisfaction, and maybe, just maybe, a buck in the tide.
>the entire industry probably sells less than 10,000 books per year,
lol, that's definitely not true. It's not much, but I'm sure it reaches at least 1million per year.
>how "good" your works are is determined by their market share
>and you're definitely lacking in literary skill to sell that much in the first place.

you just contradicted yourself.

>Maybe after you grow old and die, some people will realise you weren't such a retard after all.

I already quipped this same sentiment earlier in the thread.

[Anonymous No.14337794]

>>14337583
>you just contradicted yourself.
You just revealed your sub 100 IQ.
The first line is stating that you cannot call your works "good" or "successful" in a commercial context until you sell enough books, understand? And in the same commercial context, you cannot compare your work to the top 5% of literary works even amongst contemporary literature. Your works are in the bottom 0%.
The second line is a follow-up on the first statement with a personal opinion that your works don't display enough literary skills to be considered "good" in the literary context, which is arguably one of the most important aspect of your work in order to become "successful" in the commercial context.
Do you understand?

[Poet OP No.14337844]

>>14337794
>Your works are in the bottom 0%.

No such thing.

>Do you understand?

I understand that you're butthurt that you could never write anything as good as I could do and that you're jealous that I might have some success with my writing in the future.

[Anonymous No.14337849]

>>14336895
i disagree with your disagreement. at some point you're gonna have to listen to others. arrogance will defeat you before you ever begin

[Poet OP No.14337880]

>>14337849
I'll listen to advice I think worthwhile and won't to advice I think isn't. Call me arrogant all you want, I'm really not. I'm confident in the work I've done and I think it's better than a lot of the junk that gets published and passed for poetry nowadays, no more, no less.

[Anonymous No.14337890]

man can't believe so many people fell for this obvious bait
op is probably in his mothers basement laughing his head off rn

[Poet OP No.14337896]

>>14337890
How is this bait? Are you implying I didn't write these?

>>14331328


You're saying I went to the trouble of writing 5 poems just to troll that I've written a total 66 poems and want my manuscript published? Yeah, wow, keen eye. You sure found me out.

[Anonymous No.14337903]

You know, your poetry isn't bad, but it isn't good either. Somewhere itt you said you're better than all the instagram poets out there. That's an extremely low bar, just like all the other goals you've set for yourself. I don't expect to see your work published anytime soon, if ever. What's really going to kill you is your unearned and layman-ish overconfidence. As others have stated, you don't seem very well-read, but rather pseudish, and your lexicon and prosody are shallow. Good luck struggling to "make it," cause luck will be the only way for you. pic related

[Anonymous No.14337930]

>>14337339
>I'd rather my technique be sloppy around the edges but voice recognizable
Not the guy you responded to, but that's not how this works.
First of all, if you haven't studied other authors, how would you know that your writing style is "unique"? You need to study other authors to be aware of what is good but also "unique".
If I had to draw an analogy, you are a martial artist who has not even studied the basics of any martial arts and now you claim to have created a "unique" and "good" martial arts out of thin air with no experience nor critique and it turns out all you discovered was kicking.
It might seem original and completely "your own thing" and "nobody else's" at first, but all ideas are based on your experience of other ideas. Don't dismiss the fact that most, if not all, ideas you come up with have already been thought of and brought into literature by someone long before you were born and in much further depth and understanding than you would have when you came up with it. Going back to the martial artist analogy, there have been geniuses who have not only come up with it but also built upon the fundamentals and made it more than just the movement of your legs; these people have mastered and explored in such depth about defeating opponents using their legs. You simply cannot match them. However, you have your work cut out for you if you just learn from them and build upon what they have done. We're all standing on the shoulders of giants and you cannot hope to stand higher if you at least dont know the heights you have to reach.

[Poet OP No.14338000]

>>14337903
>That's an extremely low bar, just like all the other goals you've set for yourself.
Well, I'm trying to set myself realistic goals to start. Like I said, getting this first book published period and selling 5,000 copies of it. Any future fame or accolades or money or whatever will come in time with each new book and as I refine my craft.

>I don't expect to see your work published anytime soon, if ever.
Well, I ain't gonna stop pushing until it happens. If still after a year or two I hear nothing, I'll resort to self-publishing.
>What's really going to kill you is your unearned and layman-ish overconfidence
What's wrong with confidence? It's just enough to keep me going and to reinforce me to keep studying, keep reading, keep improving, and keep writing better poetry. i don't see why that's a bad thing.
>you don't seem very well-read
I supposed not as much as I could be or should be, fair enough.
>but rather pseudish, and your lexicon and prosody are shallow.
I don't think that's fair to assess after only 5 poems out of the 66, but whatever.
>Good luck
Thanks.

>>14337930
>how would you know that your writing style is "unique"?

I've studied some classics and fundamentals, as I've pointed out here:
>>14337049

Well, I know that whatever I write, outside of the fundamentals, would've been independently discovered whether or not it sounds like so-and-so, because I couldn't have copied so-and-so if I'd never read them before. It's a lot like how certain bands or other musical artists might not have listened to each other but listened to the same older acts that influenced them and end up sounding similar.
>We're all standing on the shoulders of giants and you cannot hope to stand higher if you at least dont know the heights you have to reach.

I get all that, and that's all well and good, but I still think there's merit in not overloading oneself with influences so that innovative new angles and perspectives and experiments may emerge which hadn't been explored before.

[Anonymous No.14338019]

>>14337339
I really should stop feeding this thread but I just had to reply to this, I think most people here (if anyone is even still in this thread) would agree you embody everything that has gone wrong with art forms in the last several decades. Your nonchalance, your confidence, your entire description both of your future plans and how even if you don’t make it you’d like to think in 200 years they’ll discover you, it just reeks of “artist as an image”, what I mean by this is you see being a poet as a quality. One you possess as surely as your eye colour or your food preferences. It’s a trait I often ever see in people from families that coddle their kids a lot, you just strike me as having the spirit of a real estate agent. I don’t think you perceive art as an immanent plane, I don’t believe you even LIKE any poets. I think you see them as a benchmark for quality, you compare your own work and think “huh well my stuff is definitely as good as x” but there’s no transcendent LOVE of poetry. I am not saying every artist needs to be some tortured alcoholic riddled with insecurity, but throughout this whole thread your entire attitude has been like a kid trying to get better grades on his essays. There’s a nonchalance to your entire demeanour and it’s subtle, it actually makes me think you’re on the dark triad spectrum. Every talented artist I’ve met, pianist, painter, writer, has been consumed by passion for the greats. I know a painter who spent years studying sculpture just because he wanted to feel a little closer to Michelangelo, and deep in his heart he knew he’d never be that good, but he loved it. Good artists treat art like a religion, because good artists see creation as a small part of godhood, and you come along and just say “here’s this poem about palm trees I wrote when I was 8, yeah it’s pretty good, well I read a few books and yeah I reckon I’m good enough to get published? Got any tips? Oh yeah I don’t want to read too much poetry I’ll lose my precious voice” and the whole thing is how I thought about stuff when I was maybe 16, it’s a radically unrealistic mindset to have at 24. I don’t know man you might succeed in life, but it’ll be due to your borderline sociopathic disposition towards criticism and self assertion.

[Anonymous No.14338050]

>>14338019
If this guy ever gets published i'm gonna very subtly review bomb him with 2 star ratings

[Anonymous No.14338091]

>>14338019
>you strike me as having the spirit of a real estate agent
I’m stealing this

[Anonymous No.14338121]

>>14338091
OP would not approve.

[Poet OP No.14338124]

>>14338019
>you embody everything that has gone wrong with art forms in the last several decades.

Because I have a respect for past culture and history and technique and mastery and I want to bring glory and dignity back to poetry by doing my little part through mastering rhyme and meter and theme and diction and feeling and take it away from the shitbird clowns who have turned it into a joke, as a form of self-absorbed venting? I'M the problem?
>200 years they’ll discover you

I'm just kidding around. I'm not saying I'll be fucking van Gogh, just the it might be seen as decent within enough time, but probably not.

>it just reeks of “artist as an image”

definitely not. Notice that none of my poetry goes into my personal life beyond my position as a writer. I do have autobiographical poems but, even then, they speak on universal themes and concepts and aren't attached to only my personal psyche and experience.
>what I mean by this is you see being a poet as a quality.

No, I see being a good poet or better as a quality.
>One you possess as surely as your eye colour or your food preferences. It’s a trait I often ever see in people from families that coddle their kids a lot, you just strike me as having the spirit of a real estate agent.

I don't fit any of this bullshit.
>I don’t think you perceive art as an immanent plane, I don’t believe you even LIKE any poets

I absolutely do. I don't just like them, I love my favorite poets. They open portals to transcendence that few other artists can achieve. Through being exposed to these writers, I have felt my life enriched and improved and I owe a debt of gratitude and my own workings to these masters. I feel a certain connection and wavelength that is indescribable and that I so rarely feel with most other pieces of media, let alone other people. I feel like my soul is being understood and returning home when I read the best poetic works.
>but throughout this whole thread your entire attitude has been like a kid trying to get better grades on his essays.

You misunderstand me, sir.
>has been consumed by passion for the greats.

It is because of my such passion that I wish to bring poetry back to the caliber that it used to hold, out of the hands of these degenerate philistines around me.
>Good artists treat art like a religion

That's exactly how I feel.
>Oh yeah I don’t want to read too much poetry

I meant more contemporary stuff from the past 30 or 40 years vs. the hundreds of years of work before it.
>but it’ll be due to your borderline sociopathic disposition towards criticism and self assertion.

I suppose a little sociopathy is healthy for the artist's vision, but I don't believe I'm that far out.
>>14338050
If you honestly think the work is worth 2/5, then go right ahead, but don't do it just because you're salty and want to bring me down out of malice.

[Anonymous No.14338133]

>>14337400
Frost is mediocre

[Anonymous No.14338144]

>>14338124
>if you honestly think the work is worth 2/5
actually, from what i've seen ITT, it's worth 1/5.

[Poet OP No.14338153]

>>14338144
lol, then I shutter to think what you would rate the hottest selling young poets out right now. In the decimals?

[Poet OP No.14338161]

>>14338144
lol, then I shudder to think what you would rate the hottest selling young poets out right now. In the decimals?

[Anonymous No.14338312]

i just think it’s funny OP comes to the board asking for advice, only to write off every bit of advice given, ‘im already a done deal’ he says - and so it is

secondly
>mastering rhyme and meter and theme and diction and feeling and take it away from the shitbird clowns who have turned it into a joke
is this really what writing is about, style? you’ve never even hinted at a theme you are interested in, except your own progression as an artist. poetry is a communication of something, not an exercise in calligraphy

[Poet OP No.14338791]

>>14338312
>comes to the board asking for advice, only to write off every bit of advice given, ‘im already a done deal’ he says - and so it is

That's not true. There's lots of great advice and criticism I've received that I will take to heart. Just because I've subjectively disagreed with some of it doesn't mean I'm 'writing every bit of advice off'

>is this really what writing is about, style?
that's a huge part of it, yeah

>you’ve never even hinted at a theme you are interested in, except your own progression as an artist

Also not true. I'm interested in a wide array of various themes. Lots of things interest me and I don't want to be pinned down to just a few topics or themes. I'd like to be able to tackle several different themes and genres and topics and ideas. But I've already mentioned a handful I've approached here:
>>14334307
> Some are about nature, some are about the city, some are about love, some are about loss, some are about animals, some are about people, some are autobiographical, some are fantastical, some are about art, some are science, etc.

In particular, I'd like to write about day in the life stuff, stuff about my local town, and Bob Dylan/Kinks type stuff, weaving literary references with topical issues with politics with history with intimate moments with narrative with nature with love with pain, the whole shabang. It'd like to challenge myself to write about anything and everything. A flag, a dog, the French Revolution, french fries, birds flying south for the winter, general relativity, a bicycle, the Fall of Constantinople, a truck, the Battle of Troy, vampires, the Jazz Age, a cup of coffee, anything.

By the way, I actually didn't open the thread asking about advice on how to improve my writing, but how to take my already completed manuscript and find a literary agent or press who can turn it into a published reality, although I also appreciate the advice on improving my craft.

[Anonymous No.14339231]

>>14331129
I think you miss the point of poetry and all art, I would honestly never bother reading a poem by you.

[Anonymous No.14339259]

>>14333728
>>14333214
These are actually better than OP's, they actually read like they have soul in them.

[Poet OP No.14339276]

>>14339259
I disagree.

[Anonymous No.14339334]

>>14330331
which book had fragments of this poem in it it's a classic but I can't remember