Poetry in October

President`s note: This month, new member Ann Peacock blogs about the benefits of joining a poetry circle, and discovering her own love of poetry.

Ann’s October Blog Post for BPS website

“A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language.” — W. H. Auden

As a new member of the Brooklin Poetry Society, I’ve discovered a friendly, welcoming group of poets. It’s an opportunity to grow as a poet through encouragement and feedback. This group provides opportunities to share my work, and express myself with other members as well as online. I look forward to our anthology to be published in the spring. Belonging to the BPS also allows me to enjoy the poetry of other members.

In school, I disliked poetry because it was dissected to death. As a young adult reading poems on my own, I felt a shift. Suddenly, some poems started appearing to me – MY own poetry. As time passed, I realized that poetry could express my feelings about a variety of things. I could reflect on life in a unique way. An exciting discovery!

For me, poetry is a musical way to communicate. It’s a way for me to move to the heart of ideas and feelings about life. Some poems are hard-hitting, some lighthearted, and some between these extremes. I use poetry to share a variety of feelings and moods as well as comment on important issues.

If you wait until every poem you write is the best it can be, you might never finish one. In fact, you might be too intimidated to even get started. Paul Valéry, a French poet and author said, “A poem is never finished, only abandoned.” Time for me to abandon this post and go write another poem!

Ann Peacock