Motivation Week Day Four: Verse isn't Poetry. You Can Write It 24/7

My mentor used to tell me he wasn’t a poet. He just knew enough about poetry to fake it. I disagree. I think he achieved greatness many times in his life, but he defined the difference by teaching us that verse and poetry are two different things.

Verse is a set of metrical units. Anyone can write it. All you need to do is obey the rules.

Poetry, on the other hand, is a kind of greatness. It’s inspired and viscerally alters the way another person sees the world.

Lionel used to tell me if you can’t write poetry today, you should write verse. At the very least, you’ll be practising your craft. You’ll learn something you’ll carry into your next poem.

Keep moving. That’s the trick. Stop expecting daily greatness of yourself every time you write. Nobody gets to win gold in every race, and nobody gets to write a real poem every time they pick up a pen. If you expect to produce poetry every day, you will grow increasingly fearful of the blank page. You will be at a very real risk of never writing again.

Disciplined practice often requires us to fake it until we make it. Write verse (or uninspired fiction) every day, or every second day, or once a week. Build a writing schedule that fits your life, then write to it no matter what.

As you know, I choose to write every day. I don’t produce inspired work on all of those days. Hell, I don’t even produce it every week, but I lose my discipline unless I do it daily. You might be different.

Let’s try a metaphor. I’m socially lazy. As an incurable introvert, I’d rather stay home than attend events. I know, however, that if I show up, good things usually happen, so I often attend social occasions because that’s the only way I will ever benefit from them. Writing is the same. If you don’t attend the party, you can’t enjoy the benefits, and if you don’t show up on the page, you can’t write inspired work.

Few people get to write as a full-time job, so I know there are challenges. You work nine to five and are probably exhausted at the end of your workday. You don’t earn from your writing, so you must do something that draws an income. Disciplined writing needn’t take an hour out of the day. You can write in between meetings. You can type haikus on your phone while waiting for a doctor’s appointment. You can set aside an hour a week for focused work. You can fit regular writing into your routine, but only if you make the decision to do so.