Is poetry messing up with your writing skills?

by Vicky Tsiluma
I love poetry and I have been engaging in it since I was twelve. Discovering the haven that is PoetrySoup greatly increased my curiosity and enabled me to try out different forms and styles of writing. The first time I wrote a Villanelle, I almost gave up in tears. It was such a foreign concept to me. However, a couple of writes later, and suddenly it is no longer overwhelming. Rhyme is still a headache as I prefer writing down my thoughts as they come and that is a hard thing to do when I have to place certain words in certain places. I love the freedom that is Free verse. It enables me manipulate words and device my own sentence structure, which is all good except when it starts encroaching on my daily writing. 

I love writing articles and I thought I was fairly good at it. That is until people started pointing out my ‘weird sentence structures’ and ‘unusual word formations’. Apparently you are not allowed to form your own words when it comes to formal writing. Words like ‘aurafixation’ and ‘misinformizing’ cannot be placed in articles.  The thing with poetry is that it affords you a freedom to express yourself and break the rules of convention. It is this freedom that lacks in structured formal writing. However, when the lines of poetry and article writing get blurred, then you are in trouble. How then can you rectify the situation so to speak?

First of all, forget about freedom when it comes to article writing. Go back to the basics of writing and ensure you follow the rules. Unless you are a superstar, forget about forming your own words. If the words get highlighted by a spell checker, do not ignore the correction. If you are like me and you don’t like going over work you have already written, get someone else to do it for you. Ensure that your phrases are not symbolic in meaning. Phrases such as ‘stomp on my heart’ or ‘birthing oblivion’ should not be used lightly especially in scientific forums. Learn to differentiate between creativity and blatantly ignoring writing rules.

Of course, you can use unusual expressions in your articles; you just need to be sure to frame them as illustrations. This will enrich your writing and still enable you to use your creativity without breaking standard rules. Poetry should not be seen as exclusive to article writing. As a matter of fact, being conscious of what you write and your audience, should make your writing better. As you learn to reconcile your poetry to your other forms of writing, you will arrive at a ‘voice’ that is uniquely yours. And that is what will make you a great poet and writer.



Get a Premium Membership
Get more exposure for your poetry and more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry

Member Area

My Admin
Profile and Settings
Edit My Poems
Edit My Quotes
Edit My Short Stories
Edit My Articles
My Comments Inboxes
My Comments Outboxes
Soup Mail
Poetry Contests
Contest Results/Status
Followers
Poems of Poets I Follow
Friend Builder

Soup Social

Poetry Forum
New/Upcoming Features
The Wall
Soup Facebook Page
Who is Online
Link to Us

Member Poems

Poems - Top 100 New
Poems - Top 100 All-Time
Poems - Best
Poems - by Topic
Poems - New (All)
Poems - New (PM)
Poems - New by Poet
Poems - Read
Poems - Unread

Member Poets

Poets - Best New
Poets - New
Poets - Top 100 Most Poems
Poets - Top 100 Most Poems Recent
Poets - Top 100 Community
Poets - Top 100 Contest

Famous Poems

Famous Poems - African American
Famous Poems - Best
Famous Poems - Classical
Famous Poems - English
Famous Poems - Haiku
Famous Poems - Love
Famous Poems - Short
Famous Poems - Top 100

Famous Poets

Famous Poets - Living
Famous Poets - Most Popular
Famous Poets - Top 100
Famous Poets - Best
Famous Poets - Women
Famous Poets - African American
Famous Poets - Beat
Famous Poets - Cinquain
Famous Poets - Classical
Famous Poets - English
Famous Poets - Haiku
Famous Poets - Hindi
Famous Poets - Jewish
Famous Poets - Love
Famous Poets - Metaphysical
Famous Poets - Modern
Famous Poets - Punjabi
Famous Poets - Romantic
Famous Poets - Spanish
Famous Poets - Suicidal
Famous Poets - Urdu
Famous Poets - War

Poetry Resources

Anagrams
Bible
Book Store
Character Counter
Cliché Finder
Poetry Clichés
Common Words
Copyright Information
Grammar
Grammar Checker
Homonym
Homophones
How to Write a Poem
Lyrics
Love Poem Generator
New Poetic Forms
Plagiarism Checker
Poetics
Poetry Art
Publishing
Random Word Generator
Spell Checker
Store
What is Good Poetry?
Word Counter