No Sweat Revisions - Booze Helps

No Sweat Revisions (Booze Helps) Poet speaks: “To write a poem you can easily revise it’s best to use free verse, for it requires so little thinking and besides with thought could come content revisions just might lose. Why take any chances?” Reader speaks: "Whatever does he mean? My God this guy is deep! Most modern stuff is so opaque, but here the words are clear. Though purpose perhaps is over my head, I feel like I’m really hearing it!” Poet speaks: "Why write at all," I hear you say, "If folks can't understand? Well, because it makes revision work a snap for any poetry class where content can be subordinate to breaking writer’s block. Why sweat the big stuff? Free verse must be free!” The Muse breaks in: "Why you could spend your life on one poem and ignore your experience completely, just writing stuff in stanza form, an indent here, enjambment there, here an indent, there enjambment, everywhere a piggy, piggy, piggy piggy! Old MacDonald wrote a poem E-I-E-I-O” Poet Speaks: “I’m confused! Without content what makes the poem mine? Is my writing it enough? Though I’ll confess that scanning published literature seems unlikely to reveal any plagiarism. Can writing without content ever be copyrighted I wonder?” The Muse muses, ponders philosophical possibilities: “Well if you have revised the poem and the new version is clearly no worse than the original, who cares if it is no better? You really tried after all. You followed instructions. What’s in a grade? And no new title needed.” Brian Johnston May 26, 2015