Noah Falck : part one

Noah Falck is the author of Exclusions, You Are In Nearly Every Future, and Snowmen Losing Weight. He lives in Buffalo, New York. 

Photo credit: Marcus Jackson

How does a poem begin?

For the most part, the way into a poem is still a mystery to me. I want to say they all begin differently or they all begin the same. Like opening a door to a house you’ve never entered or never even knew existed, but are happy to learn that it does, and you walk through it as if you know exactly where the cookie jar is. Maybe that’s not right. 

Perhaps, it starts with the musicality of the language or an image that keeps appearing in the mind, in the notebook. Sometimes it starts with a question that has no answer or a deep memory that surfaces as to say something more about the self, something more about the world. It could begin in the shower, in a field, in a snowstorm, in bed next to the love of your life. I am certain it begins when you pay attention long enough.