What do you find most difficult about writing poetry?
These days I’ve realized I have a hard time trusting myself when editing my own work. I like to edit with some distance from my own writing, as I see writing and editing as two distinct modes or phases. But I’m learning that it’s possible to take too much distance from writing, to remove too much of the initial heat in the editing phase. I suspect that part of this is due to a lack of confidence, though there might be something else in there. I know I’m getting nervous about my work when I start re-doing all the line breaks – often to the poem’s detriment. Having good, trusted readers helps with this; at some point, it makes more sense to send a draft to a friend than to keep re-working it.
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