Waiting for Poetic Inspiration: Does it Make Sense?

Here we enter divisive territory. In essence, there are two perspectives on poetic inspiration: the romantic view, and the contemporary one.

Before I explore the division, it is important to define these views. By doing this, you will see the division.

The Romantic View

This view on poetry is focused on the individual, and it asserts that there is a uniqueness to poetry — an inner life out of which poetry flowers.

The poet is sometimes considered a higher-type, someone not so different from a mystic or diviner — someone who writes profound art from their special connection to what would traditionally be called “the realm of the gods”. In our modern parlance, this would be the collective unconscious.

When I speak of this romantic view, I am not specifically thinking of the romanticist period of poetry — the likes of Byron, Blake, Wordsworth, Shelley etc. But I am thinking far further back, to the bards of old, and to the Greek poets of Socrates time (or before).

This view, as you will see, champions a natural connection with poetry; it is something that comes from the ‘higher’ nature of the poet. It’s akin to the natural perspective on genius, which says genius comes from the specific genetic constitution of the individual in question.

It is, however, only one side of a complete coin. Here we come to the contemporary view.

The Contemporary View

The contemporary view has flowered over the past 100 years (approximately). It says that the poem, perhaps even along with the poet, does not contain some special substance.

You see, in the romantic view, the poem has an essence. The words are representative of a deep, soulful, perhaps even eternal experience.

The contemporary view has a very interesting counter perspective: constructivism. It states that the poem doesn’t have an essence; rather, the feelings that emanate from the words of the poem are present from certain arrangements of language i.e. the feeling of a poem is constructed in a certain way based on how language is used.

Very cool perspective (and I say that as someone who is more romantic than contemporary).

Now we have considered the definitions of these contrasting views, we can more easily highlight their relationship to poetic inspiration.

So, Should You Wait for Poetic Inspiration?

The contemporary perspective, rejecting ‘special substance’ and embracing constructivism, naturally also rejects the idea of needing to wait for inspiration to strike (or to come from a deep place within).

Language can be used and rearranged all the time, so there’s no need to wait for that deeper feeling of inspiration. So long as you are able to write, you can try writing. Alternatively, if you do feel deeply inspired, in the contemporary view, this would represent a motivational bonus.

If you aren’t feeling creative, this can be resolved through techniques like newspaper cutting, or language games like Exquisite Corpse (i.e. in Dada). Simply cutting words out of newspaper articles and rearranging them can create a feeling of creativity and provide new arrangements of language that may turn into poems.

Now in contrast, the hardcore romantic would say, “But taken to its extreme this is purely mechanical. You are battery farming poetry!” This was my perspective for a long time. I saw the contemporary way of writing poetry like mass-producing cheap products, some of which ‘appear’ to be of good quality, but there’s no human feeling behind them, no love.

But this isn’t how a contemporary poet relates to their process of writing poetry. Most contemporary poets still have a deep reverence for the emotional side of the process. The above description is a view of contemporary poetry if it is used purely as a mechanism — most people, being human (and therefore emotional), are incapable of using a mechanism mechanically anyway. Thus, contemporary poetry is still used with feeling, which is beautiful.

Nonetheless, the hardcore romantic still sees contemporary poetry as having “cut the soul of poetry.” Again, a paraphrased version of what I have stated in the past.

The romantic view would advise waiting for a deep level of inspiration. Like Charles Bukowski, the romantic would say, “Wait until the poem comes through you like a rocket.” Because in this view, you aren’t the one writing the poem, the mysterious (and godly) powers of nature write it — you are just the vessel.

Therefore, if you just write, not feeling this deep sense of something pushing through you trying to get expression, then the poetry has no depth. It’s not soulful, and this will be reflected in the feeling of the poem. The romantic asserts that you can feel if a poem’s words are from a deep, numinous source (i.e., a godly realm/the collective unconscious). For the romantic, this is an inherent fact of the poem — it’s either there or it’s not.

Concluding Thoughts

So the contemporary view says, “You don’t need to wait.” and the romantic view says, “It’s better to wait.” But whatever you want to do is up to you. Furthermore, each perspective has the power to create great poetry — I have experienced this both first-hand (from writing my own poems in both ways) and secondarily in creative group work.

I take a somewhat controversial perspective these days: I unify the two! I use my romantic, deep feeling of inspiration with the constructivist approach of arranging language in certain ways to evoke specific imagery or feelings. I wait until I have something to say — something that is stirring inside of me, and I do allow a romantic outpouring. But I rearrange (and subtly change) my words as I write and edit, using a variety of contemporary techniques.

This way, I retain a sort of deep connection with something meaningful that comes from within, but I shrewdly shape the words using rational techniques to elevate the poetry further. For those who have read the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, I am unifying the Apollonian (rational force) with the Dionysian (irrational force).

Anyway, here will mark the end of today's post; I am traveling at the moment, so I am eager to explore the world.

As always, thank you for reading.

Adz