Poetry and Its Aesthetics (Week 9)

This week, we learned about aesthetics in class and how poems can have good or bad aesthetics. The class read different poems and determined whether they were considered “beautiful”. The definition of beauty was discussed and there seemed to be a consensus of beauty meaning something based on an individual’s own personal preference. In my group, we thought that beauty in writing was writing that was distinct and that was able to stick with the reader after reading the work of art or poem.

After doing this week’s assignment and again reading poems, we did a little works-hopping on ways to improve poetry writing. A lot of ideas sparked my mind after doing this in class exercise and I am now in the process of work-shopping and editing my own work. The workshop allowed me to think about my own poetry and the ways in which I could look at it in order to improve it. Some of the struggles that I am facing in editing my work is being able to look at my work objectively. It is hard to take out certain phrases or re-phrase things that I think sound good, but could be enhanced with more concrete words and phrases.

The artistic process seems to be a process that develops not only over time, but also over many edited versions and drafts in order to produce the best work. In poetry after pre-writing, either by coming up with a subject and expanding on the ideas around it, generating lists, and free writing, a poet then can start to zero in on their work. The first draft is then written and the crafted work can either be approved upon or is perfect the way it was written. If the first draft is not successful, a second draft can be generated through work-shopping and looking at the work and the words that were used objectively and starting the process of editing by doing the same pre-writing activities to gain more insight into the poem and ultimately gain a better and most appealing artistic work. It should be noted that a finished and complete poem or short short may require multiple drafts and pre-writing strategies in order to attain your best work.