First thought, best thought? I think not.

Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) famously advocated "first thought, best thought" to encourage writers of all stripes, especially poets, to be brave, silence the inner doubter and trust that out of fearlessness and spontanaeity will come truth and beauty. For the record, Ginsberg's advice, one of several tidbits which he called "mind writing slogans," was not original; it was a takeoff on William Blake's (1757-1827) quote:

William Blake (1757-1827)

"First thought is best in Art, second in other matters."

...even though Ginsberg credits Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche (1939-1987) with this teaching. Trungpa started out as a Tibetan Buddhist monk and ended up an alcoholic meditation guru for Ginsberg and others, and was the subject of much controversy. At a famous 1975 Halloween party that took place at Naropa Institute (which Trungpa founded; it is now a university) in Boulder, Colorado, he ordered his followers to seize our current U.S. Poet Laureate W.S. Merwin and his then girlfriend who had barricaded themselves in their room and bring them to the gathering. Dragged kicking and screaming to the "party," Merwin and his girlfriend were then stripped of their clothing. It was an event that was heard 'round the poetry world, and several prominent poets demanded that Ginsberg (who was not at the party) renounce Trungpa, which he never did.

My, my. I wonder what William Blake (pictured here in an 1807 painting by Thomas Phillips) -- an original advocate for "free love" of several varieties -- would have said. Blake did, by the way, also say:

"Art can never exist without naked beauty displayed."

...but I don't think he was talking about Halloween parties that have clearly gotten out of hand.

About a month ago, some fellow poets and I practiced "first thought" in a workshop led by Paul E. Nelson of SPLAB -- a workshop in which I first thought my first thoughts weren't so hot, frankly. But now I look at my journal and see small bits of potential in some of those scribblings. Oddly enough, the one that speaks to me the most is a draft of a poem about a woman who is posing nude for a figure drawing class.

Knowing what I know now about Merwin, I think I'll explore this, perhaps add this incident to the text in some way. My point here is that while on occasion "first thoughts" may be great, most others need to simmer, to percolate.

In chapter three of Kim Addonizio's book Ordinary Genius titled "First Thought, Worst Thought,"  she tells the reader that "the trouble is that when you sit down to write, your first thought isn't necessarily as wonderful as you'd wish." She says, the qualities of good poetry -- which she lists as 1) surprise, 2) music, 3) detail, 4) sufficient thought, 5) syntax, 6) having parts that contribute to the whole, and 7) mystery -- are not accomplished without effort.

"These elements don't magically appear in anyone's early work, but you can still invite them in, early and often. Novelist Kurt Vonnegut said that being a writer allowed him to edit himself into someone resembling an intelligent person. That's a nice way to think about moving on from your initial inspiration; you're going to make it better, more intelligent, as you go," writes Addonizio.

"And the truth is that 'First thought, best thought' is a great statement, taken the right way. It's about letting go of the conditioned mind...and tuning in to some level of thinking that's deeper than our usual concerns. If you pay attention, you'll find that there are some weird and interesting thoughts floating around in your head. Very rarely, you may sit down to write and a poem will emerge almost completely formed, having arrived on the kind of inspiration we associate with genius. If this happens, it will be because you have worked hard preparing for the poem. You've faced your fear...and you've practiced."

I totally agree.

Kathie Meyer, the Infant Poet

Birth of a poetry blog

At some point, something clicked.

I honestly never thought I would write poetry. Ever. I am an arts journalist/editor, and I aspire to writing a book or two in the creative nonfiction genre. But poetry? Not likely.

I thought that, even though 10 years ago I worked as office manager at the esteemed Copper Canyon Press in Port Townsend, Wash. I only worked there for about a year and a half before I moved on. During that time, my own writing stalled. I was, frankly, intimidated by the power and mystery of a really good poem. It made me realize, even though I was already a published writer, I had so much more to learn about my craft regardless of genre.

After I left Copper Canyon, I continued to read poetry on a sporadic basis. "Sporadic" is still a heck of a lot more than I had before moving to Port Townsend (hardly ever, even though I had worked in a university research library for the humanities) and much more than the average American who quits reading it after grade school.

During this time, the poetry kept coming to me. I didn't have to go look for it because Copper Canyon always sends me every book they publish, for review in the newspaper. Sometimes I read a few poems from them, but mostly I kept the books around in case the poet made an appearance and I needed to print a poem next to the press release or news article. Copper Canyon has given me carte blance permission to do so...how many arts editors can say that? And how many arts editors can say they live in a place where the readership values the occasional poem in the paper? I have always felt very lucky that way.

So poetry was just a spectator sport for me until I began taking a class called "Creative Exercises" from Anna Quinn at The Writers' Workshoppe in town. I didn't sign up for it. Anna offered it to me when there was a paid slot open because someone moved out of town and didn't want a refund.

One exercise we did had us make lists of words. In my "workshop journal" I wrote 11 lists of varying lengths. I don't know what the prompt was for each list now, but in the end we were to choose some of the words and write something. I ended up writing this:

A Poem's Bio

I am the circus
under the sky
performing twists
and pirouettes
the bright feathers
in my hair
loosen and fall
like hang gliders
in the Grand Canyon

Still, I did not think I was a poet, even though I did read this piece at the Workshoppe's quarterly public reading. Not long after that, I was in a workshop at Centrum's Port Townsend Writers' Conference, and I wrote what I thought was a short prose piece. I shared it in class, and afterwards a couple of people, including the teacher, told me they liked my "poem."

I thought, well if everyone thinks it's a poem, I might as well put it in that form. Then I wrote another one, and things started really rolling after that. Since then, I've written a couple more because I signed up for a poetry-in-progress at the Workshoppe. I find that poetry is a nice short form, easy to handle psychically after my brain has been fried from writing news articles and processing press releases. It feels more like fun than a busman's holiday, which is what writing creative nonfiction in my off-time was starting to feel like.

I've been reading how-to books, too. First I read Kim Addonizio's Ordinary Genius cover to cover. Then I read Ted Kooser's The Poetry Home Repair Manual. And now I'm almost finished with Addonizio's and Dorianne Laux's The Poet's Companion.

Reading, writing, thinking about and learning how to make poems has now become a daily habit. I don't claim that what I write is all that exceptional. At some point I will probably submit poems to journals and what not, but I don't aspire to having Copper Canyon Press notice me and therefore offer me a book contract because I know I'm not C.D. Wright or W.S. Merwin. Not by a long shot. I'm just having a good time.

Something has clicked.

And I don't know if the switch will ever flip back the other way, but my plan here is to keep track of my studies and work and provide a place for links to articles and so forth, all in the service of poetry. I'm calling this blog "The Infant Poet" because despite my loose association with Copper Canyon Press (Disclaimer: This blog is not authorized by the Press and doesn't speak for them in any way), I am just a beginner, and this blog will reflect more of what I don't know than what I actually do.

If anyone has read this thus far, then here is a link I want to save because the relationship between math, science and art is always of great interest to me:

"National Poetry Day: unlock the mathematical secrets of verse" by Steve Jones; The Daily Telegraph; Oct. 5, 2010.

Kathie Meyer, the Infant Poet