Thoughts On Imagery
I'm sure many of us are aware that we can go overboard on the use of "poetic" images. The fear of producing something unoriginal or trite is constantly nipping at our heels when we sit down to write, and for good reason: we want people to enjoy and want to read our stuff; otherwise, what's the point? So, to quiet that fear, we take the most interesting ideas, pictures, sounds, tastes, and smells, and plop them down. The task of writing then becomes simply an attempt to weave together what our brain has farted out in its moment of brilliance. We dig for some sort of coherence, biting pieces off the corners to make them fit, instead of stopping for a moment to really think about what's in front of us.
The images many of us use are nice and original: a sheet of sky tearing into snow-confetti -- a man made of bricks licking passing cars -- babies planted in the ground and growing into shark-mailboxes --whatever. But these images, while cool, are often baseless: not grounded in anything real. I think that a push for IMAGES: things, no matter what they are, as long as we can sense them, is what we should be after, but the concept has to be unpacked a little more, taken a little further.
I believe that a poet, first and foremost, is someone who has begun and sustained the practice of exploring the vast terrain of the imagination. We look inward just as much as we draw from the world around us for inspiration. We process this information through the context of our own personal experience: in terms of the real things that have shaped us, made us who we are. If our world is a reality, and our experiences formed out of that reality, then it makes sense that we should write about real things. But who wants real? Real life is tedium. Many people write to escape their real lives. The need to escape the oppression of reality is what gave steam to movements like dada and surrealism; but dada was extremely short-lived, and surrealism appealed only to a select few. If escapist, surreal imagery does not satisfy the average Joe, what will?
Grounded simplicity and clarity.
Yes, we've heard it before, but I think we may have been afraid to really listen. Sure, realism can get banal, if someone chooses to cling firmly to verisimilitude and forget that they're still writing a poem, which still has the potential to be something beautiful (if the author chooses). The blending of realism and art is probably our ultimate goal as poets. We need to take the actual world around us and turn it into something else. Something bigger than just the sum of its parts.
One of the biggest problems a growing writer can face is subtext -- what they want the poem to say without actually saying it. It's a thin line to walk. Every time we pick up the pen, we're trying to find that happy medium, a working balance between text and subtext. When we create images, we should be trying to imagine all the ways it could possibly function. This is a grueling task to be sure; our own subjective responses are almost always attached to them automatically (We are later surprised to find that not everyone feels the same way or gets the same thing from baby shark mailboxes, even though we thought the implications couldn't be clearer). It's disheartening, but we have to be willing to accept that our first instincts and inclinations may almost always lead us astray.
Now, I'm not saying that there's any way to escape subjectivity in your writing. It will be with you always, and that's not a bad thing by any means --it's really what makes your writing "your writing." But, as I said, we need to be as considerate as possible to the reading of others. Because this must be so, we need to think about what kind of images we're putting out there for our readers to pick up. I believe that there are two main things to consider when writing a poem.
First, as I hinted at before, we need to make sure that our images are as real as possible. This way, we can have some degree of confidence that our message will get across to a larger audience. I'm not talking about just abstraction or vaguenesses, but in the actual images we choose to present, and how to present them. For example, writing a poem that compares the idea of love to a galaxy exploding and devouring a million vividly described worlds of freedom is an interesting idea, but what is there to anchor it to reality? What do a million screaming, burning alien children, flesh dripping from their faces like honey from a comb, really give us about the abstract of "love?" You can taste, touch, feel, and smell all you like, but in the end you're left with unrelatable melodrama and...well...dead babies. Now, comparing love to the shore curled about the sea with endless repetitive motion: there's something real, something solid.
While solid, real imagery is completely necessary, I think that we are too focused on our senses for our own good. A good poet does not need to remind you that your senses are engaged. There's a type of "in your face" mentality among us that can really be detrimental to our work. I am loathe to bring up our hated axiom "show, don't tell," but I think it can come back to bite our butts if we're not careful and don't show a little restraint. Someone who writes "The paper-textured flowers wafted the scent of jasmine/ my nose crinkled and a tingle touched the back of my throat" is doing what he or she has sworn not to do: they are telling you what you are feeling. Instead of going subtly (a subjective idea, I know, and a whole different discussion) into the subject, they are pounding their reader with their sense perceptions.
I don't know about you, but I like to experience things for myself.
How we've decided to handle our subject matter will ultimately decide what kind of imagery we will use, and to what extent. Dialogue can contain its own brand of imagery (and no, not the kind that describes a picture). Suggestions, images placed at a poetic distance, in the background, so to speak, will have much more power because of their subtlety. I think, when all is said and done, we just need to realize that imagery is what makes poetry, but it is not what makes the poem. Thoughts, ideas, wording, coding, pictures, smells, suggestions -- all these things work together. You don't have to use all of them all of the time (restraint is awesome guys, seriously.), but conscious choices as to their uses must be made.
They must.
