Revision and Craft

Revision and Craft

The other day I was looking at some poems from the past, poems I had written years ago. I do this now and then to get a sense of how my poetry has changed and evolved. I came across a sonnet from over 10 years ago. There was one line of the sonnet which, while acceptable, had never seemed to me to be quite right. This time I saw how to resolve it and rewrote the line. Next I found a Shisan from years ago and as I was reading it I noticed a link between two verses which didn’t really work. I hadn’t noticed it before, but this time when I read the Shisan, a solo work, I saw immediately that the two verses were too distant, that they didn’t flow and that the link in question disrupted the continuity of the Shisan, almost breaking it into two distinct sections. I attempted to change the link, but revising a link in a Renga is tricky. One has to take into consideration the preceding verse and the verse before it, as well as the subsequent verse and the verse following the subsequent verse. In other words, there are five verses effected by any revision, including the revised verse. It is possible to do a rewrite and I have done so, but it takes a broad attention to do it right. After some struggle I decided to let it be because of these broader effects. Sometimes one simply has to accept the flaws of earlier efforts.

One of the virtues of formal verse is that it allows for revision of a poem based on objective criteria; that is to say criteria that are not just based on the particular likes and dislikes of the individual poet. That is what it means to be part of a poetic tradition. This is part of the craft aspect of poetry; revising and reworking a poem according to the framework of the formal aspects of the poem.

In contrast, the view of free verse is that each poem generates its own form and has a unique logic all its own, independent of other poems. The result of this view is that it is difficult for a poet to revise and craft the poem because the only thing the poet can rely on is the poet’s feelings, preferences, and perhaps intuition. These are whimsical and evanescent at best and oftentimes they are misguided because they are, for the most part, simply habit patterns one has absorbed in an unconscious way.

I have not studied Japanese forms of poetry in Japan, but from what I have read, teachers of Japanese poetry do not hesitate to cross out, redline, and in general critique a novice poet’s offering along what I call craft lines. This contrasts with what usually goes on in the U.S. where teachers of poetry are very hesitant to interfere with the spontaneity and feelings of a student. This is due almost entirely to the pervasive influence of free verse.

Renga, by its very nature, is a strongly craft oriented poetic form. This is true at all levels. Versification and linneation are part of the poem. Even more strongly craft oriented is that certain topics need to be placed in a Renga as a part of the Renga form. This is an unusual demand from a western poetic perspective; I can’t think of a similar demand in a western form. From the point of view of a poet, though, it allows the poet to perfect the craft of Renga. And that is one of the reasons why I enjoy Renga; because it functions as a vehicle for perfecting the craft of poetry in general. Just as a potter gradually perfects the craft of pottery, becoming more skilled on the wheel, more familiar with glazes, more conversant with different kinds of clay, so also the Renga poet becomes, over time, more skilled at link and shift, topical placement, syllabic structure, and overall flow. I have found that the gradual refining of these skills naturally spills over into other poetic forms, allowing for a greater objectivity and a greater ability to cultivate the craft of poetry.