Poetry: A Tapestry of Words, A Mosaic of Meaning

If a known poison cures a man of a terrible disease, medicine men run out of business and those who kill through poisoning will be considered sages.

Every poet worth their salt knows that feeling within when one starts or completes a piece. We listen or read, with amusement, how others interpret our works. Sometimes, it is on point. Other times, it surprises us and reveals something we never knew about ourselves. Such is the power of words. The world of words is a place where meanings vary, where perceptions change, where writer and reader are challenged (and changed) by conundrums of existence. In this beautiful tapestry of words, we seek to create a world like nobody else has seen. Poet Kofi Awoonor stated that society is the teacher, the mentor: listen, watch, observe the life around you; it is that which will provide you the impetus.


A poem is a statement of truth (or a statement on a facet of truth).Stephen King reasoned that you cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you. The truth comes in variations: your truth and mine. This is where poets can exploit prisms of meaning and arrive at ideas that challenge accepted norms. The truth is a gold mine and a smart poet (and writer) can extract nuggets for a lifetime. The tools needed in this particular endeavor is observation, contemplation and open-mindedness. A poet must be prepared anything in defense of the truth, even if it sounds like a lie to his/her readers. The world, being a stage for paradox, never runs out of scenarios. A poet must go with the flow of reality in order to state his/her dreams properly.


A poem is supposed to lead the reader to a realization. Poetry has a hook that pulls the reader in and guides him/her to a conclusion. Some poets choose to let the readers find their own conclusions. Others are unequivocal about what they intend to convey. A poem is supposed to a journey of thought, a snippet on life that drives home a theme or idea in either a good or bad light. Great poems give you a feeling of either feeling content or wanting more.


A poem can use powers of prose and drama (adjectives, characters et cetera). Good poems use every literary device available. Do not burden yourself with unnecessary limitations. However, if you consciously intend to limit your scope of writing by conforming to a set method, by all means, help yourself. I highly recommend using poetic license in your drive through the terrains of writing. Give yourself a break. Enjoy this writing life by opening yourself and works to the possibilities out there. Use prose when it best serves your poem, where rhyming holds you back. Use drama when mere descriptions will not suffice. You are your poem's creator. It is your sacrosanct duty to give it life.


A poem can be long but it has to be precise. There is this school of thought that poems should be short. You can obey that law or break it, depending on the scope of your poem. Some of the greatest works of poetry, like the Inferno, Iliad and Odyssey, run for hundreds of pages but they never exhaust themselves out of the realm of their thematic confines. Even though such poems possess qualities of prose and drama, they stay true to the poetic sense. So, yes, you can write a long poem about a historical figure or event. But do so by tempering your creative strokes with the precision that poetry requires.


A poem is a reaction to the world. Whether it is a dream, actual event or prophecy, a poem is a human reaction to either ugliness or beauty in the world. Hence, it becomes subject to criticism, not only because of its form, but its subject matter. This places the poet, front and center, as a vehicle of social consciousness, which has its existential consequences. In the endless war between the forces of the world as it is and those of the world as it should be, the poet must take sides. This becomes the poet's internal dilemma, which creates tension in his/her works. Tension, by the way, is very good for poetry. It tells the reader (or listener) that the poet is thinking.


A poem finds many different ways to state the obvious. Through euphemisms, synecdoche, similes and metaphors (just to mention a few), the poet is able to mask, obscure or reveal meaning. A poem must be able to say many things at once, either through clarity or contradiction. This enables the poet to stay out of the way of the life of the poem because it becomes the work of the reader (or listener) to apply it to his/her own experiences. This is why poetry is the bedfellow of wisdom and its progeny (proverbs and idioms). LS Mensah opines that a poem can mean different things at different times, depending on how one looks at it. So can words and images within a poem.

Justice makes us write. It stirs us out of our comfort zones to face the evils that the world, in order to keep its creature comforts, has conveniently tolerated. Writing is about what the world should be to each and every one of its inhabitants. Equal opportunities in suffering and success, equal opportunities in tears and triumphs. That is why any other writing, that glorifies and validates injustice, does not make sense.

Great poetry teaches and titillates the mind.