The man stands there a few moments before finally seeming to get the confidence to raise the microphone to his mouth again, as he megaphone reaches position this time his cheeks take on a bit of velour, and his eyes seem ablaze, he takes a deep meaningful breath, and speaks into the megaphone,

“Right, listen up,” now all eyes are on him, only they’re attentive rather than annoyed, “I demand to know where my inspiration is! I think it’s wholly unfair that you’ve abandoned me right now. I need you, I can’t write without you. Without you these pages are blank, and what words come are empty.
“Inspiration I’ve never needed you so bad, I’ve got all these things to do, and you’ve abandoned me, given up the fight, and now I stand alone against the tide of battle.
“I beg you return to me your charm, your talent. Words are meaningless without you!”

The audience looks rapt, his words have moved them, they feel his desperation, and they ponder borrowing the megaphone.

The man looks down upon his audience, upon their swept up faces, he watches the emotions play across their faces. Then a thought dawns in his mind, a realisation, maybe even epiphany.

What the man realised was this – inspiration is hard to achieve, but it can hit at the strangest moments, and all you can do is find the nearest waiting apparatus and take advantage.

Everyone has different things that inspires them to write, and inspires what to write. For myself these are most often two different events, for others they might be most often the same.

There is also another possibility one without the other, which can either be liberating or frustrating, for example:

• I may have a brilliant idea what to write, but no inspiration (will) to write it – so it all plays out in my head because try as I might I can’t convert it into words. Obviously a form of writers block.
• Something may give me inspiration (the will) to write, but without any inspiration. Here my mind, and the paper is ab empty canvas, and I can just let my thoughts flow freely. Probably doesn’t make for great reading, but it’s fun and liberating for me.

Everybody is different when it comes to inspiration, I know all too well what holds true for me, is complete gibberish to another. In broad strokes, I have probably captured the general forms of inspiration.

In terms of what inspires me to write (gives me the will), it falls down to three categories: the outdoors (nature, weather, scenery, architecture, etc…), other people’s creativity (a book, a film, a piece of music, also biographical information about a creative person, or someone who’s faced adversity in their life), and challenges (nothing gets my creative juices better than a bit of competition).

Sadly these things aren’t guaranteed to get me writing, but most often once I start writing it’s because I was inspired to by one of the above.

In terms of my inspiration what to write, it’s usually something close to hand, something I’ve imagined happening, my emotional state (yes, I can be a bit emo in my poetry), or a need to impress others so I can belong, and validate myself.

I’ve written about many things, from religion to coke cans, from fantasyic tales to mundane moments of life, and from historical events to nature.

Sometimes my indpirations puts me on the path to something specific, sometimes it’s just the starting point, or catalyst for a cascade of ideas.

I will say this, whatever the idea, I do love it when it happens, it’s a veritable joy to let poetry over take me, a joy and love that only falls short of sex.

As I’m getting older, inspiration is getting harder – dry spells last longer, but when the floodgates open, I feel sure the joy is deeper, as I come to appreciate it more.

Still I would live in those moments more if I were able to, giving myself over to the wild abandon of inspiration.

So I feel abandoned when inspiration doesn’t come, and call to it from my megaphone, hoping to attract it back. For me my megaphone is going to beautiful places, reading and listening to music, and entering challenges – hoping beyond hope, inspiration heads my call and answers.

That’s what inspiration is to me.

My own process keeps me sane, keeps me trying, and ultimately makes my work better. That’s what I’m going to explore in this entry.

I’ve found, that in the past spending a few moments considering what my process is has made for better poetry. It prevents me trying to force myself to fit molds that aren’t mine, which so far when I’ve tried has led me down paths of frustration. Having the desire to write a poem, and then destroying the will to write is a terrible thing.

Preface: Before I start exploring, it isn’t fair to say I have one writing process, I have several – the aim of this post is explore my writing process for poetry, I will do another blog entry in regards to writing literature.

So what is my poetry writing process?

The specifics change, depending on the situation, locale, and the style of poetry. However, we’ll proceed as if there aren’t any specific problems to deal with – and come back to those later.

• My first step is usually to find inspiration to write – usually kicked off by something, an event, a song lyric, a joke,or where I am. This isn’t necessarily inspiration what to write – just the inspiration to write. Who can waste a bench along the canal, the sun high in the sky, and just the odd wisp of cloud breaking up a beautiful blue sky?
• After that comes preparation, I need to find what I have on me, in pockets or bag, that I can write with. Most common for me when it comes to poetry is to write on paper. So, if worst comes to worst, I’ll use the back of a piece of paper – as long as it’s blank. Usually though, I have some form of notepad with me (either my trusty spiral bound notepad, one of my desk pads, or my little black book of story ideas). A pen comes in handy, usually I have travel with a couple. At home or work, these things are usually ready to hand.
• At this point, for me comes committal. Having gotten myself into a position to write – the desire must be there, so with pen in hand, I’ll say to myself, “I will write a poem now, no matter what”, I’m committed.
• Once I’m committed then I start sifting through as many random thoughts as I can seeking a subject, a goal, or something of inspiration. I will hoenstly go through dozens upon dozens of ideas, casting off, or embracing several as I go, until finally my pen moves.
• Now comes the first line – the first line for me is most important, generally it sets the theme of the poem. It also is most likely to form the base for any rhyming I do, it’s also the part I consider most important in grabbing a potential reader, I need to get them through the first section.
• Once the first line is written – a series of decisions have to made,
  • Do I have a rhyme?
  • Where does the rhyme reside?
  • How long do I want this poem to be?
  • How many sections or stanzas do I want?
  • What am I evoking?
• From there, I write the first section or stanza, applying the rules. Often, say in the creation of a rhyming poem, I’ll be crossing out words and lines, and replacing them with something that rhymes better, or can have something later rhymed with it.
• From there, using whatever rules I’ve created in the first section, I complete more – always revising to get the best outcome for the rules to fit backwards, and to leave room to write more going forward.
• Once I’ve written the poem to it’s end, it’s time to read it through – at which point I squirm uncomfortably realising that this or that doesn’t really work. Time to start crossing things out, and replacing them with things that do work. This goes on until I’m finally happy what’s on paper is satisfactory.
• Next comes the typing up, this also involves further revisions, because reading it through, and re-typing it lead to different thoughts and feelings on my work.
• Finally, the process is complete, and I can post my poem somewhere, or just send it to a friend see if they like it (or it just sits in one of my books of poetry, and a folder .

So, that’s my poetry writing process in detail, it could be summarised as such (just all those presentations at school and college would do):

• Inspiration
• Preparation
• Commitment
• Subject
• First line
• Decision
• First section
• Completion of draft
• Review
• Revision
• Typing up
• Presentation

If I were really clever, I’d use a thesaurus to turn it into a mnemonic, however it’s not neccesary, this is simply my instinctive way of writing poetry.

Like I said everyone has their own process, and soemtimes we change it for certain reasons – if I’m taking part in a challenge, then chances are I already know the rules I need to follow to layout and finish my poem, if I’ve been pondering a certain poem for a while, say an epic, other steps change.

Also, if I am rhyming, and I want more than simple rhymes, chances are to hand I’ll want a dictionary, a rhyming dictionary, and a thesaurus, if i’m out and about – the review stages take place at home, where I have said books (or websites). Not being a natural rhymer, I couldn’t write rhyme without them – but I do love the occaisional rhyme.

I must admit, my process isn’t all that organised, it seems it when I write it here – but really, I just go from one step to the next, to me at the time it feels instinctive, and impulsive. I’ve tried to use other writing processes, to try and break away from the chaos that I feel as I write – but all that happens is I become frustrated, and lose interest in what I’m writing. That’s how I know how important have the most write, and most natural writing process is. You break it at your own risk – but maybe, if you take that risk – you’ll find a better more natural way for you to write.