When most people hear or think about poetry, they either think of the intricate, meticulous words of Shakespeare or the rhyming form of poetry that is used in many short poems. However, that is not all that there is to poetry. There are many styles in poetry as everyone has a distinct sense of creativity that they need to express. In order to get comfortable with writing poetry, you need to find out where you lie in terms of poetic styles. This may mean exploring different aspects for a while but it will all be worth it when you find your won voice. You will even be able to enter free poetry contests for practice. Some of the things that you can do to find your poetry style include:
- Finding themes and goals
A great starting point to discovering who you are as a point can finding several themes that you are interested in and writing them down. If you have previous poems that you have attempted before, you can go back and look through them to see what you tend to write about mostly. You also need to note your goals down. What do you want to achieve when you write your poems? Do you want your audience to laugh, cry or leave in deep meditation? Having these things figured out will help you even in future to determine which poetry contests you can participate in that are attuned to your interests.
- Favourite works
Another fantastic method to help you find your style is evaluating your favourite works. Which poetry books call out to you more? Are there any particular authors you enjoy reading more than others? You can use this to find out if you may enjoy writing the same style of works that you love reading. You can try to pick a recurrent theme in the poems and try emulate your author. You can also go through poems by the winners of your local free poetry contests and see if you identify with any of their works. If you find that your interest lies in a different area, worry not. Everybody is different.
- Poetic forms
Once you have discovered the themes that interest you, you need to choose a poetic form. There are two main poetic forms; structured and open poetic forms. Structured poems often include poems written within a certain set of rules. They may be rhyming poems or not. However, open poetic forms allow you to express yourself without focusing too much on following structural rules. They can be free verse poems that give you complete artistic freedom or confessional poems that allow you to write about your personal experience. If you find that you fit more towards open poetic forms, worry not. You still have a place in the poetry community. In fact, most modern poetry contests allocate categories for all poetic forms.
