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• Cover
• Half-Title
• Title
• Contents
• Preface: A Word of Welcome for Teachers and Students
• SECTION I An Introduction to Poetry
• 1 Why Do We Write Poems?
• 2 What Is Meaning?
• We have been taught that poems have meanings
• Yes—poems totally have meanings
• 1 Poems are always about two things
• 2 Poems are not completely up to reader interpretation
• 3 Sometimes, meaning is secondary
• 4 As a writer, you don’t have to think about meaning
• Your three brains
• The Lizard Brain
• The Animal Brain
• The Human Brain
• 3 What Does Talent Have to Do with Anything?
• Talent is the capability for hard work
• Talent is the ability to muster courage
• Talent is the ability to accept doubt
• Talent is refusal to wait for inspiration
• 4 Where Do Poems Come From?
• Writer’s block is a myth
• Our obsessions, our interests
• Writing from prompts
• Form versus content
• Imitation as invention
• 5 What Does It Mean to Be a Poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• What does it mean to be a poet?
• SECTION II The Elements of Poetry
• 6 Rhetorical Construction
• Logos
• Rhetorical devices
• Pathos
• Ethos
• 7 The Elements of Poetry
• Ambiguity
• Beginnings
• Clarity
• Concision
• Contradiction
• Defamiliarization
• Diction
• Doorways
• Endings
• Exploration
• Form
• A bit about fixed forms
• Formal terminologies
• Gaze
• Gravity and Lightness
• Image
• Inventory
• Language
• Lines
• Lyric
• Metaphor
• Metaphor and the reader
• Mood
• Movement
• Music
• Narrative
• Observation and Interpretation
• Point of View
• Third person
• First person
• Second person
• Precision
• Punctuation
• Questioning
• Repetition
• Rhythm
• Showing and Telling
• Speaker
• Surprise
• Syntax
• Titles
• Value
• Mechanical value
• Associative value
• Value as comparison
• Redefinition and variable value
• Questions about value?
• Voice
• Work
• Density
• Questions about work?
• SECTION III Practicalities
• 8 The Poetry Workshop
• Three levels of understanding
• First level of understanding: I like it / I don’t like it
• Second level of understanding: This is what the poem means
• Third level of understanding: This is how meaning has been built
• The conversation is for the writer
• The conversation is for the room
• Tips for a good workshop
• Make the workshop a safe space
• Be nice
• Be forgiving
• Be generous with your critique
• Try to read the poem on its own terms
• Describe the poem instead of prescribing a fix
• Listen and take notes
• Give praise
• Write on other people’s poems
• Remember that the poem is a draft
• About “the gag rule”
• Processing workshop feedback
• Don’t simply look for consensus
• Filter the workshop’s voices
• Look past the advice
• Get some distance
• Coping with an unsuccessful workshop
• 9 Revision
• Revision = Re + Vision
• Letting go is the hardest part
• Revising the almost-good-enough poem
• Save your drafts
• Read to revise
• Revision techniques and exercises
• 10 Proceed with Caution
• SECTION IV Contemporary Poetic Modes: An Anthology
• Appendix A: 75 Poetry Experiments
• Appendix B: Additional Reading
• Acknowledgements
• Index
• Copyright