Nope, none, nada. Talent is a crock. People with talent often waste it with procrastination, drinking, doubt, whatever. Persistence, patience, practice, and willingness to learn is the key to writing poetry. Everything else is icing.continue...
More important to ask - do you really have something to say?
Maybe its a talent, stringing fine words into long pretty lines that say almost nothing.
I'd worry about what I am going to say first, and the talent for finding the right words to say it by, much later. The finest expressions cannot elevate an insipid thought.
Aparna
(Mar -4 )Well, Emily Dickson's a great poet, because she had something to say. Obviously she was not blathering on meaninglessly, even when she was not being published. Having something to say, is not about communicating to an audience. Its not a letter to the editor. Its not about getting published. Its about being clear in your own mind, knowing what you are saying, understanding where you are going. Being 'compelled' to write doesn't necessarily mean that the writing is any good. Writing well should be a goal of writing, a conscious act, not just an urge to record every random half-thought and unformed idea on paper. (Of course, if someone would rather write badly than not write, no one can stop them.) I hope you agree with the idea that writing badly serves no one.
Aparna
(Mar 5) I agree that form, esp, in poetry is very important, and a poem cannot be one without its form. (thank you, Mahendra, for pointing out the gist of my argument is about form and substance :-)). Good poetry needs both content and form.
What motivates a person to write is the need to express oneself, and next perhaps, to seek audience appreciation. We are all here in Caferati because we feel that need. But it doesn't mean we are all great poets. I think the urge to express is a natural human one, not limited to poets.
That urge also has to be disciplined towards excellence, to withhold what is not yet complete, to reject what is not good, to compare oneself with better writers to gain insight into what makes good poetry. Without this editorial process in place, we will write anything that comes to mind, concentrating on making it rhyme, or using the thesaurus to full effect.
(Good thought content without good form is rough, like crudely made unpolished table or chair with uneven legs. But a good form without substance is just five nicely polished and sanded pieces of wood joined randomly together. Its not even a table, at that point. Its a meaningless jumble of wood.)
ps This is good debate, even if we disagree. I hope there are others who will express their views as well.
