What ignites your creative spark?

Lynne Calaway

I believe that some of our best poems (pieces that we are pleased with) are often borne of feelings from opposite ends of a sort of emotional spectrum and, when tapped into, release what looks like, sounds like a soulful–maybe even a powerful–piece.  What is it for you?

Maybe it’s the quiet pleasure of  the changing leaves of fall or the joy of your first child.  Maybe it’s the blahs on a rainy afternoon or coping with an unfathomable loss, I believe that if we want to write more–share more–it’s important to understand what emotions have us powering up the laptop or pulling out  pen and paper to let the prose flow.

One way to recognize what  ignites your creative spark, if you haven’t already, is to read the pieces you’ve written over time (yep..you’ll need to dig ’em out) to see what patterns emerge as you remember what you were experiencing or feeling  at the time.

If you tend to write while wearing your rose-colored glasses, your pieces will reflect that and, maybe, that’s your niche.  For me, I probably won’t do a lot of poems about butterflies, rainbows or unicorns unless the unicorn, while chasing a butterfly, trips over the aforementioned rainbow and gores some innocent bystander–hey, accidents happen!

Getting in touch with the types of emotions that ignite your creative spark will help your focus, giving you more time to actually write rather than wasting your time trying to force a poem when you’re not “feeling” it.

Just  jot down your thoughts when you’re in the “zone”–a few sentences or, sometimes, even just a few words, then revisit and tweak it over time, and I believe you’ll start see your poem “writing itself”!