Or So I Feel
A poet is somebody who feels, and who expresses his feelings through
words. This may sound easy, but it isn't. A lot of people think or
believe or know they feel -- but that's thinking or believing or
knowing; not feeling. And poetry is feeling -- not knowing or believing
or thinking. Almost anybody can learn to think or believe or know, but
not a single human being can be taught to feel. Why? Because whenever
you think or you believe or you know, you're a lot of other people: but
the moment you feel, you're nobody-but-yourself. To be
nobody-but-yourself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and
day, to make you everybody else -- means to fight the hardest battle
which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting. As for
expressing nobody-but-yourself in words, that means working just a
little harder than anybody who isn't a poet can possibly imagine. Why?
Because nothing is quite as easy as using words like somebody else. We
all of us do exactly this nearly all of the time - and whenever we do it,
we are not poets. If, at the end of your first ten or fifteen years of
fighting and working and feeling, you find you've written one line of
one poem, you'll be very lucky indeed. And so my advice to all young
people who wish to become poets is: do something easy, like learning how
to blow up the world -- unless you're not only willing, but glad, to
feel and work and fight till you die. Does this sound dismal? It isn't. It's the most wonderful life on earth.Or so I feel."
ee cummings // connect:: bloglovin, goodreads, twitter!
2 comments
Such a lovely post hun. E E Cummings is my favourite poet xx
Thank you :) Yeah, he's one of my favourites too!
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