Letters to a Young Poet

Ever since I can remember, I drew pictures and wrote poems. I never bought greeting cards for special occasions, but created my own with original art and verses inside. I had no professional assistance about how or what to write, so my first attempts at poetry were primitive at best. My poems rhymed and the subject matter was usually religion based. In fact, the first poem I ever had published was accepted by a religious journal. The title of the poem was "To Meditate". I was unable to find a copy of that poem, but I remember the first two lines were: To meditate is just to beReceptive to the endless sea.It's all I remember, but you probably get the idea. It's not even close to the way I write now.In the spring of 1976, I enrolled at Cal State, Fresno, in a class called "Poetry Writing" taught by Philip Levine. I wasn't familiar with Levine's legacy and couldn't have known then, he would continue to win numerous literary prizes including multiple National Book Awards, The Pulitzer Prize, and would become the United States Poet Laureate in 2011. This class with Philip Levine was the beginning of my intense desire to write poetry.later, Richard Hugo and Mark Strand, among others. Their concrete images spoke in place of abstractions. I wanted to show what love is, not tell about it in vague language. I wanted to paint a visual picture of loyalty, without even using the word. The more specific the image, the more universal it would resonate with the reader. Although this seems a strange dichotomy, it is true. Specific places or actions mentioned in a poem spark similar experiences in a reader's life.An aspiring poet needs to absorb criticism from others like a sponge, but must ultimately trust his own inner voice. Phil Levine used to say, "Never avoid criticism. If you never failed, you were born today."