Changes, the When & When Not

 

There are times when as much as you work on a poem, the words just don't turn out to your liking. 

I reverted, The Tundra & the Apple Tree, to draft because it is one of those poems for me, that isn't where I want it to be. 

There is a too familiar flow to the lines. I always fear maybe I read a similar poem way back when or it reminds me of something that isn't reaching the surface of my memory.

Looking back, I began writing the poem with the thought of creating something silly with a contrast that gives a reader the opportunity to think, fill in their thoughts for what the words will mean. 

I know now that if that is a goal for a poem I want to write, then I have to do more pre-writing aka think, plan, practice words, than I usually do. Making a list of words I want to include can be helpful when a poem has such a specific theme. Using a thesaurus, it is easy to fall down the rabbit hole with a word. That is all right because you can pick up other words along the way.

There is no fantasy

more true

than how we,

in our element,

in this era,

on these days,

are living 

fiction ingredients 

folded into reality.

Those lines are the core of the poem, The Tundra & the Apple Tree. What I'm thinking of changing is the tundra and apple as examples to carry the theme. A week or more, and the poem should be finished to repost.