Journal 2
My name is Madalyn Watts, I am a freshman at The Ohio State University Marion Campus, and I am majoring in Dental Hygiene. A fun fact about me is that I can speak fluently in Spanish, I have been studying the Spanish language for 8 years. I began in the 5th grade and continued until I graduated high school. I was very close to minoring in Spanish as well, but I decided that one major would challenge me enough. Believe it or not, I use my speaking skills quite often. They allow me to adapt to an increasingly diverse society which I am very grateful for! I am very excited to see where this new chapter of my life takes me to and all of the new people I meet along the way.
From Four Genres In Brief, I would definitely say that the terminology and the anatomy of a poem has been the most helpful to me. From different forms to the use of white space in a poem, to different terms like enjambment and scansion. These new elements of poetry, while they are very new and sometimes a bit confusing, they allow me to expand my knowledge of poetry. More specifically, they allow me to contribute more to class conversations and analyses. I even find myself using these terms and concepts in other classes, which allows me to get a foot in the door when I comes to discussions. Also, one particularly helpful piece of advice that I have taken away thus far is “Ultimately, the only real way to become a poet is to keep writing poems - lots of them - most of which you’ll end up throwing away.” This gave me a great sense of relief, because I always read poetry and felt jealous that people actually had thing like this floating around in their brains. I was afraid coming into this class that I would be the least poetic, clumsy writer, and that nothing profound would ever come from my poetry. But now I know that these world renowned pieces of poetry have been revised countless different times and critiqued even more. In my mind, there is no such thing as a perfect poem, there is always something to improve upon. But I find great happiness in the fact that no one will ever write a great poem the very first time.
Madalyn, good stuff and lots to reflect on. You write with candor and honesty about some of your hesitations and fears concerning poems and writing. The truth is that everyone has these at times, and they can really be road blocks. Learning Spanish has opened doors and conversations for you that were unimaginable without Spanish. Believe it or not, poetry and creative writing is nearly like learning another language, or two, or three. You need to know the critical language and terms just to know how to talk about craft and technique, but then the writing itself opens up a whole new world of ideas and exchanges. It even goes beyond language in some peoples' view, including mine. Hope you are enjoying the writing so far and thanks for your post here.
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