The Notebook.

My poetic adventure in 2023 will be similar to how I started in 2022, with a slight variation. Starting with the letter A, I will try to explore several poetry styles. This journey in poetry writing started two years ago when I strongly desired to learn more about reading and writing poetry. Black Out Poems became my obsession at the end of 2022. I promise to be a little more diverse this year. I start in 2023 by writing an “Ars Poetic” verse style. This form of poetry can be translated from Latin as “The Art of Poetry,” I titled this poem The Notebook.

How does “Ars Poetic?” relate to The Notebook

Horace started this tradition somewhere around 13 B.C.E. This form of poetry is simply writing a poem about writing a poem. It expresses how the poet feels when engaged in the writing process, examining the poet’s relationship to the poem. There are no rules about meter or rhythm. Writing this form of poetry should be a fun experience.

Note: I decided to tackle my “Ars Poetic” poems by writing them in a series of poems without any rules of meter and rhythm. The subject matter concerns what I could write about if I chose to write about the subject matter.

The Notebook
Mama gave us a dime at the store
My brothers bought two shiny red cars
To play with on my uncle’s cold wooden floor
Me, I bought two pencils and a blue notebook
I couldn’t wait to get back to the house
A story lurked in the back of my mind
Waiting for my fingers to spill  it out
On a white sheet of paper with thick black lead
All afternoon I was quiet as a mouse
I couldn’t ask for anything more
Then scrolling through squiggly lines, 
only I could decipher
Mama told me to slow down
But the words exploded inside of me
Like a bubbling out-of-control geyser
Spilling hot and heavy onto the page
I guess I could write about that

Like notes sung by a little bird
Letter upon letter
Word upon word
Line upon line 
Stanza upon stanza
This poem is for me to create and define

Who is Molly Shea?

Molly Shea is an accomplished fictional short story writer from Indiana who writes short stories and novels about a fictional town called Tecumseh.  To read more of her short stories and adventures, click here.

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