Outflow

I plan to continue my poetic adventure in 2023, 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 started 2023 by writing “Ars Poetic” verse style. This form of poetry can be translated from Latin as “The Art of Poetry,” I call this poem Outflow.

How does “Ars Poetic” relate to the poem Outflow?

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.

Outflow
Words should spill on the page
Like lukewarm blood
Growl like a tiger in a cage
Pour like warm salty tears
Open like a flower about to bud
Expressions of urgency
Of passion and pain
An unspoken insurgency
Into the soul
Expressions of our courage and fear
The clitter clattery of flattery
Written in jest
Rolled into the porcelain pages of a scroll
Fragile reminders of our human condition
Seeping emotion, 
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
beyond definition

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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