Read Your Poems

Often when I critique poems or manuscripts for poets, I recommend they read their poems out loud.  When you do this, you can hear the flow, how it sounds, if you have the spacing and punctuation right, etc.

You can also hear if you have used words that are hard to pronounce.  I am a word lover so I often use words that no I can’t really pronounce even if I’ve used a Dictionary app to tell me how to say them.

Some poems are better on paper to be read.  Some poems are better to be read aloud.  It truly depends on the poem!

As with writing itself, when you write your poems ask yourself what is the intended outcome of your poem?  Are you sharing it with a loved one, is it just for you, do you want it published somewhere, do you want it in a poetry book, or is it more suited to a song lyric with added music?  There are so many outcomes.

Many a time, I’ve picked up a book that once I start or finish reading it I realize it probably would’ve been better as a short story, and so on.  You have to know what form your work truly fits.

Reading your poems out loud, though, can give a new life to your work.  These days with so much online, video meetings and readings and so on, you have plenty of opportunities to read a poem for an open mic.  It’s good to workshop a poem that way.

Everyone has their own process for writing.  I like to handwrite most of my poems and then rework them when I type them into my tablet or computer.  After that, I may read them at an open mic to make sure I get everything exactly right.

You can also practice reading other favorite poems by other poets.  That will give you good practice as well.

Reading your poems so you can hear them is so important even if you get someone else to read them to you!