Prompt #200 - What Does a Poem Need?

This week prompt is a follow-up to last week’s and all those wonderful poet-tips. 

So ... let's stay in revise/edit mode and begin by taking a look at a few ideas of what a poem needs to be a poem.

For starters, a poem needs

1.  to be fresh and to have a dynamic sense of language;
2.  to have a strong emotional center;
3.  to engage readers, to be accessible;
4. to require every one of its words—no more, no less;
5. to avoid preachiness and sentimentality;
6.  to steer clear of abstractions (to show, not tell);
7.  to be clear even when complex;
8.  to create an integrated whole of meaning, language, and form;
9.  to startle, to connect even the unseen dots, to reveal;
10.  to employ craft effectively and attend to the mechanics of verse while using the head as much as the heart;
11. to have more than a single subject (the obvious, yes, but at least one other suggested and inherent);
12. to “speak” with the ownership of the poet—both the poem and its contents, its emotional core, and its voice (the page may be silent, but readers must hear the poet’s voice).

Guidelines:

1. This week again, take a look at some of your previously-written poems and pick one that hasn’t quite worked for you, one that still needs “fixing."
2. Using the checklist above, examine your poem analytically and see if it meets the criteria. If it doesn’t, ask yourself why not and work on it line-by-line to make improvements. 

Tips:

1. Go back to last week’s prompt and review the tips noted there. 
2. Focus on one or two of last week's tips and apply them to your poem.
3. In the process, you may think of some tips of your own. If you do, be sure to jot them down! 
4. Click here for some helpful editing tips from Writer's Digest.

Poem:

The Poem Wants a Drink

By Karen Glenn

In the workshop, students analyze

what each poem wants, what each one

strives to be. Well, this poem is

a layabout with limited ambitions. It wants

a drink. This poem doesn't give a damn

for rhyme or reason. It only sings

off-key. It has no rhythm

in the jukebox of its soul.

It grew up without symbols.

It doesn't know from assonance.

Give it mambo lessons, and it

still won't learn to dance. It has

not one stanza with a lyric pedigree.

It's late, and getting later, and this poem

wants a drink.

Call it gray and tired. Even call it

a cliche. This poem's lived long enough

to know exactly what it means

to say: Don't be stingy

with the whiskey, baby.

.....Yes, the night

has been a cruel one, and this poem

could use a drink.

Source: http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/poetry/myheart.html