An essay every aspiring poet must read!

ADVICE I WISH I'D BEEN TOLD
by
~WALT MCDONALD~
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Over the years, I've heard good advice from others; I wish they had told me sooner. Probably they did, but I didn't listen. What I'm about to say is what I constantly urge myself to do. I offer these comments to save us time, to help us strip off some ankle weights of language. The difference between second place and first place in the high jump, between the silver and the gold, is only about an inch. Ah, but "How glorious that inch / And that split-second longer in the air before the fall" (Robert Francis, "Excellence").

1. Resist Abstractions, and They Will Flee from You

General and abstract statements are easy to say, and usually flat. They don't show; they tell. Imagine friends stepping out into the hall and seeing something vivid and specific, then coming back into your room and summarizing all the specific, sensuous details they saw in abstract, general statements � like any of these: "He was a distinguished-looking man." "She looked angry." "She treated others with justice." "He had a strange way of fixing his hair." "He gave her costly gifts." "She reacted in a negative way."
I understand these claims � but I don't see or feel them as richly as I wish I could. The power of language is in vivid specifics that make us see � or hear, and feel, through sensuous images. A plot summary is not as vivid or powerful as seeing the movie. In order to make any of those statements quoted above, the writers might have seen specific details, but � instead of sharing them with readers � they have "ab-stracted" (drawn conclusions from, or taken from) their impressions and given us only the abstract notions of the experience � "distinguished-looking," "justice," "a negative way."
These are the kind of easy abstractions I'm likely to make in first drafts � when I'm simply trying to find a few lines for a poem. But go beyond first thoughts. I urge you to reach, to work hard; don't sit down like a couch potato, comfortable with the easy abstractions of your mind's first draft. A poem works best, for me, when the writer doesn't tell, but when he or she invents combinations of specific words to show us old facts in new ways. Poems with too many abstractions and not enough images tell about something, but don't move me as much as they could.
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This is just a short piece of this great essay that comes from here: http://valpo.edu/english/vpr/mcdonaldessay.html
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-I beg beginning poets to read this, and read it through all the way.

Regards
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