Write an article based on this "Study forms Consider studying poetry formally. Research venues that will publish your work. Figure out how you're going to make money. "Read your poems to a construction worker on his lunch break."
. A successful poet needs to learn about traditional poetic forms and be comfortable writing within strict guidelines as well as free-verse. Can you write a couple lines in iambic tetrameter if the poem calls for it? What about a villanelle? Studying traditional forms will make you a better reader and a better writer. Many schools, community centers, and libraries offer after-school poetry workshops as an extra-curricular activity for reasonable prices, where you can read others' work, study poetry, and participate in a poetry workshop. In a workshop, you'll all share new work and critique everyone's work in a welcoming environment. It can be a great way to improve drastically, both by getting an experienced teacher and other poets' feedback. At the college level, studying poetry is a fundamental part of any creative writing program, and most English departments offer a wide variety of poetry courses that a successful poet would be foolish not to pursue. It's a sad truth: more poetry is published every successive year, and less of it is read by the average reader. There are literally hundreds of high-quality literary magazines publishing poets like you, people who engage with poems, love reading them, and want their voice to be heard. Book prizes are also common, for a small reading fee. If you've got enough poems to put a book together, try entering your manuscript and seeing what happens. You might even win some money. Walt Whitman worked as an ambulance driver and a nurse while he wrote his classic American poems, while Frank O'Hara worked at an art museum and wrote poems on his lunch break. Many poets seek careers in academic fields, while others become musicians, truck drivers, or parents. Whatever you do, keep writing your poems, and take your art seriously. " Amiri Baraka, mid-century American Poet and performer, famously offered the advice that poets should read their poems to construction workers on their lunch break, and that if they didn't get beaten over the head, they might actually have something. It's good advice. There's a lot of noise in the world, and your rhyming poem about a bird on your windowsill might have a hard time cutting through the noise. A successful poet finds some way to do just that.