Hello all!

After a long time away from he open mic, I'm keen to get back among the performing poets!

So I have a question to ask.

When writing your poetry how important do you find using punctuation and capitalisation (not meaning capitals at the start of each new line) in writing your poetry?

Personally, I've always taken the tack that punctuation allows me to see another poets rhythyms and intentions. As for capital letters I use a capital as a way of indicating an important word.

I know and can think of many, many solid poets who do the same. My own writing has brrn more influenced by stageplays lately.

So do you use punctuation in that way...is it important?

It has been said that "rules are for the obedience of fools and the
guidance of wise men", but punctuation can't be discounted due
to its importance in securing the intended (or right) emphasis, as the
meaning of a sentence can be altered
by the omission of a comma, for example.
Correct spelling is desirable and
whilst the occasional "typo" can
slip by, these can be avoided by
careful reading before posting.
If there is doubt about any word,
a good dictionary and a thesaurus
should help solve the problem.
Correct words, spelling and punctuation are the tools of a writer's trade if he/she is to be
understood and taken seriously.
We owe it to our readers that they
are in no doubt about our intentions
and our reliability when putting
our product into English. Often
easier said than done, I know. But
who said it was supposed to be easy?! Be prepared to be fallible,
but seek to reduce the chance.

Punctuation is very important most of the time as it indicates timing (remembering poetry is verbal and as much in the mouth as on the page) and intention etc.

M.C's post is good, but it does highlight a problem.


Quote
We owe it to our readers that they
are in no doubt about our intentions
Unquote

The above is fine for some poems, great for perfectly replete little cameos that present us a picture etc. But the above quote is often not only not the case, but in fact the exact opposite of what the poet wishes to achieve.

We often wish to write between the lines and be far less than prescribed. And we also sometimes want the reader to draw/tease out meaning for themselves. Sometimes expected grammar is a hindrance to this, at other times positively it is unwanted.

e.g

When writing a poem that has say a duality of meaning and extended metaphor that runs through it; you might not wish to use the grammar expected of factual writing and prose. Doing so may put a nail into one of the intended interpretations.

Ultimately it comes down to what you are doing with the language and what you wish to achieve; it’s a style and preference thing to.

Go take a look at E.E Cummings. At first you might find his style a bit of a nightmare. But you soon

fall

into

it

he does, use a style

that achieves a
tumbling! cadence
Unexpectedly.

Chris is right to take up my remark about "intention." I was momentarily lost in the area of grammar and certainly agree that
some poetry uses allusion. allegory
and double-meaning to get its message over. It just goes to show
how we have to be careful what we
write if we are not to be misunderstood - and, in a personal sense, be less than accurate! :-)

Lynne Truss’s book will plainly tell
To punctuate your poem well;
To fail to do so can confuse;
Examples may, sometimes, bemuse;
The classic sentence is, of course,
“I helped my friend jack off his horse”.

When I first started writing, I capitalised every single line, and Ray pulled me up on it. I thought it looked good then, but have slowly started to drop that now, in favour of capitalising only those lines which feel like a fresh sentence. Quite often I will put in some commas, but not all, for the sake of flow - as Chris as mentioned above.

Sometimes, if you put everything that counts as 'correct' in, it makes it look shite on the page.

I'd agree with everything Laura just said. Other people read your work with different eyes though. I've been told that my poems haven't been punctuated properly.

I like my punctuation and line breaks to be in line with the way I would breathe and perform my work. I hate poems chopped up artificially to follow some perceived structure or make them look nice on a page - it's all about flow and meaning for me.

I used to use punctuation, but then one day, Appollinaire like, decided to take them all out, and have never looked back since.

I use space and open-field techniques to open up the poem so it becomes a kind of visual piece as well as an aural piece. I see poems as at least partly visual constructs as well as sound and idea constructs - I have a soft spot for 'concrete' and 'visual' poetry though I don't do that myself.

Punctuation seems to me to be for prose not poetry.

JC (or should that be "J.C."?) comes up trumps again...it just
shows you can laugh as you learn!