I used to write a lot of poetry when I was younger, of a sort I would not hesitate to call "bad poetry". From my current perspective, I would say what made it bad was that I was doing it either simply for the sake of writing poetry (in terms of cool people write poetry, not poetry for poetry's sake) or else I was doing it because I was afraid to say something plainly.
Then in my early twenties for a variety of reasons, I became alienated from having an emotional life and told one of my close friends I had renounced poetry (which she though was funny, like surely poetry is really broken up about it.)
As I was thinking about poetry today, and why it exists, it occured to me to wonder whether there are ever thoughts that are more clearly expressed as a poem than in prose -- Sort of like how a drawing can sometimes be more accurate than a photograph, or how exposure time interacts with depth of field in photography. Well, I don't know if this will result in my writing any poetry, though my emotional life has grown back somewhat.
Just wondering about why you all don't write poetry. Maybe you do.
