In high school I was very much involved in poetry. You cannot read a poem quickly. There's too much going on there. There are rhythms and alliterations. You have to read poetry slow, slow, slow to absorb it all.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
When I was in college, I wrote poetry very seriously, and then once I had started writing short stories, I didn't go back to poetry, partially because I felt like I understood how incredibly difficult it was.
I read mostly poetry.
I was lucky to have read a lot of poetry when I was younger; it helped me to remember a way to write.
I started writing poetry in high school because I wanted desperately to write, but somehow, writing stories didn't appeal to me, and I loved the flow and the feel and sense of poetry, especially that of what one might call formal verse.
I'm not an academic, but I've always loved poetry since I've been small.
My grandmother taught me how to read, very early, but she taught me to read just the way she taught herself how to read - she read words rather than syllables. And as a result of that, when I entered school, it took me a long time to learn how to write.
You have to learn a few things, which you do along the way, but basically, poetry is a matter of the ear. Iambic pentameters or what constitutes a stanza comes naturally - your ears will know.
I was completely devoted to reading and books from the age of seven. It took until I was 18 to have the confidence to write poetry.
Poetry for me is very easy. It's like a lightning bolt. I feel this calling, and the first line of the poem comes into my head, and I just have to go to the page, to the typewriter, to the computer or whatever and write it.
Even though I was a reluctant reader in junior high and high school, I found myself writing poems in the back of class.