My Interest in Poetry

I’ve been writing poetry since I was in my teens. Bad poetry at first, but eventually after years of study
and reading other poets work, and more study, I eventually started to write publishable works. Every
year I publish five or ten poems in literary journals like Kansas Quarterly and Wisconsin Review, but also in fairly unknown small magazines (sometimes online these days) like Tattoo Highway and bluestem.
I’m just as interested in reading other poems in those magazines as getting published in them. Poetry cuts deeper to the bone than most fiction—and in a much smaller space. Poetry can also be elusive, sticking with you for hours or days (or longer) after you’ve read it. And, poetry is technical, its structure is something that can be played with, adjusted, reversed. I have to consider more than the sentence (as in fiction). I have to consider line endings, pauses, sound and flow. When I write poetry it comes from a totally different place than my fiction. I’m interested in that place, what’s in there.
I have favorite poets, but am finding new poets all the time through reading the poetry journals. Some of my favorite poets include my friend Gary Copeland Lilley, as well as more notable poets like James Wright, William Stafford, W.S. Merwin, Jeanne Murray Walker, Cornelius Eady, and Mary Oliver. Another friend who’s just starting to publish more often is Gerald Braude. You’ll be seeing his work more often, I’m sure.
Overall, my interest in poetry has as much to do with reading and writing it, with the sound of the language, the flow of the words lined up together (including the silences). Of all types of writing, in fact, the silences are controlled by the poet most, just like in music. And isn’t music and poetry similar even if they are not so tightly tied together like in a song.
Poetry has opened doors in my being, in my heart and soul as well as my head and body. Poetry has taken me places I couldn’t have gone otherwise, and am forever grateful that I got to go.

* * Terry Persun holds a Bachelor’s of Science as well as an MA in Creative Writing. He has worked as an engineer, has been the Editor-in-Chief of several technology journals, and is now marketing consultant for technical and manufacturing companies. Seven of his novels have been published. His science fiction novel “Cathedral of Dreams” won a ForeWord Reviews Book of the Year Finalist Award, and his historical novel, “Sweet Song” won a Silver IPPY Award. His latest science fiction space opera is “Hear No Evil”.