Writing About Solitude Without Writing a Sad Poem

Solitude is the most confused subject in poetry, half loneliness and half peace. A judge on the three moves that turn a solitude poem into a real one, the test that tells you if the poem is about the loneliness or the being alone, and the one image that always works.

Solitude is the most confused subject in poetry, because it is half loneliness and half peace and most poems about it cannot decide which. The solitude poem is the poem that is trying to be two things at once, and the confusion is the thing that makes it fail.

The solitude poem that works is not about being alone. It is about what the being alone lets you do.

The confusion trap

The confusion poem is the one that cannot decide if being alone is a punishment or a gift. The poem that says 'I am alone and I am sad' and 'I am alone and I am free' in the same stanza is a poem that has not decided what the solitude is for. The reader feels the confusion; the poem does not resolve it.

A poem about solitude should not describe the being alone. It should describe what the being alone lets the person do.

The three moves that turn a solitude poem into a real one

Move one: the specific thing done alone. The solitude poem that works is about a specific thing done alone, the coffee, the walk, the book, the quiet. The poem that says 'I am alone' is a poem about the idea of solitude. The poem that says 'I drink my coffee on the porch and nobody talks' is a poem about a person, and the person is the solitude.

Move two: the peace that is earned. The solitude poem that works is about the peace that is earned, not the loneliness that is suffered. The poem that says 'I am alone and I am sad' is a poem about the loneliness. The poem that says 'I am alone and I have learned to like it' is a poem about the peace, and the peace is the thing that is earned.

Move three: the choice. The solitude poem that works is about the choice to be alone, not the being alone that is forced. The poem that says 'I am alone because nobody wants me' is a poem about the loneliness. The poem that says 'I choose to be alone because the quiet is the thing I need' is a poem about the choice, and the choice is the agency.

The test that decides

Here is the test I use on my own solitude poems, and it is the only one that matters: is this poem about the loneliness, or is it about the being alone? If the poem is about the loneliness, it is a sad poem. If it is about the being alone, it is a solitude poem.

The sad poem says 'this is how bad it is to be alone'. The solitude poem says 'this is what being alone lets me do'. The difference is the difference between a complaint and a choice.

The one image that always works

The image that always works in a solitude poem is the one that is so specific it could only belong to the person the poem is about. The way they drink their coffee. The way they sit in the chair. The way they look at the light on the wall. The image that is so small and so specific that it could not be a symbol; it could only be a fact.

The solitude poem that works is the poem that has one of those images in it, and the image is the thing that makes the poem true.

Where it goes wrong

The trap is the poem that is about the feeling instead of the person. 'I am alone and I am sad' is a feeling; 'I drink my coffee on the porch and nobody talks' is a person. The feeling is the cliché; the person is the poem.

If you want to see a solitude poem that is about the person, the prompts library has a set on being alone and the self, and the contest window is open when the draft is ready. Solitude is not the subject. The person is.

Keep reading

For the craft side, the solitude collection covers the deeper method. The negative-space module is the page to read next, and the contest is where the work goes when it is done.

By Writory Editorial, for Writory.

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