How to Start Writing Poetry
Quick answer: How to start writing poetry today: read ten poems, copy one by hand, then write about one small true thing. A no-nonsense starting routine for beginners.
Start writing poetry by doing three things this week: read ten poems by living poets, copy one of them out by hand to feel how it moves, and then write your own short poem about one small, true, specific thing from your day. That is the whole entry ritual. No course, no expensive notebook, no permission required, and no need to know what an iamb is yet.
The mistake most beginners make is starting with a Big Subject: love, death, the universe. Big subjects have been handled by geniuses and your first attempts will feel thin next to the ghosts. Small subjects, the burnt toast, the neighbour's radio, the way your grandfather folded receipts, belong entirely to you. Nobody has written your version of them, which means your first poem can already do something no other poem does.
Read first, but read like a thief
You cannot write poetry from a memory of school anthologies. Spend a few days reading contemporary work: Mary Oliver, Ocean Vuong, Warsan Shire, Billy Collins, whoever a search for 'best contemporary poems' surfaces. You are not reading for pleasure alone; you are casing the joint. Notice what a poem does in its first line, where it breaks lines, how it ends. When a line gives you a jolt, stop and ask what caused the jolt. That question, asked a hundred times, is most of a poetry education.
Copying one poem out by hand sounds quaint and works strangely well. Your hand learns the pacing your eye skims past: how short the sentences are, how much white space the poet trusted, how little explaining happens.
Your first poems: rules that help
For the first month, constraints are kinder than freedom. A completely open page invites your most generic writing.
Build the habit before the skill
Skill follows volume. A poem a week, even a bad one, beats a masterpiece planned forever. Keep everything in one notebook or file, dated, and never delete: your tenth poem will be visibly better than your first, and that visible slope is what keeps beginners going. When you have half a dozen drafts you like, consider putting one in front of strangers. A monthly contest like Writory's, where every entrant gets a score across creativity, emotion, structure, language and theme, turns the terrifying question 'is this any good?' into actual information you can use.
What you can safely ignore for now
Beginners burn weeks worrying about the wrong things. You do not need to understand metre yet; free verse is a legitimate lifetime home. You do not need to rhyme; most contemporary published poetry does not. You do not need a defined style, a pen name, an Instagram strategy, or an opinion about the Romantics. You need thirty small true poems, written one at a time. Everything else is downstream of that pile.
What poets can take from this
- Read ten contemporary poems before writing your first.
- Write about small, specific things you could photograph.
- Keep first poems under 15 lines.
- Ban abstract words like love and soul for your first month.
- Date and keep every draft to see your progress.
- Aim for one poem a week rather than one perfect poem.
Try it yourself
Write a poem of 12 lines or fewer about the most ordinary object within arm's reach of you right now. Make the reader feel something about it by the last line without ever naming the feeling.
Questions
Do I need to read poetry to write it?
Yes, the way a musician needs to hear music. You do not need a literature degree, but writing poems without reading any is like cooking without ever tasting food. Ten good contemporary poems will teach you more than any single article.
Should my first poems rhyme?
Only if rhyme comes naturally to you. Forced rhyme distorts beginner poems more than any other habit, pushing you to say things you do not mean because they end in the right sound. Free verse is the friendlier starting point.
How long should a beginner's poem be?
Short. Somewhere between six and fifteen lines is ideal, long enough to build an image, short enough to force choices. Long poems hide weak lines; short ones teach you to find them.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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