The trick to writing better than you can

[PrinceMyshkin]

The trick to writing
better than you can
is to get out of the room
where the writing’s being done.
Do something low,
something unworthy, but
above all, do something else!

Get yourself out of the room.
Better still, out of the house.
Best of all, get out of the country!

Put on some women’s undergarments.
I hear they flatter the skin
and act as a spur to the imagination.
Think a wholly impure thought.
Vote for the other party.

[Haunted]

Sound advice Prince, I got to try your method, I have no qualms about putting on women’s undergarments..... But even if none of the above works for me the poem would still stay with me just for the fun of it.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Sound advice Prince, I got to try your method, I have no qualms about putting on women’s undergarments..... But even if none of the above works for me the poem would still stay with me just for the fun of it.

Apropos women's undergarments, I did want to make that reference gender-neutral, but I lacked either the poetic skill or the patience to make that fit into a line.

[hillwalker]

Your devilish wit shines through again, Prince.

Are we to presume this methodology has worked for you in the past?

H :v)

[PrinceMyshkin]

Your devilish wit shines through again, Prince.

Are we to presume this methodology has worked for you in the past?

H :v)

Yes, indeed. keep your eyes peeled for "The Maker of the Poem: WB Yeats" coming soon to a screen near you. But perhaps equally well as the aforementioned technique is a bit of delusional-mindedness. I.e., the poem was inspired by a comment I thought Paul Simon made in his review of Stephen Sondheim's memoir, Finishing the Hat where I believed Simon wrote that when he came up with the line "Like a bridge over troubled waters" he reflected that he didn't know he could write that well.

Thence my poem. AND YET, after multiple re-readings of that article, and even down-loading it so that I could do a search for the relevant words, I could not find it!!! So indeed I must have been in some other room when I read it and when I wrote my poem in response.

[Delta40]

Yes. I've been stuck in this room too long. I promise to go out into the sun today.

[JMJ]

Good, well-written advice. Hard to come by these days. Thanks PrinceMyshkin.

[Jerrybaldy]

personally I always imagined you wrote with silk against your skin

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thanks Delta, JMJ & JerryBaldy

[dibyendra]

I liked your witty and unusual advices! :) Thanks PrinceMyshkin! Putting women's undergarment is quite unusual trick to better writing :).

[MANICHAEAN]

Prince

I took your advice,
And went out of the room.
Slipped into my silk Janet Reger.

But where is the spark,
That is but divine,
To make me a literary raver?

For I cannot but baulk,
At the challenge you pose,
In girls underwear to feel hearty.

My mother will see me,
My dad won't be pleased,
And my sister will join theTea Party.

Can I, but please,
Prince Myshkin, I plead,
Stick to Y fronts in which I feel hot.

To knock out my lines on a sweet summer's night,
And still feel I know what I've got.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thanks Dibyendra, and


Prince

I took your advice,
And went out of the room.
Slipped into my silk Janet Reger.

But where is the spark,
That is but divine,
To make me a literary raver?

For I cannot but baulk,
At the challenge you pose,
In girls underwear to feel hearty.

My mother will see me,
My dad won't be pleased,
And my sister will join theTea Party.

Can I, but please,
Prince Myshkin, I plead,
Stick to Y fronts in which I feel hot.

To knock out my lines on a sweet summer's night,
And still feel I know what I've got.




This is a gloriously funny response to my original bit of advice but in answer to your dilemma, here's a further bit of advice: to the best of your ability, imagine yourself a woman and then put on your beloved Y fronts and write your next poem that way!

[MANICHAEAN]

Not tonight Prince I've got a headache.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Not tonight Prince I've got a headache.

Wonderful! Reminds of the joke about the guy who comes home. drunk and somewhat horny. Goes into the bathroom, extracts a couple of aspirins and carries them into his bedroom where his wife is fast asleep, her mouth slightly open. He drops the aspirin into her open mouth, which wakes her up.

"What was that?" she asks.

Couple of aspirin," he answers.

"But I don't have a head-ache!" she says.

"That's all I wanted to know," he says...