Re: how to get started writing poetry
The most important thing is to read poems, then write, then edit.
If you worry to much about what you're writing as you write, you strangle the good ideas and the bad, so let your writing happen, then worry at it later. No-one will see it unless you show it, so don't be afraid to write badly.
There's some fantastic advice from the North-East poet basil Bunting, that I try to remember but constantly forget when I write- it's true, I think, for all writing, not just poetry.
I'd also suggest a basic understanding of main poetic forms (blank verse, iambic pentameter, scansion and so on)- though this helps really with understanding how poems work-I find it more helpful to actually read poems of a type, rather than an academic explanation of type.
ADVICE TO YOUNG POETS- BASIL BUNTING
I SUGGEST
1. Compose aloud; poetry is a sound.
2. Vary rhythm enough to stir the emotion you want but not so as to lose impetus.
3. Use spoken words and syntax.
4. Fear adjective; they bleed nouns. Hate the passive.
5. Jettison ornament gaily but keep shape
Put your poem away till you forget it, then:
6. Cut out every word you dare.
7. Do it again a week later, and again.
Never explain - your reader is as smart as you.
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