[quote=orpheus]I was never a poet, just a scribbling bleater trying to make sense of the world. A poem is the product of a feeling, a thought that may well up from some place familiar but unexplored. A person in touch with their feelings may write poetry but a philosopher will write on the basis of rationalised sensations. Poets will always start with a feeling, and more is the pity when rationalising takes over and makes x and y axes of it all - rhyme and meter and all that. 
It appears to me that all the poets here begin with a feeling and then some allow their heads to give form to whatever their hearts express. I approach it thus, and I believe many others appear to as well.
Write more poems, even if they feel second-rate - one can rationalise them into shape later.
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