I draft poems and rewrite poems by hand and my process is messy and, I admit, I am a little disorganized and chaotic. I was sure I had this particular poem in a particular pile written on card stock (for some reason). But I can\u2019t find it. I\u2019ve looked everywhere and even looked (yes) in my computer with the idea maybe I already put it into an electronic form by accident.\u00a0 But I can\u2019t find it anywhere.<\/p>\n
I never dare put a poem in electronic form until I am sure I am close to done, at least for the solid first draft. As I rework the poem I edit by hand and again, when I am sure, I commit to electronic form.\u00a0 I always have felt it is a betrayal of the poem to put it into the computer before I have worked with it a bit.\u00a0 Guilty? Yes, I feel guilty if I don\u2019t work with it by hand.<\/p>\n
Now\u2026I have lost a poem and I know I have also lost other poems in the past as I have also lost other things in life \u2013 as Elizabeth Bishop of course would understand – but I was quite sure this poem was in a specific pile. I need to look at the pile again and maybe turn each sheet upside down in case my lines were on the back of the paper, not the front, as I first assumed.<\/p>\n
Nope, there are no edited poems on the back of these pieces of paper. There are other places to look also \u2013 even though I know the poem isn\u2019t there. I\u2019ll look in my desk and under the bed. \u00a0Under the bed is highly unlikely but if I was working with the poem as I was going to sleep it might have slipped underneath.<\/p>\n
It isn\u2019t in either place.\u00a0 I\u2019ll look again in the pile and maybe again in my computer in another folder thinking maybe I did decide to put it in electronic form already and may have misfiled it under another folder. For instance, instead of the folder for poetry maybe under \u2018Finances\u201d or \u201cPhotos\u201d or \u201cResume\u201d. But no, it is not misplaced in a folder.<\/p>\n
I had rewritten the piece substantially and now I am not feeling so much defeated as annoyed. On the surface I would claim mild defeat but inside it is more annoyance, irritation. And if I can\u2019t remember all the edits (I know there is a stanza three quarters of the way in that is lost to me) so I will begin to rewrite.<\/p>\n
I know in the past I have lost poems and little pieces of paper with snippets of lines or images written down quickly. My filing system used to be messier but I do think when it was messier I actually lost less. I am trying to be more organized and was sure that poem was in the pile. I think I will look again.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Melissa Hotchkiss<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I draft poems and rewrite poems by hand and my process is messy and, I admit, I am a little disorganized and chaotic. I was sure I had this particular poem in a particular pile written on card stock (for some reason). But I can\u2019t find it. I\u2019ve looked everywhere and even looked (yes) in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":289,"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286\/revisions\/289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.theurbanrange.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}