One of the great things about this “As The Pizza Cooks” kind of writing is that it saves me from having to figure out titles. I hate figuring out titles for things. I remember in grade school they used to have these reading comprehension tests where you’d read a paragraph and then were asked to select the best title for it. I always got those wrong and never understood why. It’s also the among the most common criticisms I get with my poems in a poetry workshop.
Seriously, I can take a poem to a workshop, ask for input and I can almost guarantee that I’ll get two comments: This should be a longer poem and you need a better title.
I’m a bit traumatized about this so to avoid having that come up again on my blog, I just started using numbers as titles. Now, I do at least let you know if I’m talking about music or nothing (these pizza posts are about nothing, but you keep pressing the like button on them so here we are).
I didn’t sit down to talk about poem titles. Actually I’m a bit worried I might have a bit of a sinus infection, but what’s really on my mind is reading poetry out loud. You see, in those poetry workshops I attend, we read each other’s poem and then it’s open for comments about the poem. We do send a written version of the poem before the workshop so we can read it ahead of time and hopefully come up with something useful to say about it. The general idea is to say something that you liked, something you didn’t, something that you didn’t understand and offer an editing suggestion or two (all of which the writer is allowed to ignore completely).
But … I hate to admit the number of times I’ve read a poem, made detailed notes and thought I had something useful and helpful to say only to have the poet read their poem and my brain go, “Oh, that’s what you mean.” Then I drop everything I’d written beforehand about the poem and have to make up comments on the spot.
There is just something about hearing a poem vs. reading it that can often change my view of a poem — especially when it’s the writer of the poem who is reading aloud. I often find myself saying that I prefer to hear poems rather than read them. Poems are meant to be heard.
Currently I’m not in a regular poetry workshop group. Sadly there just aren’t that many in my area and I haven’t found a group that meets online, but I have found a number of places online that do regular readings of poetry. Some of these also do a bit of commentary on the poems while one has a Q&A session. Mostly these are podcasts which I can listen too while I’m in the workshop, but I did find one doing live readings with the real poets reading their own works.
Here’s a couple I like:
https://www.inflectionism.com/ The Infectionist Review is an online poetry journal that’s publish a couple of my favorite poets. They do a monthly poetry reading with a Q&A session.
Two Podcasts:
https://www.slowdownshow.org/ The Slow Down does a daily reading of a poem with commentary. They also have a daily mailing list with the poem of the day. I prefer the podcast.
https://onbeing.org/series/poetry-unbound/ Poetry Unbound is a weekly show by Padraig O Tuama, a great contemporary poet. There’s a lot to Padraig, and this is just his comments on poems he reads.
I used to listen to a woodworking podcast and a maker podcast but both ended their shows so now I’m picking up poetry and one theological one: https://thebiblefornormalpeople.com/podcast/ The Bible for Normal People. I don’t write much about my theology on this blog, but I do have beliefs, interests and opinions. Peter Enns, who started this podcast is a contemporary theologian and professor of Bible studies at St. Davids University. I like the fresh and uncomplicated interpretations he gives and the depth which his podcast goes. The podcasts are also long enough for me to get a fair amount of work done in my shop.
Well, that’s all I have time for as the timer just went off.
And maybe this will be a new feature, but here’s this week’s pizza:
The curst is Diane Henders recipe that she posted for me in a comment a few weeks ago. Worked great — well I guess it could be rounder or squarer or something. The toppings are spinach, pepperoni, olives, mushrooms and red onion. Yum.
Andrew's View of the Week 
The pizza looks delicious. I like to think about appropriate titles but don’t really need them for my regular posts. I am learning about poetry in WordPress. Thank you for the links.
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It was. WP likes to format things oddly, but there are ways around that.
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The pizza dough looks great! Love all the toppings. Poetry, I’ve never read much I have to admit.
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We love our pizza!
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I like the reference to St Davids University 🙂 I’m also glad to read Diane’s pizza crust is a winner; I have the recipe printed out and ready to go in my kitchen. As for poetry, it’s an interesting observation about reading it vs. hearing it. Maybe that’s why I’m not much of a fan. My preference has always been reading. When I listen to something I tend to get distracted by whatever else I’m doing. I need to find a hobby where I can put a podcast on in the background. Working in the garage + radio baseball broadcasts seems to work for me but of course baseball doesn’t require the same concentration as poetry.
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It’s a little different in a poetry workshop where you’re focus is on the reader and what they are reading. I don’t listen to poetry in the workshop, but I do listen to podcasts out there.
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Your pizza looks delicious, and I’m glad the crust recipe worked for you!
What a cool thought about poetry. The difference between hearing and reading a poem had never occurred to me, but you’re right: Back in the (long-ago) days when I was in high school English classes, poems read aloud always seemed to resonate better. Especially, as you noted, when the author is the one reading. I’m off to check out your links now – thanks! :-)
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It was yummy and I have leftovers for today’s lunch! I think read and hearing send the poem through different parts of our brain so we experience the poem differently depending on how we receive the words.
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One thing I dislike about posting Amazon reviews is I have to come up with a title. I’ve started including them in the review so I can simply grab them when it’s time to post.
And about your reaction to changing your thoughts on a poem after hearing the poet read it–maybe you shouldn’t. Maybe your thoughts are simply fresh insight. Just a thought.
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Often it’s the fresh insight I’m getting. Also sometimes the writer’s voice inflection or timing in reading changes how I react to a word or line in the poem. Not all the time, but often enough that I want to read and hear a poem before commenting on it.
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Good morning, Andrew. I hear you on the ‘title’ thing. I began my blogging over at a website called Lumberjocks and I had over 1600 blog posts. (You read that right!) I began posting every day and it became a habit. That means I had conjoured up over 1600 titles. :O Now I post once a week and it is still difficult for me to come up with one sometimes. I find that waiting until the post is finished gives me a clearer direction of what to title it. Sometimes I used to title it first and then I would wind up changing it because I would go off in another direction. I write stream of consciousness most times so this works for me.
Anyway – your pizza looks yummy! Thanks as always for your insightful posts. Have a great week! 🙂
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I first came across you on Lumberjocks, but I was never that active on the site. On a lot of my blog writing, the title isn’t that important to me, but when it matters, I do spend a few more brain cells to figure it out.
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I’m not a fan of listening to poems, but I find that I need to ponder them a couple of times. Your book of poems is so compelling that I look forward to your next one.
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It might be a couple of more years before that one is complete – I’m a slow writer.
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Could be because you have so many other interests!
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could be … 😉
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I’m with you on titles. In my case, for sermons.
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Yes, if you do that every week you start to run out. I’ve done some lay preaching and have titled more than one, “Message for This Week …”
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