Nikki Moustaki

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In 2001 publiceerde Nikki Moustaki ‘The complete Idiot’s Guide to writing Poetry’. Een boek over poëzie en het schrijven van poëzie, met tips en adviezen om meer uit het creatieve schrijfproces te halen en advies over te gebruiken vormen van poëzie.

Het boek is opgedeeld in een aantal hoofdstukken met verschillende paragrafen. Zo zijn de hoofdstukken getiteld: What is poetry and how do I write it, Opening the stanza’s  door: entering poetry, Popular types of poems and how to write them, en Poetry and practicality.

Een leuk en leerzaam boek voopr elke dichter die verder wil komen, die zijn of haar grenzen wil verleggen of gewoon nieuwsgierig is naar een boek over poëzie.

Het boek is te koop voor het luttele bedrag van $1,99 (tweedehands) via Amazon.com maar je kunt het boek ook gratis als E-book lezen via Google books.  (ga naar Google, boeken en typ de titel in).

Nikki Moustaki is is schrijfster van boeken over exotische vogels. Ze heeft een master degree in creative writing poetry van de New York University, een master of fine arts in creative writing poetry, van de Indiana University, master of fine arts in creative writing fiction, aan de New York University. Daarnaast heeft ze inmiddels verschillende prijzen gekregen voor haar literaire werk.

Na de tragedie van 11 september in New York schreef Nikki het gedicht ‘How to write a poem after september 11th’

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How to write a poem after september 11th’

First: Don’t use the word souls. Don’t use the word fire.

You can use the word tragic if you end it with a k.

The rules have changed. The word building may precede

The word fall, but only in the context of the buildings falling

Before the fall, the season we didn’t have in Manhattan

Because the weather refused, the air refused . . .

Don’t say the air smelled like smoldering desks and drywall,

Ground gypsum, and something terribly organic,

Don’t make a metaphor about the smell, because it wasn’t

A smell at all, but the air washed with working souls,

Piling bricks, one by one, spreading mortar.

Don’t compare the planes to birds. Please.

Don’t call the windows eyes. We know they saw it coming.

We know they didn’t blink. Don’t say they were sentinels.

Say: we hated them then we loved them then they were gone.

Say: we miss them. Say: there’s a gape. Then, say something

About love. It’s always good in a poem to mention love.

Say: If a man walks down stairs, somewhere

Another man is walking up. Say: He sits at his desk

And the other stands. He answers the phone and the other

Ends a call with a kiss. So, on a rainy dusk in some other

City of Commerce and Art, a mayor cuts a ribbon

With giant silver scissors. Are you writing this down?

Make the executives parade through the concourse,

Up the elevators, to the top, where the restaurant,

Open now for the first time, sets out a dinner buffet.

Press hard. Remember you’re writing with ashes.

Say: the phone didn’t work. Say: the bakery was out of cake,

The dogs in the pound howled. Say: the world hadn’t

Asked your permission to change. But you were asleep.

If only you had written more poems. If only you had written

More poems about love, about peace, about how abstractions

Become important outside the poem, outside. Then, then,

You could have squinted into the sky on September 11th

And said: thank you, thank you, nothing was broken today.

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