Pedgogy Forum, week 4

Criticism is a difficult craft to master. I found this out first hand before our last class. As I was critiquing Randie and Trista's poems, I kept thinking that they seemed fairly strong. I discovered some minor problems, but ultimately felt that they contained strong imagery and evocative messages that were trimmed of excess baggage. I struggled with what to say and what not to, and how to say it. However, as we dissected each poem in class, I was inrigued by how much a knew but failed to express. Time and again other classmates expressed ideas that had crossed my mind, but that I never wrote down or didn't know how to. It was comforting to know that if I was confused by the speaker's place in a poem, others were too. I also learned that I often am expecting too much from my reader in my own writing. In the past, I always figured it was my poem so who cares what anyone else thinks? It makes since, however, that if we expect others to read our stuff, we have an obligation to make it possible.