Lacking inspiration? Try cut-up poems
Ever felt like inspiration has just… vanished? It happens. One of the important things all writers have to learn is how to write when you’re uninspired. I’m going to share my top tip - maybe if you try it, you’ll learn a bit more about what works for you.
My go-to when I’m feeling uninspired are cut-up poems. This is where you take a source text, cut it up and rearrange words, sparking a fresh poem. Some step by step instructions on how I do this (there’s no secret sauce, other people do it differently):
1) Find a source text. This can be a magazine article, something from a newspaper, an advert. Scientific papers are often good. Sometimes I walk around outside and write down phrases I can see from signposts, billboards, shops. Or I scour the internet looking for odd sounding phrases.
Side note: try not to do this with fiction, song lyrics or other people’s poetry. You want fresh phrases that you’ve put together, not someone else’s. Ditto when it comes to slogans or other poetic phrases in copywriting/advertising. Use judgement. Don’t steal someone’s cool word pairing. You want to spark ideas, not nick ‘em.
2) Make sure you have a printed copy, either torn out of the magazine or printed off your device. Technically you can do it on a screen but I find this rarely works. Now, use a pair of scissors to cut out words and phrases. Aim for around 20 - anything that strikes you - and lay them out on a table.
Side note: aim for images. By image, I mean something that’s tangible, a concrete noun like ‘sparrow’ or ‘snowflake’. These are different to abstract nouns like ‘love’ or ‘winter’. If you have only abstract words, your poem may come out a bit vague and high minded. Look for visual words, colours, textures. Also grab words that interesting you because of their shape or sound, like ‘flabbergast’. Cut out words that catch your eye.
3) Move the words around on a table and see which words touch each other in strange places. There’s no formula for this. It’s play. See what pairings are odd - ‘marmalade’ next to ‘vanishing ice’ for example. See what sounds fresh. Try a few different pairings, space them out. Do this intuitively, trust yourself.
4) Write up your poem. When you’ve found a nice set of pairings, or some phrases that sound interesting, type it up or write it out long hand. This is draft 1. Now, you can either scramble the words on your table and do some new combinations, or edit the poem you’ve just made.
5) Edit your poem. The idea is to take the kernel of what you’ve laid out from the cut up words and refine it. Maybe the poem needs a bit more concrete imagery. Maybe some of the pairings sound odd rather than exciting. Maybe that line would sound better with a verb in it. Remember, there’s no need to stay wedded to your original way of laying out words, take the inspiration you’ve got and run with it.
And there you have it - inspiration gathered from a cut-up poem.
Coda: what happens if it’s rubbish?
Good question. Sometimes I do the cut up process and what comes out is a bit lame. Usually, this is because I’ve chosen a text with too much abstract stuff in it, or I need a better theme (eg. nature, urban streets, food). Sometimes, if the source text is about lots of different things, there’s no theme or what we call ‘semantic field’ of words. Without the theme or semantic field, it doesn’t hang together.
If this happens, you can either find another article that’s a bit more cohesive and work with that, or pick a phrase that was interesting and try writing a poem from it.
All of this is springboard work, getting out of your head and into writing mode. Don’t overthink it. Good luck!
Poetic health warning: Do not use whole phrases from adverts or song lyrics. If your poem gets super famous or you try and publish it, copyright laws exist and you don’t want to get on the wrong side of them. Best to stay away from these source texts, or be sure to scramble them unrecognisably.