Revision, upon further reading, of my ten rules:
10 Rules (For Writing Like Glenn Taylor)
1. Use music as inspiration during the whole process, whatever you define the “process” to be.
2. Keep it short and sweet.
3. Make line-length flexible and variable.
4. Make sure the poem is aurally/sonically tight.
5. Compose mainly in the first person.
6. Avoid abstractions for abstraction’s sake.
7. When debating between simile and metaphor: metaphor.
8. Focus more on the emotions, not the intellectual.
9. Use allusions/facts/knowledge to ground the poem in reality.
10. Make use of the major theme of relationships (living or non-living) in the poem.
I feel more comfortable with "this" set, as it is much more refined/imperative (this is where I went after initial posting and thinking/revision), and I think it addresses something more directly in my previous posts--figures of speech. While wit/[black/off-] humor is a part of who I am as a poet, I think a "bigger" rule concerns the use of figures of speech. Metaphors win, as noted by the previous entry, on account of their (or what I perceive to be their) directness or precision in terms of "meaning." And, I can definitely see how these rules can begin to overlap/blend to form the harmonious (e.g., injecting fact-based metaphors to take abstractions beyond the state of simply "existing" as abstractions). With that in mind, I a) may edit my previous analysis (or "checklist") of a poem entitled "Laws of Motion" or b) just keep this in mind with future projects specifically for this class.
Whew.
Also--should these all begin as "must" e.g. must use music...?
-Glenn
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