I'm going to quit today.
No, tomorrow.
Well, I can write some small poem and publish it.
One poem, no big deal, right?
These are some of the thoughts I've been having since joining the 100 day poetry challenge started by @d-pend. I like the challenge a lot (see also my first post & my thoughts on it back then). It makes people write and reflect on their lives daily and constructively. I have written daily poetry before, poem-a-day series where sometimes for months I wrote a poem each day. Especially when I was travelling or living in a new place. The poems I have from those days are not really good, but they are valuable to me, as they show me who I was and what I was dealing with at the time.
So I got really excited about this challenge when I read about it. Because I would like to do that again, and to share it with people around me, on steemit, to rejoice in the power of writing and reflecting like that. But after one week, I have to be honest to myself. There are quite some aspects to this whole challenge that I do not like.
The problem of mediocrity
Everyone should write whatever they want, obviously. That doesn't mean I should like to read whatever it is that is written. And adding unedited drizzle to steemit is not something I like. Poetry can be like that, including my own. And that's no problem, because the aim of this challenge is to write, to get out the words, to commit to something daily and to get your writing muscles flexed. Why then would we also want to force ourselves to publish that online?
In my own writing I try to move beyond ranting, stream-of-consciousness writing. I have nothing against that type of writing, just don't consider myself important enough to also publish them. So I try to not just put random things online, I consider each word (especially in poetry) and most of all... I endeavour TO EDIT everything to reach some sort of standard. This takes a lot of time. Time that is necessary. But also time I actually have to and want to spend on other writing projects I have at the moment, and which are more important for some reasons. I have been writing more poems than one per day, in order to make it possible to have time to edit them, to let them rest at least one day before posting them online. But this completely defeats the purpose of the challenge (or at least my challenge): which is to write daily poetry.
The problem of community and rules
Another aspect that I struggle with, is the way this challenge seems to be for people a way to get known. The initiative was beautiful, but due to the sheer amount of people who joined (possibly also spurred on by the fact that there are monetary prizes to be had), the organizers have a tough time. Going through everything, making lists. Daily poetry voice chats. All things I appreciate, don't get me wrong. But it's something I'm not interested in. I don't relate well to other poets as a community. Some individuals I can deal with and I already like how through this challenge I found some poets I really like. BUt I cannot deal with, and don't have the patience to be part of a forum where most people, despite the best intentions of some hard working admins, seem to only come to get upvotes. Posting their steemit-links several times and disappearing again. And if I didn't know any better, I would probably be okay with that. But I know it is also possible to have another type of community, which I have already found in @thewritersblock, so I also haven't really tried with the Steemit School. So I hope people will understand this is all on me, and my expectations and longing, and has very little to do with the intentions and work of other people.
I just received this comment by @d-pend on this short haiku, which made me finally decide that it is time to re-evaluate my own intentions. I understand why there need to be guidelines when there is a contest involved, but both the daily-publishing and the amount of lines as a minimum to make up a poem go far beyond my own desire to write more poetry. In my day-to-day life as a writer I face so many guidelines and requirements I need to fit to. Academic journals, publishers. Steemit for me is a place where I am able to set my own standards, even if that means that nobody will understand what I am saying or when nobody reads what I'm saying.
So I could just continue and let the haikus not count -- I can have 10 off days of the total 100 days, so that would mean 10% haiku would make me stay in the clear. Or I could start faking things, put one letter per line, and be fulfilling the requirements. But that is just not interesting to me.
Is there a solution? Yes!
I love this challenge as it makes me write. I do not like that I have to get it into a specific shape & of high enough quality to have it on the blockchain forever. In the present form, I will not be able to keep it up, as it goes against my intentions for steem. But I found a simple solution. I have decided to go old-school. I will continue the challenge and write poetry each day for 100 days and keep up my pledge to this contest. But I will do so in my private notebook. (You know, pen and paper and all that.) And the poems will remain in that notebook. I will probably write some updates on steem, maybe once a week.
I am definitely aware that this goes against the intentions of @d-pend to have more poetry on this platform. And I am also aware that I will not be able to be counted as having finished this challenge by the end of the 100 days. Nor will any of my poetry be considered for his daily prizes. But that's okay. This challenge to me is not about the applaus of others.
And I do think I will be posting more poetry here than I used to, because that is how things go, when you write poetry every day. Yet I will remain in charge of the quality and the timing. And that's also what writing is about for me. To find one's own voice and develop quality that you believe in, amidst the spreadsheets of the world.