I always carry a notebook and a couple of pens. If I don’t write down my ideas immediately, there’s almost a 100 percent chance that I’ll forget them. As soon as I saw that dancing-banana card, I wrote down my idea. It was the same in the novelty store. That flying hot dog poem would not exist if I hadn’t written down my idea for the poem at once.
Another very important thing about writing is rewriting. I doubt that I’ve ever written a poem that came out exactly right the first time. Every poem I write gets rewritten at least once, and most get rewritten half a dozen times or more. As I said, I rewrote that hot dog poem several hundred times. I don’t expect you to do that, but you should look closely at what you’ve written and ask yourself if there’s a way that you could improve it. I ask myself that question a lot, and the answer is always yes! Sometimes there are whole sections or lines of a poem that can be made better, and sometimes it’s just a matter of a single word.
Many years ago I wrote a poem about a fire-eater. I had him swallowing all sorts of embers and coals but couldn’t quite find the word I wanted to have him finish his hot meal. I decided that it would be fitting to wash down all that fire with lemonade but still couldn’t find the perfect verb. That’s when I went to a book I always have on my desk, a thesaurus. It’s probably my most useful reference book and has helped me solve problems thousands of times.
Eventually I found the word that I was looking for. The word is extinguish. Once I saw it in the thesaurus, it seemed obvious. I strongly suggest that you keep a thesaurus around when you’re writing, whether it’s poetry or prose. A rhyming dictionary helps too.
thesaurus: a special kind of dictionary that groups words with the same meaning. Suppose you’re looking for another word for big. In the thesaurus you’ll find that similar words are large, great, huge, enormous, and so on. This is a very useful book for writers. You should be able to find one in your school or public library.
rhyming dictionary: a reference book that lists more rhymes than you could possibly think of. I find it invaluable. You should be able to find one in your school or public library.