Ars Poetica – Ilse Kramer

Ars Poetica

By Ilse Kramer

Poetry does not reflect a specific mood of the poet, rather he uses words to create a mood which every reader knows and understands.

While writing, the poet’s mind is taken upward to a level higher than his usual awareness.

He looks at happiness and sadness from the outside in.

In poetry, mind and soul are working together to express the truth and the essence of things existing.

The poet looks at the subject of a poem (a flower, parting, young love) and makes the reader see more than he ever has before.

Poetry is identification. For instance, dancing stands for joy, daffodils become a symbol for spring.

Poets have to be bold. They plunge into the dark unknown, uncertain whether they will find the beautiful or the grotesque, whether there will be something which causes pain or jubilation or peace.

Rage is forbidden while composing poetry, unless it is a rage already brought under control.

Poetry creates and recalls memories. The poet paints a word picture of something experienced by the reader, or he describes something which will happen in the future and
then be recognized by the reader.

Writing poetry is playing with words,which is no easy task, because all the words chosen have to be the right ones, they have to fit into the place where they belong, and finally they have to have the best possible sound.

Shakespeare talks about the role and importance of imagination.
He says “The lunatic, the lover and the poet Are of imagination all compact.”

Rainer Maria Rilke speaks of the similarity of poetry and physical love.
In his Letters to a Young Poet he declares: “And in fact artistic experience lies so incredibly close to that of sex, to its pain and ecstasy that the two manifestations are indeed but different forms of one and the same yearning and delight.”

The writing of poetry takes solitude, chosen isolation. Nobody can hold the poet’s hand when he is forming his lines and verses, he has to do it by himself.

Poetry is the slaying of dragons. The dragon of the fear of the unfamiliar, the dragon of being unconnected, the dragon of nothingness.


Ilse Kramer

Ilse Kramer

Ilse Kramer is the Poet Laureate of Central Congregational Church. She continues to prod church members to dip their toes into the poetry pool.

Posted in Poet Laureate.