Poetry 101 :D

Some days just have moods of their own. Today was one such day. Lazy beginnings, clear skies, warm delightful movies (My Fair Lady, While you were sleeping), friends and loved ones and then amazing ghazals. The mood of the entire day was one of unhurried joy and laidback comfort. So basically a day when thoughts kept flitting in and out of my mind... lingering and teasing, resting and moving on. The ghazals made me think of poetry in general and word pictures that some people are so amazingly able to paint!

I don't always understand poetry. Sometimes it is because the words used are way beyond my vocabulary, sometimes because the emotion/situation within the lines is not of my life, of my experience. But some words, some lines, some poems cannot but leave you untouched! I had heard this quote somewhere "Sometimes someone says something really small and it just fits right into this empty place in your heart." And beautiful poignant poetry does that to you, leaves you feeling like you just had to listen to those lines atleast once in your life! Perhaps it is because of the pictures that those words paint, perhaps they let you travel back and forth in time. You can relive old times, remember the happiness, the pain, the laughter and tears. You can dream of the future or even dream of things that you know are improbabilities in your life. But even those few moments of dreams are worth the regret of knowing that they shall perhaps never come true.

Some poetry is for the solitary soul, some for crowds, some is for when you are with friends or family, some for when you are with a special someone. I think not all poetry is perfect for me. What you like may not evoke a similar reaction from me. Some lines might actually make me imagine a fragrant breeze, the whisper of waves on the shore or even show me glimpses of the lives of the people whose story unfolds in those lines. Some make me smile gently to myself, others make me laugh out loud or even bring forth unwilling tears. But the wonderful part is that there is always some poetry for everybody. You just have to find your kind. Someone has already written it, or shall write it for you. Best of all, may be you can write poetry for yourself. You never know what is hidden within you till you actually begin to search :)

Also, the same poem can mean so many different things to different people. Each person has his or her own interpretation irrespective of what the poet initially meant to convey. That is the entire beauty of it. The freedom to love and understand something without rules. Seriously, when first attempting to read poetry and to understand it, if we go beyond the figures of speech and the rhyme scheme and all that and just get to the meaning and depth of the poem, then poetry will be dear to so many more people. The rhyme scheme is important but secondary to the story that the poem means to tell. The rhythm, the words and their awesome power and the figures of speech make it all richer, but it is the original idea that makes up most of the magic.

I am sure each one of you has a couple of lines of some poem, song, ghazal that has lingered in your mind way after you heard it or read it. Perhaps you could leave those lines here as comments for this post :)