So in-between the usual daily house/children busyness, today I've been battling with finalizing the line-breaks on a poem to be published in the next Horizon Review. It's finding that balance between how I read the poem, how it looks on the page (screen), and imagining how other folk are going to read it.

I mainly break my lines according to natural pauses when I read it aloud and what I particularly want to emphasize. For a long time (so it seemed to me) I was stuck writing in three-line verses, I found it hard to shake that off. Now I've found a freedom in not keeping to the same number of lines in every stanza but this introduces the problem of when to have a stanza break and how does it look on the page if, for instance, I have a three-liner followed by a two-liner followed by a one-liner!
Anyway, I think (I hope) I got there in the end.

Very much stuck on a poem at the moment, I have plenty imagery and theme but it's not working, I think I'm trying too hard to force it together. So often I feel when starting a poem, from the very first line, that I'm working toward reaching the end of it as quickly as possible so as not to mess it up!

I had the wonderful experience last night of discovering poems by a poet I had not come across before that have completely blown me away. I was randomly listening to poets reading their poems at the Poetry Archive website (a fantastic resource) when I clicked on the name Jean Valentine. The rich imagery, the dream imagery and the tautness of her language appeal to me hugely. I can't wait for a chance to order a book of her poetry.