A poet asks for Alison Chisholm’s advice on redrafting an image-filled poem inspired by illness
One of the hardest questions to answer as a poet is how much revision does the poem need, and how much more would squeeze the life out of it. Unfortunately there is no simple answer. Every poem is different, with its unique trigger and the special fingerprint of its construction and development. While a poem in a set form has a recognised shape to define it, a free verse poem needs to devise its own shape even as its message unfolds.