How to Write a Romantic Love Poem

Video Transcript

"So you want to write a romantic love poem. Now why are you writing it? If you are writing it because you want to get published that's a whole other set of problems. I'm here to tell you how to write it to someone you love. First stop worrying you already know in some way what you want to say. It doesn't have to rhyme, it doesn't have to have a regular meter to it, what it has to be is honest. But you don't just want to say I love you, I love you, I love you, that's boring. It's honest but it's boring so what you want to do is you want to find an image, find some image that explores your love or that you can compare your beloved to and explore that image, expand on it deepen the expression of your own emotions. My favorite love poem is by Shakespeare of course, Sonnet 18, "Shall I compare these to a Summer's Day, Thou Art More Lovely and More Temperate. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May and Summer's lease hath all too short a date". He is comparing his beloved with a Summer's day and through the poem what he is comparing his beloved with expands. A Summer's day, the month of May, the entire season and eventually with all of time, the conclusion of the poem is that the poem and his love are greater even than the eternity of time. So he takes this small comparison and he explores it and he expands it and he becomes well one of the greatest love poems ever written. Yours may not be the greatest ever written but if you are honest and you find your image, your gimmick and go at it and look for the truth, it will be successful."