"I think that there are fiction writers for whom that works well. I could never do it. I feel as if, by the time I see that it's a poem, it's almost written in my head somewhere"
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Olds is swatting away the romantic myth of the poet as a diligent carpenter, planing language into shape line by line. Her confession is almost the opposite: craft matters, but the first decisive act is recognition, not construction. “By the time I see that it’s a poem” suggests an internal threshold moment when experience snaps into a form that feels inevitable. The poem isn’t drafted into existence so much as retrieved, as if it’s been quietly assembling offstage.
The quick nod to “fiction writers” does a lot of cultural work. It positions fiction as a medium where outlining, engineering, and revision can be primary engines, then marks her own practice as resistant to that kind of procedural control. Not superior, just incompatible. That modesty is strategic: she’s not dunking on fiction; she’s defining a temperament. Olds’ poems often pull from intensely personal material, and the line implies that the ethical and emotional risk of that material demands immediacy. If you over-design the encounter, you might sand off the pulse.
There’s also a subtle power claim hidden in the self-deprecation. Saying the poem is “almost written” in her head frames inspiration as a kind of authority: the poem arrives with its own instructions, and the poet’s job is to listen accurately enough to get it down. That’s not laziness; it’s a discipline of attention. The subtext is a warning about forcing form onto content. For Olds, the poem declares itself, and revision is less invention than fidelity.
The quick nod to “fiction writers” does a lot of cultural work. It positions fiction as a medium where outlining, engineering, and revision can be primary engines, then marks her own practice as resistant to that kind of procedural control. Not superior, just incompatible. That modesty is strategic: she’s not dunking on fiction; she’s defining a temperament. Olds’ poems often pull from intensely personal material, and the line implies that the ethical and emotional risk of that material demands immediacy. If you over-design the encounter, you might sand off the pulse.
There’s also a subtle power claim hidden in the self-deprecation. Saying the poem is “almost written” in her head frames inspiration as a kind of authority: the poem arrives with its own instructions, and the poet’s job is to listen accurately enough to get it down. That’s not laziness; it’s a discipline of attention. The subtext is a warning about forcing form onto content. For Olds, the poem declares itself, and revision is less invention than fidelity.
Quote Details
| Topic | Poetry |
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