my creativity is not to be controlled
During the seemingly endless internal dialogue (slash-fist-fight) I am always having with myself about what I am going to do after undergrad, I have stumbled into an epiphany: I don't think a graduate program in writing is what I want, despite thinking it was what I would always do.
Poetry as an artistic medium has undergone an intense hyper-professionalization in the last few decades, with a drastic increase in MFA/workshop/funded programs seeking to academize and commodify poets and poetry for the needs of the institution (to appear more cosmopolitan, maybe).
Institutions want to make art useful on their own terms. At the same time, there are no shared conventions, such as we have with prose, or with music. “Craft” is a dirty word; the past is erased (Mlinko, The New York Review).
While I don't disagree with the professionalization of poetry as a concept (career writers will always need financial support to create their art and I would never rebuke that), I don't know that I would thrive in an environment where my creative portfolio is the basis of my employment or where the workshop is the center of the art-making or sharpening process. I enjoy the act of comparing poetry with other writers in a workshop in theory, but I worry (with past workshop experience proving this true) that comparison and critique is where my motivation to write poetry goes to die. I love writing, and I want my writing to be read, but I have other things I could pursue in a professional environment more enjoyably than writing.
I thought for a while that the MFA route was the only way to become a professional writer. But I've learned, as I've met more and more career writers, that the term "professional" in spaces like creative writing doesn't necessarily mean a 9-5 behind the writer's desk. We can't all be Stephen King. If you're a poet, you're definitely not likely to be. Most of us have other jobs, other hobbies, and other passions to pursue alongside writing. In many cases, pursuing writing alone is considered a rare privilege. I discovered a passion for museum studies and archival work during undergrad which I am excited to explore. My initial plan of taking my writing to new professional and academic heights, meanwhile, has taken a backseat. Writing is one of the few things I feel truly gifted at, and I would rather hone a new passion and see where it takes me than begin to question one of the few joys I get between research and other projects, especially as I get older and extracurriculars fade into the background. There are niches within archival/museum work that I connect deeply with, such as literature and film, that I would love to learn about in a hands-on setting through internships or graduate programs.
So where does career writing come in? Especially considering that it is still a goal of mine, despite quieting in the face of new professional pursuits? Well, it may seem ridiculous, but I figure I will just continue to write. I regularly submit my work to literary journals, magazines, and websites, and I will keep it up. In many ways, my career has already begun and will continue alongside my other careers and pursuits, whatever they may be. When I work too closely with my poetry in an academic setting, I find that I read the poetry of others as a guide for being a poet writing poetry as opposed to being a person living her life, which is what poetry is about— life. My life should yield poetry, not the other way around.
I have an overactive imagination. Many, if not all, of the big decisions I have made in my life have been governed by the images my imagination comes up with. When I picture my life as a writer, full-stop, I see myself typing. I'm behind a desk. Maybe I'm on a university campus. Maybe I'm a professor there. Maybe this is what I do in my free time. When I picture myself pursuing this new passion for museum studies, I see myself walking through a hallway. I'm going somewhere. I'm not writing in that image, but I know I'm happy there.
I love literature. I love writing and poetry and the physical feeling of type on paper and talking about books and enjoying creative work. But when I see myself as a writer, full-stop, I am alone. When I see myself living my life otherwise, everything is amplified and visceral. Poetry is less a of a compulsion and more of a companion. I would like my writing, the endlessly generative and ungovernable force that it is, to be my friend through life. I do not wish to control it, nor do I wish it to control me.
I guess I have my answer.