How to Write Poetry for the Angsty 7th Grader Going Through an Emo Phase

by Ala Y

Immersed in Verse is subtitled as "An Informative, Slightly Irreverent & Totally Tremendous Guide to Living the Poet's Life." This book is about how to express oneself through, write, and revise poetry. There's many descriptions on different types of poems. It also includes different elements which can be used to strengthen one's poetry.

The book is written with an "inviting" tone of voice for the ambitious reader. The exemplary poems are interesting selections and great for discovering poets. The heavy illustration sometimes distracts from the message of the writing, which sucks. I did find some helpful tips like the writing habits advised in the first 20 pages of the book. The wording, although the book itself tells aspiring poets to build their vocabulary, is super basic. The book itself lacks in complexity. This is neither a good or bad thing, simply an observation.

Overall, I'm not going out of my way to purchase this book for reference later on (I found it in the media center at NHSS), but I might keep some notes from it in my writing journal for future reference. If you're new to poetry, check it out. If you've been exposed to poetry for a while, I'd look in another direction for a more intuitive guide.