I’ve got a lot of friends doing NaNoWriMo, otherwise known as National Novel Writing Month. I’ll join them next year. This year, I’m going for the poetry. My friend Pamela wrote about her Challenge Prep for the November PAD Chapbook Challenge and I figure I need to get back on the poetry horse sometime. Why not November? Maybe I can’t commit to writing a novel, but a first draft of a poem each day seems within my current reach.

I wrote recently about How to Focus Your Writing Time. Writing challenges offer the external structure that a creative writer normally lacks. And when you get a structure, it will help you learn more about yourself as a writer.

Here’s what I’ve learned so far:

1. I choose the short form, again. As an undergrad, I took fiction, playwriting, and poetry. Grad school was for poetry. Why? It was shorter. While I could come back to a poem repeatedly to revise and craft new drafts, the sense of accomplishment was tangible with poetry in a way that longer forms didn’t offer me.
2. Even if the Writer’s Digest site is down and there is no prompt for the day, I will make no excuses. I will use one of their previous prompts and write, write like the wind.
3. I can’t write like the wind on a computer. At least not poetry. I need a pen in my hand. Damn the ring finger callous that will reappear and the blue ballpoint ink stains. I will wear them with pride.
4. Just thinking about writing poetry puts clichés in my head. Ezra Pound’s command to “Make it new” begins looping an instruction for me to imagine a new life for language.
5. I fit in my skin better when I’m writing poetry. I’ve spent years reading and writing it, taking classes and talking to people about it, organizing events so people can perform it. It’s like going back to my hometown. I recognize the landmarks.

So whether you want to participate in NaNoWriMo, the Nov PAD Chapbook Challenge, or create a challenge for yourself (like blogging every day in November), what will you do this month to give yourself a little structure?