Poet’s Statement

The Tree Outside My Window



There are times in life when amazing things happen. You are filled with excitement and experience great happiness. There are also times when things don’t go your way. Bad things happen, a friend lets you down, or you experience major disappointments. You can be sick or suffering from a broken bone or lose someone close to you like your grandpa. At these times, I often think things over from my bed, staring out the window, thinking the rest of the world is feeling the same.

There is a tree right outside my bedroom window. It is always there and it makes me think about what else is going on in the world. Even when you think life is falling apart, the tree is there, still standing, reminding you that life goes on. The tree experiences difficulties, like storms and goes through changes, like seasons. Dogs come by and do their business. Tulips come up around it in the spring. But still it is there each morning when I wake up. Trees do not judge.

I was not a big fan of poetry. When someone said poem, the first thought that came into my head was “Roses are red, violets are blue.” When I started to read poems every day, I realized that many of the poems I liked were about nature. The ones that really spoke to me were those by Robert Frost. He was a major influence in my work. Many of the Frost poems I read were about nature but they also seemed to be talking about life. He likes to use simple scenery but he describes it, in great detail, to create a specific picture in a poem. I think he does this well in many poems but especially in “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening”. He describes the snowy setting but you also get a clear picture of what the horse thinks of the stop when he says “He gives his harness bells a shake, to ask if there is some mistake.”

At first it seems like his poems are simplistic, but I think there is great meaning buried in many of them. This is what I really like. I have been looking at the tree out my window for a long time but it is hard to put all those thoughts into a short poem.

In this poem, I was attempting to convey the idea that a tree can be a good example for us. It stands tall through good times and bad. When they lose their leaves they can power through it but if we lose something simple, we can flip out. Nature is a great place to release your thoughts.

My process in writing this poem was to examine something that was simple but had a deep meaning to me. As long as I can remember, the tree outside my window has always been something I focus on when I am thinking about things, so it was good inspiration to begin with. Then, I just wrote down my thoughts about the tree not worrying about any of the mechanics. I went through a lot of drafts, going back and forth over where to place the focus. There is a lot to be said so I had to start to edit out things. Then I focused on the best way to put the words together. I had to fight my “Roses are red” mind-set. Too much attention to rhyme was getting my message muddy.

I am most proud that I can write a poem that is about something that has a lot of meaning to me instead of something cheesy that rhymes. I like the way it sounds. I like the alliteration at the beginning and the use of the word ‘all’ at the end of the lines of the last two stanzas. I also like how it ends instead of rambling on. I learned that from Frost’s poem, “Fire and Ice”. He talked about how he thought the world would end by fire but, if not, ice would be okay. He just ends it there instead of going into a detailed explanation.

I struggled with the revisions. You spend so much time on each line and each sentence and then you get someone’s input and you start unraveling it all over again. I also struggled with how to convey so many feelings in so few words. The other thing is it takes a lot of time. I am not sure how much time it takes professional poets to write a poem but it took me a long time. You can’t just sit down in one hour and be done with it.

Overall, I think I did a good job. I like how I can make it my own without a set prompt or rubric that dictates what it should be. I feel like it is my own but it has been influenced, a lot, by Frost.