English @ SUNY Geneseo | Nick Vanamee | Activity https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/members/nickvanamee/activity/ Activity feed for Nick Vanamee. Thu, 27 Aug 2026 18:23:02 -0500 https://buddypress.org/?v= en-US 30 hourly 2 2bf8b375f9589e450a8b13e0b13987c4 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Don't make me say it, on the site The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/15024/ Sun, 01 Mar 2020 21:44:10 -0500 I feel like your poetry could absolutely keep a wall up and remain impersonal, there is no obligation to lay everything bare. But there absolutely is the misconflation between poetry being personal, and poetry […]

]]> 0 871bc9553f88234731e51fc831568e7c Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Poetry in Pictures, on the site The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/15023/ Sun, 01 Mar 2020 21:07:17 -0500 You may know them, but I wanna point you towards two artists who try a very similar thing to what you describe here.
Evan Cohen (https://wetflakeybark.tumblr.com/) creates one-page graphic panels that have a […]

]]> 0 91dc4eed924c33b507e4715c9523efb7 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post "Film is an Empathy Machine, Poetry is a What Machine?" in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/15021/ Sun, 01 Mar 2020 20:20:16 -0500 I keep coming back to our in-class exercise prompt Wednesday: “Film is an empathy machine, poetry is a what machine?” I really didn’t grasp it then (“reverse-engineer code,” what?) and I still don’t know, but t […]

]]> 0 6c6d73acbaca9a3e01c4e0c74885ce2a Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Abstract Reality, on the site The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/15007/ Mon, 24 Feb 2020 06:07:58 -0500 I don’t agree, I feel that, when used in conjunction with grounded images and striking actions, abstractions can be powerful. Of course, you don’t want to use a word like “envy” on it’s own, but when you connect […]

]]> 0 cfac8849ca4ab238bd2d62c43e3fc837 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Things I am going to STEAL, on the site The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/15006/ Mon, 24 Feb 2020 05:24:50 -0500 Going back to our discussion about great poets stealing lines, I feel like there’s an imbalance in the way we think about intellectual theft- taking and improving on other people’s craft is absolutely essential to […]

]]> 0 c2c4718f78d7521cd150e6871f7e22c5 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Cadence & Presentation in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/15004/ Mon, 24 Feb 2020 04:34:36 -0500 As an introduction to
found poetry, Professor Beltz-Hosek made a poem out of the back of a pack of
Sticky Notes. She cut up each sentence into lines, and what surprised us all is
that it didn’t not work. Breaking […]

]]> 0 ff6fc695981831c698bc07e80a1872e0 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Interaction between text and reader in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/14946/ Sat, 15 Feb 2020 23:34:55 -0500 One of the things I’ve started thinking about for my work here is the structure of poems- not the placement of words on a page, but how the reader interacts with the poem itself and how the poem informs the r […]

]]> 0 76aa46230b92849fff55e1c373ea698c Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post "What Got You Into Poetry?" in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/14809/ Mon, 03 Feb 2020 03:24:22 -0500 What really got me into poetry in a meaningful way was as a tool of self-expression. I love to paint, too, but it’s very difficult to express or explore certain ideas in painting. You can capture emotions, s […]

]]> 0 b00de270658bf8d32d30dd327214c3df Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Lost in Stereo, on the site The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/14703/ Sun, 26 Jan 2020 07:51:39 -0500 You mentioned that you had been looking at awkward cadences as a source for inspiration- one song I know that has a tense/awkward cadence is A Handsome Stranger Called Death, by FOE. About halfway through the […]

]]> 0 7bca5b93102ad0c978e4faca1ad3822a Nick Vanamee commented on the post, My Source, Listed:, on the site The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/14702/ Sun, 26 Jan 2020 06:15:34 -0500 You mentioned you find inspiration in alternative like Fleet Foxes and Bon Iver: an artist that you may find similar inspiration in is Odesza, especially songs from their 2014 album In Return, like Sun Models, or […]

]]> 0 760dbfe71a22954c0dac73aff865c8e1 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Inspiration from (not-words) in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/14666/ Thu, 23 Jan 2020 04:12:28 -0500 One source of source of inspiration for writing I’ve found,  surprisingly, is Twitter. Sometimes people will write or share very short, very abstract, outlandish jokes, to stick out other posts, and those end up […]

]]> 0 10605dd0ca85ffa360e9f9b28ad92129 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post What Poems Ask of Us in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9988/ Fri, 13 Apr 2018 07:28:30 -0500 One of the things that struck me this past week was our analysis of There but for fortune. I noticed that the poem itself was incredibly straightforward and blunt, but our analysis assumed that the poem was a […]

]]> 0 65e3930baf72065e9a094bc5fd74f98b Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post sung lyrics vs written poetry in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9950/ Mon, 09 Apr 2018 05:30:08 -0500 I’ve been listening to a lot of music for inspiration, and I’ve been thinking about how poetry and song lyrics are tied together, yet so different. Rythym in poetry needs to be carried by the meter- the words […]

]]> 0 d0caf52f572d3193c4c22f86fe3843f4 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Shape Poetry in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9891/ Fri, 30 Mar 2018 06:03:46 -0500 I was inspired to try out shape poetry when our class turned in poems with unconventional formats- I had always used the done-to-death format of a flat wall of text . The idea that words should reflect what they […]

]]> 0 e911de4aeb26b74bf5102aefb4fff331 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, "English is the BEST major," Maria Lima screams in her Brazilian accent., on the site The Contemporary Poem http://cpoem.sunygeneseoenglish.org/2018/03/29/english-is-the-best-major-maria-lima-screams-in-her-brazilian-accent/#comment-11640 Thu, 29 Mar 2018 20:36:58 -0500 Snaps to Maria and Dr. T. My philosophy teacher said the same thing- he would always say that we should go to school and college for our own education, not to get grades. Grades, he said, don’t really matter as […]

]]> 3a97f75f57afa67fc6992dae59210d0b Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Y'all Should Read McCormack and Morrison in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9859/ Sat, 24 Mar 2018 08:04:48 -0500 McCormack’s The Road and Morrison’s A Mercy are great inspiration for poetry, as well as great examples of affective prose that force the reader to take the same state of mind as the narrator. They’re novels, not […]

]]> 0 505e14fcc4b309bc483932a1242fc1d3 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Review of Home Places: Contemporary Native American Writing from Sun Tracks, on the site The Contemporary Poem http://cpoem.sunygeneseoenglish.org/2018/03/02/review-of-home-places-contemporary-native-american-writing-from-sun-tracks/#comment-11466 Sun, 04 Mar 2018 03:34:04 -0500 Very interesting to hear about poets from other cultures, how their different perspectives and backgrounds affect their work, how someone who wasn’t raised on Shakespeare and Frost might think about wordplay and syntax.

]]> 5481fc098a6838d968d0dc313a316c76 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post King on Inspiration in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9763/ Sun, 04 Mar 2018 03:24:29 -0500 There’s a Stephen King quote: “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.” It’s a quote meant to quell the frustrations of writer’s block- that if you should simply sit down […]

]]> 0 288abd11fae8accd7f8761c2c22e11d5 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, When Poetry Goes Silent, on the site The Contemporary Poem http://cpoem.sunygeneseoenglish.org/2018/02/19/when-poetry-goes-silent/#comment-11453 Fri, 02 Mar 2018 20:17:42 -0500 Reminds me of Amber Galloway Gallego’s work as an ASL translator for musicians. She mixes it up the same way Valli does, in that she adds emphasis through her hand motions, facial expressions, and she way she […]

]]> 0bd87aba39f62c52eb88b2ecea6a9cc7 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Sleep/no sleep, on the site The Contemporary Poem http://cpoem.sunygeneseoenglish.org/2018/02/27/sleep-no-sleep/#comment-11447 Fri, 02 Mar 2018 04:34:07 -0500 3AM is always the best time to write, I don’t know what it is that makes it feel so profound. For me, I think it’s because the end of the day, when everything has happened and you have quiet to reflect on what’s […]

]]> 0d1c9bd2cef66613778196feddd056c7 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Mixing Spacing Up in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9687/ Sun, 18 Feb 2018 04:54:34 -0500 I had never considered how spacing might affect a poem until this class: my creative writing teacher was not very experimental, and emphasized rhyme scheme and syllable count more than stretching the medium itself […]

]]> 0 73faf7d2acb657e5d3a92813e7f6c2a0 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Joseph North on the Monetization of Writing in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9641/ Sun, 11 Feb 2018 00:51:51 -0500 This is only tangentially related to poetry, but I have nothing else interesting to say this week, so here we go. Joseph North has predicted the death of the liberal arts  (including poetry)  as we know it u […]

]]> 0 34bc05ad21528c28ccd6cd910e7df987 Nick Vanamee commented on the post, Exiting Existentialism, on the site The Contemporary Poem http://cpoem.sunygeneseoenglish.org/2018/02/08/exiting-existentialism/#comment-11282 Fri, 09 Feb 2018 05:40:30 -0500 This a common theme, I’ve noticed. Not only from my own experiences, but also from what I’ve heard about other schools. I think this mindset is a reaction to the high pressure put on kids from a very early age. […]

]]> 638e76089213c33def04db0e25e96398 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Intrigue in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9579/ Sat, 03 Feb 2018 19:41:59 -0500 Subtlety and mystery have always been tools I’ve been fascinated with. The best books I’ve ever read have always employed mystery as a tool to draw me in, and allude to a hazy web of implications and connections. […]

]]> 0 fce57262b56711a43710eecab63f6790 Nick Vanamee wrote a new blog post Painting isn't great poetry practice. in the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9512/ Fri, 26 Jan 2018 04:40:25 -0500 Sound has always been at an arm’s length. Before this I only painted.

The fundamental gulf between art and sound is so deep that they are complete polar opposites in almost every way. Sound is flowing, […]

]]> 0 e5f1284ccddcf73512b85e2e2819200f Nick Vanamee joined the group The Contemporary Poem https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9501/ Fri, 26 Jan 2018 01:42:29 -0500 0 08a58d4cf550e6eb565aef0ede23568f Nick Vanamee became a registered member https://sunygeneseoenglish.org/activity/p/9499/ Fri, 26 Jan 2018 01:35:31 -0500 0