I hardly remember how I started to write poetry. It's hard to

Hear the reflective words of David Antin: “I hardly remember how I started to write poetry. It’s hard to imagine what I thought poetry could do.” In these lines we hear the voice of one looking backward, not with arrogance, but with wonder. He admits the mystery of beginnings, the way an artist stumbles into the path of creation without fully knowing why. Few poets can recall the exact moment when they began, for poetry often arises not as a choice but as a necessity. And fewer still can explain what they first believed it could achieve, for its power is larger than any expectation.

The ancients knew this mystery well. Did not Hesiod say that the Muses appeared to him suddenly in the fields, commanding him to sing? He did not choose the hour or the task—it overtook him. So too with Antin: his words suggest that poetry began as something almost accidental, a call he could not trace, a voice that entered his life before he could name its purpose. For the calling of the poet is less a career than a fate, less a decision than a revelation.

And what of the question—what can poetry do? This has troubled every age. Some have believed it could stir revolutions, move nations to rise, shape the destiny of empires. Others have thought its purpose smaller: to console the lonely heart, to preserve memory, to delight the ear. Antin, in his humility, admits that at the beginning he did not know. His statement echoes the bewilderment of every young poet who lifts the pen without yet understanding the weight of the act. Poetry is a mystery that reveals its power only with time.

History gives us a tale that clarifies this truth. When the young Wilfred Owen began to write, he may have thought his verses were personal, private, insignificant. Yet when the Great War engulfed him, his lines became the testimony of an entire generation. At the start, he likely could not imagine what poetry could do—but in the end, his poems gave voice to the unspeakable grief of millions. So it is with Antin’s reflection: the poet cannot know at first what power lies hidden in the act of writing.

Antin’s own life illustrates another dimension. He was known not only for written verse but for his “talk poems”—improvised, living performances that blurred the line between speech and literature. At the beginning, he could not have imagined this evolution, nor that poetry could become such a dynamic, communal act. His words remind us that the path of art is not straight but unfolding, that the meaning of one’s work often becomes clear only after years, even decades.

The lesson for us is plain. Do not despise the uncertainty of beginnings. Do not demand to know, at the first step, what your art or your effort will accomplish. To create is to step into mystery, to trust that meaning will reveal itself in time. Even if you cannot see what poetry—or any work of the spirit—can do, you must begin. For the beginning is not about certainty, but about faithfulness.

Practical actions follow. If you write, write without demanding answers—let the work teach you what it can do. If you read, read not to calculate usefulness but to be changed, even in ways you cannot foresee. And in life itself, do not delay your calling because you cannot measure its impact. Plant seeds even if you do not know the harvest. For often the smallest beginnings, half-remembered, bear the greatest fruit.

Thus Antin’s words are not confession alone but instruction. He hardly remembers how he began, nor what he thought poetry could accomplish—but this very forgetfulness reveals the truth: creation begins in mystery and unfolds into revelation. Let us, then, embrace the unknown, begin without full understanding, and trust that what we create may do more than we could ever imagine.