author – A. R. Hurst

It’s one of those strange, contradictory quirks of my creative personality: I am a profound lover of music, someone who hangs on every single word of a well-crafted lyric, yet I find myself unable to fully engage with formal poetry on the page. I know, I know—lyrics are poetry, structured into verse and chorus with metre and rhythm. But for me, the difference is vast and entirely down to the delivery system. The same profound words that move me when carried by a favourite melody leave me cold and struggling to connect when presented in their bare, printed form.

The Saving Grace of the Soundtrack

For me, the melody is the saving grace, the element that makes lyrics immediately accessible and powerful. Music provides the emotional scaffolding and the necessary context that allows the words to land effortlessly. The bassline can convey heartbreak, and the rhythm can communicate urgency; the words simply have to fill in the detail. This means the emotional labour is shared between the musician and the lyricist, allowing me to fully absorb the story without feeling blocked by the form.

Furthermore, lyrics are usually delivered as part of a communal, performed experience. Whether I’m listening on headphones or at a gig, there’s an immediate connection to the artist’s intent and emotion. This is a fundamental contrast to reading poetry, which often feels like a solitary exercise where I must actively work to excavate meaning from the dense, exposed language. Music offers a pre-packaged emotional journey; poetry requires me to build the entire journey myself, which is where I hit my creative wall.

The Tyranny of the Blank Page

My struggle with formal poetry is rooted in the sheer effort required to decode the structure and find the emotional hook. When words are stripped down and presented in stark, deliberate lines on the page, the form—the specific rhyme scheme, the strict metre, the unusual line breaks—often feels demanding. Rather than sounding like natural speech or expressive emotion, the words sometimes feel like they are bending to service a clever structural rule, and I find myself scrutinising the form rather than simply feeling the content.

This difficulty is compounded by the lack of context. Without the propulsion of rhythm, the emotional cues of instrumentation, or the energy of a singer’s voice, the isolated words of a poem feel demanding and inaccessible. They sit there, static and exposed, forcing the reader to spend valuable time decoding the structure before engaging with the meaning. I suppose I simply rely on music too heavily; I need the words to travel in the vehicle of song for my heart to open to them. And don’t even get me started on the idea of poetry slams…

The contradiction remains a simple matter of creative preference: I am utterly devoted to the words, but I need them to travel in the vehicle of song. It’s not that I don’t like poetry, it’s that I just can’t seem to do it.

What is your own strangest creative contradiction—the one thing you want to love, but find yourself unable to connect with?

For a writer, the process often looks like a purely imaginative act, but in reality, bringing a novel to life requires a specific set of tools. Just as a builder needs a hammer and a carpenter needs a chisel, I have a personal toolkit—a mixture of low-tech, tactile items and powerful software—that helps me transform a fleeting idea into a sprawling world like Empire of Embers. This is the practical, behind-the-scenes look at the gear I rely on every single day.

The Physical Arsenal: Ink and Paper

While most of my work is ultimately delivered on a screen, the most crucial and chaotic part of my early process relies on the oldest technologies: paper and a good pen. I always start with handwritten notes because there’s something about the physical act of putting pen to paper that bypasses the internal, critical editor. This is where the initial brainstorming happens—where raw ideas for character arcs, spontaneous dialogue, and initial world concepts get scribbled out. It’s a dedicated space where every thought is welcome, ensuring the foundational creativity is messy and free from the formal formatting or distractions of a word processor.

These tangible tools are equally vital during my revision process. After printing out a full draft, I use highlighters to literally colour-code my manuscript. For example, one colour might track a specific character’s emotional arc, another might track a recurring theme or motif, and a third might track a key plot thread that needs consistency. This visual map is absolutely essential; it allows me to spot structural flaws, check the pacing, and ensure that every element is balanced far quicker than I could by simply reading the text on a screen alone.

Digital Powerhouse: The Essential Software

Once the scribbles and colour-coding have done their job, it’s time to transition the project into the digital realm where the true manuscript takes shape. Despite the proliferation of specialised writing apps, my final destination is always Microsoft Word. Its rock-solid reliability, industry-standard formatting, and clean interface make it the perfect environment for the focused, steady work of getting the chapter count up and turning those rough notes into clean, sequential prose. This reliable software is the final forge where the messy, raw material is hammered into a professional, cohesive final document.

For managing the sheer volume of information required to build a large world like the Empire of Embers, I rely heavily on simple digital organisation outside of the main manuscript file. While Word is for the prose, I maintain cloud-based documents for all the crucial lore—the specific history of the volcanic regions, the political hierarchy, and the rules of any magic system. This dedicated space acts as an encyclopaedia for my world, ensuring consistency across a series and preventing the overwhelming amount of lore from cluttering the main story.

The Final Philosophy of the Toolkit

Ultimately, none of these tools, whether a simple highlighter or powerful software, actually write the story for me. They are aids to the creative mind, acting as a supportive framework for the true craft. They help me manage the chaos, stay organised, and refine the prose.

What about you? Do you prefer the old-school feel of ink and paper, or are you all digital when it comes to your own creative projects?

Tag Archives: author

Music vs. Metre: Why I Love Lyrics but Struggle with Formal Poetry