Struggle

The following is my view on poetry, in fact its my view on writing in general.

Writing is much like painting, with one minor difference, "Aha," you might say, "The difference being that you paint a picture with words instead of paint." You would be wrong in that assumption however.
A good writer produces an image in your head just as clear as any painting, perhaps even more clear. Then what, you might ask, is the difference I speak of? Number of colors. Imagine each word is a color that a painter might use to create his/her image. Now say they wish to paint a blue sky, there are several shades of blue one can use, several variations adding green adding yellow, more black less black. These in the end produce one color. Perhaps that shade of variant of blue we will call "joy" blue, another might be called "perfect" blue, one might be called "pristine" blue, all of these are colors, but in the end the painter can use only one of those colors, for if you add them together, it creates another color entirely, which may not be blue at all.
This is where a writer differs, we may use as many colors for one object as we wish, "The sky was a perfect blue, pristine in its majesty and filled with an aura of everlasting joy that would bring forth a sigh from the lips of any who viewed it" I've just used several colors for one image, each working together in its own way. Admittedly this is not the most beautiful of word combinations to achieve an amazing effect, but it was merely to point out the idea.

Going to a more basic level, art is the hope of evoking within people things that do not have words or colors, feelings that can not be described. For to look at something that is awe inspiring, it is beyond words. The combination of sensory details and feelings that arise in you can not be matched. A painter tries to copy it with an image, while a writer attempts to use words in combinations to draw out the emotional response that has no words.
This in itself seems odd. I've just stated that writers try to use words to say things that have no words. Odd, but true.
Through all of this, writers inevitably seek to widen their mastery of the human language, to gain more and more "colors" to continue the analogy, to add to their painting's, but knowing a word is not the same as knowing how to use it perfectly. Every word which means the same thing, draws out a slightly different image from the reader. Further more using some archaic word which means exactly what you are trying to say, is not always a good answer. If it is a word that only you know the meaning of, the reader will instantly become color blind to your image of the sky.
For example, if I were to say "The sky was fepondoropick in its presence" its just as though the word were not there, a gray spot. Feponderopick, as witty and large as it is, has no meaning. If you look it up in a dictionary it will not be there. Any word that is rare among rare, may as well not be in the dictionary, because few people will take the time to stop what they are reading in order to better gain insight as to what a writer may mean.
Further more, even if they are one who DOES take the time to look up a word they do not know, the illusion has already been broken. Your image is lost.

Thus I feel it is important to write smart, not witty. Writing is not about showing your intellect to the world. It is about making others feel as though they are on the same level as you. The more in sync they feel with your mind, the more immersed in the story they will become. If they feel you are talking down to them, the immersion is lost. If they feel you are talking up to them, the same effect is achieved.