This is the entirety of the “multi-stanza” sub-direction of the first direction for the “Mist from the Mountains” poem, thus far. (Not shown are the additional writings for the first direction’s “variations” sub-direction, the second “one-stanza” direction and the third “two-stanza” direction—all yet to be fully explored.)

This is how my poems usually develop—an explosion of lines that coalesce into verses that I write and rewrite, experimenting with different ways of expressing the theme. The result is the nebulous mass of words, lines, stanzas and notes you see above.¹

The three columns on page four each contain a version of the “multi-stanza” draft as it exists currently. They are essentially the same—extracted from pages one to three—but with sufficient differences in rhyming sets that they must now be considered separately. From these will emerge the final “multi-stanza” poem.

1. “Poet. Pedant.” explains how I end up with so colourful a body of text.