"Whenever I have dipped into books of aesthetics, I have had an uncomfortable feeling that I was reading the works of astronomers who never looked at the stars. I mean that they were writing about poetry as if poetry were a task, and not what it really is: a passion and a joy. For example, I have read with great respect Benedetto Croce's book on aesthetics, and I have been handed the definition that poetry and language are an "expression." Now, if we think of an expression of something, then we land back at the old problem of form and matter; and if we think about the expression of nothing in particular,that gives us really nothing. So we respectfully receive that definition, and then we go on to something else. We go on to poetry; we go on to life. And life is, I am sure, made of poetry. Poetry is not alien - poetry is, as we shall see, lurking round the corner. It may spring on us at any moment".
I think this is a good way of making sure you are not writing like an idiot. Sometimes we write in school like we have to write it in a certain way or structure. If we write poetry like it's poetry, it loses the effect. Poetry can just happen and you won't even realize it. Self expression comes up a lot in poetry and art, you can be telling a story or experience and you can have it become poetry in a snap. Almost like how you think, you think of different words that relate to a certain experience and it gets written down on paper and just makes sense to you. Sometimes explaining doesn't have to happen in poetry.
