Full of surprises...

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"Most of my poems 

go through several drafts 

on paper, and not every idea 

for a poem works out.  

I have a big cardboard box 

full of scraps and snippets 

that never quite turned into poems.  

I don't throw these out 

because sometimes one will 

jump out of the pile 

and begin a whole new poem, 

one I hadn't thought about at all.  

Poetry is full of surprises."

 ~ Maxine Kumin, 

in The Place My Words are Looking For

Right now I keep ideas and snippets of poems in a notebook, but I love this box idea.  It is true -- sometimes a little phrase I wrote down months or years ago will jump out at me (surprise!) and inspire me to write something new. Don't throw out your ideas.  Even if they're not working for you right now, they may turn out to be "just the thing" to get you started some day in the future!