Mythopoesis, from Blake's personal cosmologies to Tolkien's influences, fabricates lore; it appears in modern poetry to revitalize archetypes, address existential voids, and forge collective identities, bridging ancient oral traditions with contemporary symbolic innovation.

Mythopoesis describes the creation of new myths, mythic narratives, or entire mythological systems through poetic invention, moving beyond retelling existing myths to generating original mythic frameworks. Tolkien coined "mythopoeia" to describe how fantasy literature creates functional mythologies, but poets have long engaged in mythmaking. Blake's intricate personal mythology in his prophetic books exemplifies full mythopoesis—creating deities, cosmologies, and narratives rivaling traditional mythic systems. Yeats developed his esoteric system in "A Vision" to provide mythic scaffolding for his poetry. The technique involves more than allegory or metaphor; it creates complete symbolic systems with internal consistency and explanatory power. Contemporary poets may create micro-mythologies—small-scale mythic narratives addressing contemporary experience. Mythopoesis allows poets to address universal human concerns through invented frameworks, bypassing exhausted traditional mythologies while maintaining myth's power to convey meaning beyond literal statement. Students should distinguish mythopoesis from allusion or retelling, recognizing when poets generate rather than reference mythic material. The technique raises questions about poetry's relationship to belief, imagination, and truth-claims.