| Author | Message | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 785 Registered: 07-2006 |
I know we have had this discussion at length once before, but the subject of poetics/prosody is one I find endlessly fascinating and there are new voices here at Wild who have not had opportunity to share their thoughts. Furthermore, there has arisen some similar discussion in the threads for specific poems, and rather than continue it there at the possible expense of the poet looking for specific critique, I thought I would broach the subject here. So, what does a work have to "be" to qualify as a poem. Is it a poem until the reader "proves it isn't"? Or must the poet "prove it is"? All respectful comments welcome! I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| Bren
Moderator Username: bren Post Number: 1544 Registered: 12-2001 |
I'm in the no proof is necessary camp but I'm not sure I'm answering the question correctly. Do you mean in regards to whether it's free verse or prose? If you're referring to any reader I don't think most would concern themselves with an answer because they may go for content more than form but another poet would indeed delve in because we do that. Whether to help or discover for ourselves. We revise and critique and question. Hopefully without giving offense. I know people who think if it doesn't rhyme it can't be a poem. It wasn't until I started coming to Wild and met a few special people at the old TCP that I learned about all the different forms there were to read and write in. I thought poetry had to be long and wordy to be classified as poetry. Bren | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 787 Registered: 07-2006 |
What I am writing here is no more poem than cocaine, even though I have cut it into lines. I guess what I am looking for is opnions on when a piece crosses the line from being prose to being poetry. Where is that border? Is there a defined border? (Ha, had to edit my non-poem example. I'm a mess.) (Message edited by dwillo on December 11, 2008) I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| LJ Cohen
Moderator Username: ljc Post Number: 10516 Registered: 07-2002 |
I don't know, Will. Your little example uses a comparison and comparisons, along with figurative language, are at the core of poetry. One can also have poetic prose, just to muddy the waters a bit. best, ljc Once in a Blue Muse Blog LJCohen | ||
| nia sunset
Senior Member Username: nia Post Number: 3191 Registered: 04-2006 |
What I am writing here is no more poem than a raindrop from my dark skies, even though I have cut it into lines as a windless leaves of a million pieces of my heart, but who knows, when or where does it drop that poetically will hit between life and dreams, who knows... I just keep reading and watching you all, I am on the way of poetry, by being a reader firstly, then trying to be a poet in this language, but poet is poet, I think, and who tries to get the balance between feelings and thoughts into a poetical language, it is not easy of course. Poetical sound, expressions, imaginaries, are all important, but I can't explain how they come up. love, nia  Butterfly Wings of Nia "Carry the beauties;wash the badnesses with your poetical spirit" | ||
| Andrew Dufresne
Advanced Member Username: beachdreamer Post Number: 1856 Registered: 01-2006 |
I spend my time worrying about what a poem is or is not It is a perfect way to avoid writing a poem. Oh it's a joke, come on lighten the hell up. ad | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 526 Registered: 03-2008 |
It has always been my opinion that we should lighten up. WHO is to say what "is" and "isn't" a poem? Should we allow anybody with an opinion to limit the definition? I should hope not. Or maybe we could give certain people the right to declare something "poetry"? Wait. That idea sucks too. Hmm . . . I'm gonna stick with what I've always been taught. We live in a time described as "postmodern" (a term which comes with plenty of its own baggage) and in this day and age, a poem is a poem because the writer said it is. Much the same way that installation art is still, well, "art". Cheers. | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 788 Registered: 07-2006 |
So writing a piece gives you the right to define what it is to a reader? ad, HA! I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26188 Registered: 07-2001 |
when the last leaf falls the last feather the last drop of rain the last line a poem is possible when it snows under the coach a poem is born Smiles. Gary The tent is infinite even though some wish to restrict it otherwise. Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5049 Registered: 05-2006 |
I usually pick it up and turn it upside down, like a figurine. On the bottom there's a bar code. I take my scanner and run it across. Then I see what it says on the liquid crystal display. If it says, "POEM, 25% OFF", that tells me that it is, indeed, a poem, but could use a lot of trimming. If it says, MISCELLANEOUS WORDS - AS IS", then I know it might do well at a literary garage sale, but I shouldn't expect an editor to give it the time of day. Hope this clarifies things. Fred even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans | ||
| MV
Senior Member Username: michaelv Post Number: 1030 Registered: 11-2003 |
This thread is a poem  MV | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 527 Registered: 03-2008 |
Will -- Absolutely it does. I'm sure you'd love it if the creation of poetry came with a prescription of sorts -- and I'd love to SEE your prescription. Look, I've taken part in workshops with Formalists before, 18 year old kids quick to say "THIS is not a POEM" (bum bum BUM) and they toss their noses in the air and move on to the next piece. This is where your logic ultimately leads -- one person deciding arbitrarily (or according to their own custom) if what I write is a poem or not. Who is anyone to say that I haven't written a poem, when I have declared it to be true? I'd love to hear YOUR description of what a poem is. Please. Let's hear it. If you don't believe that the author has authority over his work, please explain the derivation of the word "author". My dictionary says it comes from the Latin for "founder" and "one who causes to grow". It says nothing about "one who depends upon Will Eastland's opinion". Or anyone else's for that matter. Please give me the right to write poetry, and I will continue to give you the same. | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5050 Registered: 05-2006 |
I am the author of my son. I certainly caused him to grow, certainly founded him. But, at 21, he enormously prefers that the definition of who he is and the constraints on his behavior NOT be defined, or circumscribed, by me. So, following the metaphor, to the degree that a poem is like a child, eventually the child/poem manifests a will toward autonomy. * * * * * That said, it is true that poetry does not have a rigid definition, and those who do try to impose rigid definitions are frequently doing this as a power play, as an expression of their cultural ignorance, or to promote their own genre-specific work. * * * * * Now that rhyme and meter no longer have a grip on poetry, we might say Poetry is generally a verbal art form, often of limited size, and displaying exceedingly careful choice of language. As well, it incorporates numerous aesthetic elements, including, but not limited to, figuration, imagery, allusion, suggestion, repetition with variation, musicality, and appeal to the senses. Fred even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans | ||
| nia sunset
Senior Member Username: nia Post Number: 3201 Registered: 04-2006 |
Fred, you said and shared so nicely your thoughts, and it was inspiration for me too, please may I say mine, I am the author of my soul! without love and heart, I have a desert in my soul and without my soul I am nothing... so they are all a kind of vicious circle of my living part. Poetry is something else that the answer for us. thanks, love, nia Butterfly Wings of Nia "Carry the beauties;wash the badnesses with your poetical spirit" | ||
| Hugh W Walthall
New member Username: xenophon Post Number: 13 Registered: 11-2008 |
pri= marily it is a ribbon of shallow senti- mentality about 30 m's wide Jacques Lacan, Jacques Lacan you really turn me on.... | ||
| Ros Badcoe (Rosemary)
Intermediate Member Username: endolith Post Number: 650 Registered: 03-2008 |
So, by extension, I can designate my writing as 'An Excellent Poem', and you can't disagree? | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 790 Registered: 07-2006 |
W.F. I impose my own definition of poetry on no one but myself. But Ros gets near the heart of some of what I am after here. You, W.F., have expressed very strong opinions about what makes good poetry (and I, frankly, have little disagreement with you on that), but yet make no requirements to qualify as poetry itself. Why have a standard for quality and none for qualification? btw, please withhold assumptions about the intent of my statements or questions. I may merely desire to stimulate discussion. I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| Ros Badcoe (Rosemary)
Intermediate Member Username: endolith Post Number: 651 Registered: 03-2008 |
There must be some constraints on what is poetry, otherwise I may as well claim that the sink in my bathroom is a poem. Given that the whole concept of poetry is a human construct, it must have some (invented and agreed by people) boundaries. I have a similar problem with 'art'. My widest definition is that if I could have knocked it up in 5 minutes myself, it probably ain't art. So, rumpled beds = not art. (Message edited by endolith on December 12, 2008) | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1090 Registered: 10-2005 |
For what it's worth, I'm with Lisa, Will... that "non-poem" sure looks like a poem to me! Comparison by way of metaphor is the heart of poetry to me... and to some of my favorite poets. You have an interesting comparison, a play-on-words with "lines", a poem about poetry, and what is arguably a tongue-in-cheek commentary about the composition of a poem. I think it's actually a fairly -good- poem! "language is vitally metaphorical; that is it marks the before unapprehended relations of things" -- Percy Bysshe Shelley, speaking of the language of poets in his "The Defence of Poetry." Director of the Bread Loaf School of English and long-time friend of Frost, Reginald Cook: "Is it a two-layer poem?" Robert Frost: "They're all two-layer." More from Frost, a big believer in synecdoche, his favorite brand of metaphor: "Poetry begins in trivial metaphors, pretty metaphors, 'grace metaphors,' and goes on to the profoundest thinking that we have. Poetry provides the one permissible way of saying one thing and meaning another. People say, 'Why don't you say what you mean?' We never do that, do we, being all of us too much poets. We like to talk in parables and in hints and in indirections - whether from diffidence or from some other instinct." -- From "Education by Poetry" by Robert Frost. Edward Hirsch: "The transaction between the poet and the reader, those two instances of one reality, depends upon figurative language—figures of speech, figures of thought." -- From his essay, "A Poet is a Nightingale". I'm inclined to agree that metaphor sits at the heart of poetry. It may not, in the end, be the deciding factor in determining whether or not something is a poem, but it may well be the deciding factor in determining whether or not something is considered to be a good poem, or a great one, in the collective mind of its readers. (Message edited by runatyr on December 12, 2008) "Yo quiero hacer contigo lo que la primavera hace con los cerezos." ~Pablo Neruda Translated: "I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees." | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 793 Registered: 07-2006 |
Ros, your sink would only qualify as a found poem, unless you scratched it out of Marble and fitted the pipes yourself. Regarding the big tent, I must say Michelle Detorie, a fine poet and editor of the e-zine Womb, is doing some interesting things with what she calls picturepoems. I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 528 Registered: 03-2008 |
Will -- I apologize if I seemed to be substituting my opinion for your own -- I just feel very strongly about this particular issue. I respect your work (a great deal, actually) and your opinion. Ros -- I think if you were to take your sink and hang it on the wall at a gallery and declare it "a poem", you'd sell it to the highest bidder. This is just a symptom of the world we live in. Kind of freeing, isn't it? EDIT: I have heard people say, on this site, that my definition (or lack of one) is basically a "free for all". I take this as a compliment. The creation of poetry SHOULD be free for all those who wish to participate. The last thing we need is to close ourselves off further from the majority of the world -- who no longer read poems. If you want to further alienate people from poetry, continue to declare THIS poetry and THAT not. Such snobbery will never fail to disappoint audiences. Don't forget what Frost said. "A poem is that which begins in delight and ends in wisdom." (Message edited by wfroby on December 12, 2008) | ||
| Ros Badcoe (Rosemary)
Intermediate Member Username: endolith Post Number: 652 Registered: 03-2008 |
WF, I probably would sell it, and I think that's rather sad, not freeing. People can produce any old tat and call it art, or poetry, or whatever form it is in. And I think it short-changes those who produce it and those who buy it. | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 794 Registered: 07-2006 |
HUGS ALL ROUND! Ok, back to business. I am perfectly willing to continue this conversation on a modified basis. I would like to continue to hear what people believe constitutes poetry (so far Fred and Jeffrey have obliged), but would also listen to opinions of what makes good poetry, although I suppose that is manifest in nearly every critique. I was reading an essay last night by Wallace Stevens and came across several interesting statement regarding poetics; I wish I had the book with me so I didn't have to paraphrase. "You are free to do as you like, but everything matters." I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 795 Registered: 07-2006 |
But, W.F. (I'd call you Will, but I might forget if I am writing or reading a post), couldn't one make the case that the audience is more snobbish than the poets are? Might not one argue that readership is "down" because writers have drifted from broader audience expectations? I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| Ros Badcoe (Rosemary)
Intermediate Member Username: endolith Post Number: 653 Registered: 03-2008 |
Could I add that I'm all in favour of WF's "The creation of poetry SHOULD be free for all those who wish to participate." But equally, if we celebrate that, we risk people producing, well, the sort of thing people do produce when they are just beginning, and thinking that they've produced great art. Just look at the sort of poetry you find most often on the web. So perhaps Will has a point - not that good poetry is too 'hard' for general consumption, but that there's too much dross putting people off! | ||
| Jim Corner
Senior Member Username: jdc Post Number: 4152 Registered: 09-2006 |
Words on the page cut into a reader's core -- mind and body responds in moments of rumbling motion. the sound-bite wins wins another fan. It's a poem! Jim, (Message edited by jdc on December 12, 2008) Emboss The Snowflake Publisher of www.DesertMoonReview.com | ||
| steve williams
Board Administrator Username: twobyfour Post Number: 2303 Registered: 01-2003 |
interesting stuff here. I want to expand on a few quotes Jeffrey left us. When you do a painting, you look at something and then mix your colors and then what you put on the canvas is not exactly what you see. In fact, it can't be. Even if you took a photograph, there are innaccuracies in that process as well. So, every painting must then be a metaphor and an interpretation by the artist of that reality. Now to say that poetry is at it's heart metaphor is fine but it is not exclusive. All writing is at it's heart metaphor. I've seen some very fine metaphors in short story and novel and non-fiction etc. For me two additional traits set poetry apart. One is the idea that form, whatever the form, should add to the content. There must be a reason why the poet chooses certain line lengths or words to break on, or sounds that resonate with the words. Words themselves have limitations and in any writing, they are as paint to a painter, a necessary approximation of reality. the second thing about a poem is the notion of the smallest possible length. The idea that to reduce the poem any further would hurt the content. And also the idea that one word too many would also hurt the content. The poet searches for that perfect balance of length and meaning without over or under writing. These are for me the unique things about poetry. The other tenets we talk about here like 'show vs. tell' or 'over modified' or punctuation are really not isolated to poetry but rather apply to writing in any form or genre. thx again s | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 529 Registered: 03-2008 |
I want to throw in another angle here, something from another world that I'm a part of. I was in a playwriting course at university, and a few of the students would constantly argue a point similar to what we're discussing here. The question was "Why does no one go to the theatre anymore?" My answer was always something like this -- Our best playwrights had one eye constantly fixed on the box office. A great example of this is William Shakespeare, who often modified his texts or threw in entire scenes of cruel jokes and swordfighting in order to increase the crowd. When contemporary playwrights write tight little dramas that go nowhere, why should they be surprised when nowhere arrives to watch the play? I do not think it is the "dross" (thanks for the nifty word, Ros) that pushes people away from poetry -- doggerel has always existed! -- but rather the attitudes of poets and the exclusive nature of their work that keeps people from reading it. The fact is . . . people WANT to read "Desiderata". They don't necessarily want to read the stuff that really excites ME. We can't legislate their taste. But if we want them to read our work, we can alter the work. Now . . . no one's exactly lining up to change their poem to meet a wider audience, and for good reason. I've talked myself into a circle.  | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 4427 Registered: 10-2005 |
Will- While I might argue the merits of the question, since we are here already, I'll share one of the most astonishing poems I've ever read:  by M.C. Richards She writes about the poem in the book Centering in pottery, poetry and the person: "Two nouns, two sounds, with a long silence between. A long time of silence which is, on the page, a long space of emptiness. Hands is an image Birds is an image, Between them, a long wordless flight. Each pick up the interacting waves of sound and picture." I was going to say it takes two words to make a poem, But then I thought of this poem:  which I just wrote, and realized it is resonance that makes a poem. In this case the word resonates with only the page and the reader. -Laz | ||
| MV
Senior Member Username: michaelv Post Number: 1031 Registered: 11-2003 |
One word to define Poetry: Metaphor 2 words: Metaphor & Music Hence the commonality w/ Music M&Ms  gotta love those Ms MV | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 796 Registered: 07-2006 |
Laz, "Winter" is a bit cliched. I might go with l'hiver. Good effort!  I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 4428 Registered: 10-2005 |
Yes Will, you are right! Winter is cliche! (Sorry though, I'm not sure what yours means.) I often have to make the distinction between whether what I'm writing is a poem or journaling. It's when you cross over from the personal into the universal that your words become poetry, and that can happen in varied ways. -Laz | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26210 Registered: 07-2001 |
Among haiku writers, there is an argument that TUNDRA is the perfect once word poem. I believe ILLUMINATION belongs on that list. Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| sue kay
Moderator Username: suekay Post Number: 1111 Registered: 11-2005 |
Very interesting stuff. As usual. I suppose the lowest common demoninator for any written work, is the writer and at least one reader who "understands" it. At that point we are kind of reading an eye chart. The Big E is pretty apparent to everyone but the truly blind, when you go to the next line, you lose a few, the next line a few more and so on. So. We may even lose the "one" reader when the author says, Yes!!!!! Tell me what it meant to you, and the reader complies to find the author shouting, "That's not what I meant." LOL. Such is the spoken word, its cultural load, its context, and oh, just everything. I say the broadest definition obtains. All language is symbolic. So when we use those symbols we communicate both the idea(concrete) and the broader meaning(abstract). I don't think we can escape metaphor if at least one other person thinks it is. For example. Someone says "I really like your poem." Someone gets mad and says "what the hell did you mean by that?" Context is everything. LOL. Anyway, I have lately read essays lamenting the deminished readership for poetry and I believe it was in a forward to Poetry magazine noting that what is said about poetry is more important now than the poetry. I think a lot of that comes from the extraordinarily wide range of what is accepted as poetry as well as a general enthusiasm for "experimental" "new" and a desire to push the boundaries. All good things in my view by the way. But at some point which will be different for everyone, we will lose agreement on form. Such is life. I guess we talk about it because we are human and thats what we do. One of my favourite books on "modern " art is The Painted Word by Tom Wolfe. His premise is that visual art as practiced has lost all visual meaning and it need not be practiced at all. Just post an explaination on the museum wall and let people make their own art from the prompt. Of course the prompts are obfuscating and abstruse in the extreme which means......anything you want baby. He gives as an example a piece of visual art that appeared in April 1970 in Arts mgazine, by Lawrence Weiner. 1. The artist may construct the piece 2. The piece may be fabricated 3. The piece need not be built Each being equal and consistent with the intent of the artist the decison as to condition rests with the receiver upon the occasion of receivership. So what you see when you are permitted by the artist to view your own idea is a gift from the artist to you, without the artist, without the art and maybe even without you. Now that is minimilist. We need a bit more than that in my opinion, but who am I to say what is enough? Anyway, this is just tongue in cheek, and if someone finds I have answered Will's question, well then I'll be damned. I didn't know.. I wasn't trying to be didactic. But I agree with Steve. Form should serve content and be of the shortest possible length. That is certainly my personal preference. But we have lots of choices and that is good thing. regards sue} | ||
| nia sunset
Senior Member Username: nia Post Number: 3207 Registered: 04-2006 |
the question "Is it a poem?" also carries itself another question too, about poet? who is poet? Poetry for me, when it reaches my heart, when it makes me shake or move or to think it is a poem. Seems easy but not easy as seems. There are some important points that they all should come together at the same time, at the same place! 1) beauty of language /usage of language 2) poetical sound of the words/lines 3) meaning (expressions, imaginaries, methaphors, etc) when all of them dance at once in a reader's world, and touches the heart, it is the poem. By the way I never call myself as a poet, but I say, my language is poetical in my mind, so all my study/efforts/works to try, to arrange it into the words. As some of you know this is my second language, but I do love to read and to write and to think in this language, anyway, this topic inspired me and I dropped some lines on other page about poetry. thank you Will, with my love, nia Butterfly Wings of Nia "Carry the beauties;wash the badnesses with your poetical spirit" | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26211 Registered: 07-2001 |
it is therefore it is a poem s/g PS: Study the rise of the impressionists and the response of the Academy to their work. And then the response of the Academy to more modern art, etc, etc. Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Andrew Dufresne
Advanced Member Username: beachdreamer Post Number: 1857 Registered: 01-2006 |
It's only poets who care about this stuff. I asked someone who was panhandling for money outsid emy local Safeway what she thought a real poem was and she said, "Can I eat it?" Well, that's good enough for me. ad | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 4429 Registered: 10-2005 |
Can I smoke it?  -Laz | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 797 Registered: 07-2006 |
Laz, hiver (can't remember if it's la or le, but the elision takes care of that anyway) is simply French for winter, which, if you can find a lighter and some rolling paper big enough . . . Andrew, I have at least three non-poet friends who care. One of them enjoys reading poetry, too. (Message edited by dwillo on December 12, 2008) I want either less corruption, or more chance to participate in it. ~Ashleigh Brilliant | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32522 Registered: 11-1998 |
I have found this discussion of "What is a poem?" most fascinating. I always do. This question has been posed since man started putting pen to paper. There have been eons of discussion about what is a poem from the greatest minds that have ever been. And still no one has yet to satisfactorily answer the question. Honestly, I highly doubt there is one answer that will satisfy everyone. I also doubt that we will come to any sort of agreement on definition here. But still, it's fascinating to discuss. Trying to define "what is a poem" is sort of like trying to nail jello to a wall. An interesting diversion, but ultimately unsatisfying. The distinctions between poetry and prose are constantly blurred, more so now, perhaps, than in any other time in history. Poetry is constantly evolving. As soon as you decide what it is, it changes. Anyway, I've left some definitions of "what is a poem" from some of the greatest minds and writers in mankind's history. There are many, many others I haven't included. Peruse them if you have the time. Perhaps one of these will be a satisfactory definition for you. But don't expect that the definition you find appealing will appeal to others. That's the thing about poetry. It refuses to be nailed down to any one person's definition of it. Annoying, isn't it? Especially for those who like black and white answers to techni-color questions. As for me, I prefer to try to write poems than worry too much about what they are. And I also like to comment on other people's poetry. Hey, did you know we can do that around here? We can write poems and comment on other's poems. Ain't that a gas? Love, M -------------------------------------------------- One demands two things of a poem. Firstly, it must be a well-made verbal object that does honor to the language in which it is written. Secondly, it must say something significant about a reality common to us all, but perceived from a unique perspective. What the poet says has never been said before, but, once he has said it, his readers recognize its validity for themselves. - W. H. Auden Poetry is what gets lost in translation. - Robert Frost Poetry lies its way to truth. - John Ciardi Poetry is the deification of reality. - Edith Sitwell Poetry is ordinary language raised to the Nth power. - Paul Engle The language beneath the language: This is poetry. - Andrea Pacione Poetry lifts the veil from the hidden beauty of the world, and makes familiar objects be as if they were not familiar. - Percy Bysshe Shelley Poetry is not the record of an event: it is an event. - Robert Lowell Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is a speaking picture. - Simonides A poem should not mean but be. - Archibald MacLeish Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words. - Robert Frost If a poem is written well, it was written with the poet's voice and for a voice. Reading a poem silently instead of saying a poem is like the difference between staring at sheet music and actually humming or playing the music on an instrument. - Robert Pinsky Poetry is the journal of the sea animal living on land, wanting to fly in the air. Poetry is a search for syllables to shoot at the barriers of the unknown and the unknowable. Poetry is a phantom script telling how rainbows are made and why they go away. - Carl Sandburg Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash. - Leonard Cohen We tend to be so bombarded with information, and we move so quickly, that there is a tendency to treat everything on the surface level and process things quickly. This is antithetical to the kind of openness and perception you have to have to be receptive to poetry. - Rita Dove Poetry is being, not doing. - E.E. Cummings In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in poetry, it's the exact opposite. - Paul Dirac Poets utter great and wise things which they do not themselves understand. - Plato Reality only reveals itself when it is illuminated by a ray of poetry. - Georges Braque Poetry gives you permission to feel. - James Autry Poetry is the revelation of a feeling that the poet believes to be interior and personal which the reader recognizes as his own. - Salvatore Quasimodo Poetry is an orphan of silence. The words never quite equal the experience behind them. - Charles Simic Of our conflicts with others we make rhetoric; of our conflicts with ourselves we make poetry. - William Butler Yeats Poetry is speech framed ... to be heard for its own sake and interest even over and above its interest of meaning. - Gerard Manley Hopkins Not philosophy, after all, not humanity, just the sheer joyous power of song, is the primal thing in poetry. - Max Beerbohm No man was ever yet a great poet, without being at the same time a profound philosopher. For poetry is the blossom and the fragrancy of all human knowledge, human thoughts, human passions, emotions, language. - Samuel Taylor Coleridge Poetry is like making a joke. If you get one word wrong at the end of a joke, you have lost the whole thing. - W.S. Merwin Poetry is a packsack of invisible keepsakes. - Carl Sandburg Great poetry is always written by somebody straining to go beyond what he can do. - Stephen Spender We can only approach the gods through poetry. - Thomas Moore Poetry is all that is worth remembering in life. - William Hazlitt Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one's soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself, but with its subject. - John Keats Poetry ... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance. - John Keats Poetry, in the past, was the center of our society, but with modernity it has retreated to the outskirts. I think the exile of poetry is also the exile of the best of humankind. - Octavio Paz The gap between verse and poetry is enormous. Between good poetry and good prose the gap is much narrower. - Michael Longley A poem is an instant of lucidity in which the entire organism participates. - Charles Simic Poetry isn't written from the idea down. It's written from the phrase, line and stanza up, which is different from what your teacher taught you to do in school. - Margaret Atwood Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild ... - Boris Pasternak Poetry is a language pared down to its essentials. - Ezra Pound Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful. - Rita Dove Poetry allows one to speak with a power that is not granted by our culture. - Linda McCarriston Poetry is a deal of joy and pain and wonder, with a dash of the dictionary. - Kahlil Gibran Poetry begins in delight and ends in wisdom. - Robert Frost Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history. - Plato As a tool of cognition, poetry beats any existing form of analysis (a) because it pares down our reality to its linguistic essentials, whose interplay, be it clash or fusion, yields epiphany or revelation, and (b) because it exploits the rhythmic and euphonic properties of the language that in themselves are revelatory. - Joseph Brodsky A poet's object is not to tell what actually happened but what could or would happen either probably or inevitably .... For this reason poetry is something more scientific and serious than history, because poetry tends to give general truths while history gives particular facts. - Aristotle The crown of literature is poetry. It is its end and aim. It is the sublimest activity of the human mind. It is the achievement of beauty and delicacy. The writer of prose can only step aside when the poet passes. - William Sumerset Maugham What is a poem but a hazardous attempt at self-understanding? It is the deepest part of an autobiography. - Robert Penn Warren A poem is a construction of inner space. Language is to inner space as light is to material space. - Sven Birkerts Poetry is the suggestion, by the imagination, of noble grounds for noble emotions. - John Rushkin A poet's work is to name the unnamable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it from going to sleep. - Salman Rushdie Poetic language honors polarities. We use the language of poetry to provide the many levels of feeling, facets of knowing, simultaneously, so we can examine them and move forward. - Peggy Osna Heller Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things. - T.S. Eliot Poetry is the rhythmical creation of beauty in words. - Edgar Allan Poe There’s a sameness about American poetry that I don’t think represents the whole people. It represents a poetry of the moment, a poetry of evasion, and I have problems with this. I believe poetry has always been political, long before poets had to deal with the page and white space . . . it’s natural. - Yusef Komunyakaa You will find poetry nowhere unless you bring some with you. - Joubert The joy of poetry is that it will wait for you. Novels don't wait for you. Characters change. But poetry will wait. - Sonia Sanchez I think many people (like myself) prefer to read poetry mixed with prose; it gives you more to go by; the conventions of poetry have been getting far off from normal life, so that to have a prose bridge makes reading poetry seem more natural. - William Empson Poetry is either something that lives like fire inside you - like music to the musician . . . or else it is nothing, an empty, formalised bore around which pedants can endlessly drone their notes and explanations. - F. Scott Fitzgerald Poetry is the language in which man explores his own amazement. - Christopher Fry A good poem tells us a truth about the world; a bad poem tells us a truth about the author. - Larry Poetry is of so subtle a spirit, that in the pouring out of one language into another it will evaporate. - John Denham A poet is a man who manages, in a lifetime of standing out in thunderstorms, to be struck by lightning five or six times. - Randall Jarell Here undoubtedly lies the chief poetic energy: the force of imagination that pierces or exalts the solid fact, instead of floating among cloud-pictures. - George Eliot When it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry. The poet, too, is not nearly so concerned with describing facts as with creating images. - Niels Bohr The nonmimetic character of language is thus, in a certain way, the opportunity and the condition for poetry to exist. Poetry exists only to "renumerate" in other words, to repair and compensate for the "defect of languages." - Gerard Genette As to the pure mind all things are pure, so to the poetic mind all things are poetical. - Henry W. Longfellow Poetry is the music of the soul, and, above all, of great and feeling souls. - Voltaire Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and making music with them. - Dennis Gabor I have nothing to say and I am saying it and that is poetry. - John Cage Contemporary poetry ... tries to transform the sign back into meaning: its ideal, ultimately, would be to reach not the meaning of words, but the meaning of things themselves. This is why it clouds the language, increases as much as it can the abstractness of the concept and the arbitrariness of the sign and stretches to the limit the link between signifier and signified. - Barthes I write first drafts with only the good angel on my shoulder, the voice that approves of everything I write. This voice doesn’t ask questions like, Is this good? Is this a poem? Are you a poet? I keep this voice at a distance, letting only the good angel whisper to me: Trust yourself. You can't worry a poem into existence. - Georgia Heard A poem is energy transferred from where the poet got it, by way of the poem itself, all the way over to the reader. - Charles Olson A poem is a verbal artifact which must be as skillfully and solidly constructed as a table or a motorcycle. - W. H. Auden Poetry, even when apparently most fantastic, is always a revolt against artifice, a revolt, in a sense, against actuality. - James Joyce Poetry is ... the physical enactment of a process of knowing by means of language. - Mark Doty Poetry is a mirror which makes beautiful that which is distorted. - Percy Shelley You arrive at truth through poetry; I arrive at poetry through truth. - Joubert It is the job of poetry to clean up our word-clogged reality by creating silences around things. - Stephen Mallarme I never find words right away. Poems for me always begin with images and rhythms, shapes, feelings, forms, dances in the back of my mind. - Gary Snyder Poetry presents the thing in order to convey the feeling. It should be precise about the thing and reticent about the feeling, for as soon as the mind responds and connects with the thing the feeling shows in the words. - Wei T'ai Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood. - T.S. Eliot Poetry must have something in it that is barbaric, vast and wild. - Denis Diderot Poetry proceeds from the totality of man, sense, imagination, intellect, love, desire, instinct, blood and spirit together. - Jacques Maritain I have never started a poem yet whose end I knew. Writing a poem is discovering. - Robert Frost The writing of a poem is like a child throwing stones into a mineshaft. You compose first, then you listen for the reverberation. - James Fenton Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance. - Carl Sandburg Poetry is boned with ideas, nerved and blooded with emotions, all held together by the delicate, tough skin of words. - Paul Engle Most people ignore most poetry because most poetry ignores most people. - Adrian Mitchell No good poem, however confessional it may be, is just self-expression. Who on earth would claim that the pearl expresses the oyster. - C. Day Lewis By making us stop for a moment, poetry gives us an opportunity to think about ourselves as human beings on this planet and what we mean to each other. - Rita Dove Poetry amounts to arranging words with the greatest specific gravity in the most effective and externally inevitable sequence. - Joseph Brodsky | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10203 Registered: 12-2003 |
M, an impresive list of what poetry is, and one to add: Poetry is a shuffling of boxes buckled with a strap of facts.--Carl Sandburg maybe what poetry is is indefinable Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Poems don't have to rhyme.--Ted Kooser Rhyme is a technique that works best when it doesn't call attention to itself.--Addonizio and Laux | ||
| brenda morisse
Senior Member Username: moritric Post Number: 2754 Registered: 04-2007 |
Dearest M, mi hermana, I agree with all of the definitions. Good discussion. love, brenda | ||
| MV
Senior Member Username: michaelv Post Number: 1033 Registered: 11-2003 |
The abundance of definitions/comments on & about Poetry serves to affirm that Poetry defines denotation; but then it is about connotation. Thanks, MJM, for this round-up by the pros. Happy Holidays to you and my fellow poets here @ WPF MV | ||
| Terry Gresham
New member Username: terryg Post Number: 3 Registered: 12-2008 |
I like some of the old Richard Brautigan poems where he wrote a title, and that's all. A blank page followed. I think that not writing something can also be considered a poem, if not written well. | ||
| Vienna
Senior Member Username: vienna Post Number: 718 Registered: 11-1998 |
My take is this. Regardless of form, if the words really touch you, if the experience is beautiful or thought provoking, then it is a poem. A poem needs words and an intense emotion behind it. V If wishes were horses..... | ||
| Orestes Paramour
New member Username: orestes Post Number: 45 Registered: 11-2008 |
*sighs... Truly I have found the site of intelligent creativity I have been searching for. I can't remember who said it, but he said 'There is no table. It does not exist. We see it only because we have collectively agreed that there is a table.' Maybe there is no poetry, no art, no beauty, no truth, but what we collectively agree to. But when we don't agree, what happens then? Is there any less truth, beauty, art and poetry just because we don't see it? Poetry is. That's my definition. Doesn't make it good, it just makes it. (Message edited by Orestes on December 19, 2008) | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26346 Registered: 07-2001 |
A koan without an answer (but isn't that true of most of them). We needs to be defined. And without an Academy to regulate and obfuscate, there are so many we's that all of us will not agree. But let us agree poetry is a big tent, and that is all we need to agree to. Of course, we won't because there are so many we's to disagree. Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Orestes Paramour
New member Username: orestes Post Number: 46 Registered: 11-2008 |
LOL indeed. For me poetry exists. That's all. It is. | ||
| Hugh W Walthall
New member Username: xenophon Post Number: 22 Registered: 11-2008 |
okay, if you want two word "poems": Nuke Mecca. Eat children. Hurt women. Beat Oklahoma. Drink Pepsi. Love God. Wait here. Be cool. Welcome to the world of skillful advertizing and propaganda. Is it a poem, or is it Memorex? This is the western world, baby. To paraphrase Yeats, it's a poetry violent and famous. It drags the corpse of Hector round the walls of Troy. Happy is he who shall seize your children and dash them against the rock. (Psalms 137:9) Jacques Lacan, Jacques Lacan you really turn me on.... | ||
| Packrat
Valued Member Username: harolyn_j_gourley Post Number: 229 Registered: 02-2008 |
We-e-ell, assuming that this was meant to be a poem (and not just bait), Hugh, it would appear to be an oppositional/contrast-type construction; in which case... ...you missed the line-break between "Pepsi..." and "...Love". --Packrat. | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26347 Registered: 07-2001 |
Be cool does not belong on that list. It is a natural state, unavoidable. Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 177 Registered: 11-2008 |
hi all. have to put in my nose to this discussion. when i read Will's first example that he said was a non poem, i found similar examples in the Outlaw poet's manual that matched it rather well. Are any of us able to stand up to members of that style and say they are not poets, nor is their work poetry. the answer is NO. there is a poet who writes as gungalo who is an expert on creating styles. she has hundreds of them. who is to say that any of her styles are not poems. remember, every style whether the reader likes it or not has people of great repute who have tried it at one time or other. i was looking thru the outlaw manual and found that they consider my favorite poet WCW as one of their members. outlaws claim many great members of a style that we all read who like to step into outlaw every once in a while. genre come to popularity at different times, even repetitively over several centuries. but not everyone writes currently popular styles. I think that the reader has to decide whether they like something,not whether it is a poem. it is the writer who says they are writing poetry. if we did not have different opinions, we would all be writing Roses are red.....etc. wordy aren't I? cole (Message edited by collector1 on January 09, 2009) cole | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10579 Registered: 12-2003 |
harris, it depends if you submit, where you try to submit, and what the editors like also. If you just write for yourself anything could be poetry. If you write to submit, you have to write toward what the editors accept, if you write for the craft then it is good to try new things and explore as a means of growth. It has a lot to do with the reader's or editor's tastes also. Not everyone likes to read or write the same kinds of poetry, that is why there are so many styles and why people continually develop new ones. Some readers don't like every poem by the same author either. I know I don't, not even if it happens to be one of my favorite poets. I can respect the craft, but there are times I simply don't like a poem or don't connect with it in some way. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 178 Registered: 11-2008 |
Kathy, you are absolutely correct, but as an editor myself over some years, I allow my taste to tell me if I like it or not. I do not allow my opinion to say if it is a poem or not because I can find that style or genre somewhere. I don't collect prizes or enter competitions, I just read and critique and read references for the ability to learn and I write. Recently, I came across a much lauded though not famous poet and found out that poet had won many many prizes. I just did not like his work and keep on going back to read his entire collection to see if I can find something, but I can't. this does not mean he will great or not great. it just means that the prize committees and the editors of the mags he submits to like his work. so i think our job is to chose what we like. i hate when i see someone write that something is not a poem. I always remember the critiques on "Trees" and on the statue of liberty where critics said they were not poems.emma lazarus not a poet. excuse me while i shake my head over that. i guess if they are truly not poems then we just regressed to "roses are red..." again. harris/cole cole | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5260 Registered: 05-2006 |
I believe that many words have both a "casual colloquial" and a "strict" definition. For example, if you refer to this link -- hand trucks & dollies -- you can see that the thing on the left is a hand truck and the thing on the right is a dolly. Now, here's what's curious. Most people call the thing on the left a "dolly," and if you ask these same people to go back into the warehouse and bring back a "dolly," they will return with the thing on the left. And even though I'm "in the know," if I want the typical person to bring me a hand truck from the back room, I'll ask them to get me a dolly. So, along the same line, there are many verbal artforms (and even some non-verbal artforms) which are called "poetry," and on the streets it's useful to call them such; but in a strict sense they are actually similar artforms, and are better described as those other artforms. There is no doubt whatsoever that Shakespeare's plays have a strong, pervasive poetic element in the dialog -- and yet cultured individuals will usually call them plays or dramas. On the other hand, if a person at the common level of erudition encounters on a table two volumes, one of Newton's Principia and the other of Shakespeare's tragedies, and if this person is asked "to find the book of poetry," we will not be disappointed when s/he comes up with the Shakespeare, because in a loose, casual sense -- though both volumes are works of consummate genius, and though word choice in both volumes is amazingly precise and disciplined -- the Shakespeare is far closer to whatever rough and amorphous entity we call "poetry." Fred From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 560 Registered: 03-2008 |
Fred -- Had the same problem with sabre saws vs. jig saws when I used to work in a theatre shop. Speaking of theatre, we could go round and round about "what is a play" if this were a theatre board, or "what is a short story" etc etc. | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5262 Registered: 05-2006 |
That's an easy one, Will. You hunt for cages. Inevitably you find a few dozen of them here and there. You look inside. If one of them has trapped "the conscience of the king," then you know it's really a play. Gosh . . . I thought everybody knew that! Derf From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2350 Registered: 11-1998 |
Fred, hand trucks and dollies matter not. it's the esscence of what they do that's important. And face it, they both have wheels and that's probably what's confusing the green horns to begin with. I learned long ago to ask for the high backed two wheeler or the low boy with four wheels to avoid confusion. And sometimes, just to be a smartass and exhibit my vast knowledge of moving things, I'd ask someone to bring the dog's dick or a Johnson Bar -depending on what I was trying to move. Now that was fun in oh so many ways -especially when it was a newbie. Not trying to offer poetry relevance here but if it sounds like poetry, reads like poetry, and it makes you think differently about things, than it's probably, at the very least, a poetic effort. Def Jam Poetry, for example and the most part, is nothing more than angst, rant, everyday observation, personal feelings and controversial topipcs with the F word tossed in (now and a then) for shock / surprize value, because it works. But is it "poetry" as the masters would have us define it. Hell no. No more than Hip Hop is rock & roll -but is all music to the ear. And in this case, if the ear perceives it and the mind produces a pleasant thought from it, or thought that altered the thought process from its original state of mind, good or bad, in my opinion, it's probably poetry -in the guise of bad poetics and form, yes, but poetry all the same. | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 561 Registered: 03-2008 |
Wait . . . you're saying that a piece performed at Def Jam is instantly transformed into a poem featuring "bad poetics and form"? Simply by virtue of it being performed at a specific venue? This is the height of intellectual arrogance, and this kind of arrogance is at the HEART of why poetry is read by, well, no one. I'm surprised that someone who loves poetry would stoop to this level. Def Poetry Jam was on Broadway in the past couple years -- can you imagine the number of people exposed to poems through this? But I suppose now you'll say something about the quality of the poems blah blah blah. And I'm just as sure that you'll have another judgement to pass. Until we embrace poetry in all its forms, this kind of infighting will continue. And when art is plagued by infighting, it never succeeds. Ask the futurists, ask the dadaists, surrealists . . . seen many Baroque composers lately? Go ahead and have your opinion, but don't pass it off as fact. I believe poets like Beau Sia, Rachel Mckibbens, Helena Lewis, John Hill, Amiri Baraka, Kelly Tsai, and even Billy Collins (who I'm sure you just LOVE) are valid names -- all of these have performed under the umbrella of Def. | ||
| Cosima
Advanced Member Username: ffyredrop Post Number: 2302 Registered: 12-2003 |
thanks M, for the round up! "Truth is more, larger, than all the words that ever were and ever could be. Poetry sips directly." Frances | ||
| Jan Thie
New member Username: jantar Post Number: 25 Registered: 12-2008 |
I have no private definition of poetry to offer. I'm quite old-fashioned in my own writing (much more so than in my reading), so I feel comfortable with the things Auden wrote about the art & craft of writing poetry. Having said that, I think all of us, who read and write, will have to come to some kind of instinct for or knowledge of what works for us. I suspect it will never be possible to decide what is or what isn't poetry. Perceptions and practices change over time and what would work in one language would not always work in another one. I'm not even sure it's very useful to try and come to both a specific and universal definition (or even understanding) of what is poetry. (I'm pretty sure, anyway, that such a queest would not turn us into better writers...) Having said that, I think there is nothing wrong with people making their own minds up about what works for them as poetry and what does not. As long as these personal conclusions are not confused with a more general absolute truth. My private instinct is to be not all-inclusive though. If you are prepared to call everything poetry, from Shakespeare's sonnets, to a flickering Coca-Cola neon sign, to the feedback of guitars and the sound of a lonely gull or passing train... Well, if you include all, then you end up with something that becomes unpractical to the point of uselessness - as a definition or categorisation of poetry, I mean. Meh, end of ramble, Jan. "The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning." (Mark Twain) | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2351 Registered: 11-1998 |
Rob -like I said, hip hop ain't rock and roll, but it's all music nonetheless (as is rap, I suppose). It's all in the ear(s) of the beholder, just not mine. I'm not passing judgement -only expressing an opinion. Then again, seeing as opinions are like assholes, and I lost mine to cancer last year, I'm probably not entitled to an opinion anymore. You're right about one thing though, I do LOVE Billy Collins. Rod McKuen too. smiles. D | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26769 Registered: 07-2001 |
I suspect it will never be possible to decide what is or what isn't poetry. Why do we want to? Smiles. Gary puzzled Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2352 Registered: 11-1998 |
Oh, and to be perfectly clear about what I was trying to say (and to be clearly understood), I was inferring to poetry “purists” and “traditionalist” with regard to def. Not myself personally. I happen to enjoy performance poetry immensely. Arguments will be made forever with regard to “when is it a poem” and a good example might be the simple haiku. 3 lines with syllables of 5, 7, 5. A purist / traditionalist will insist it pertain to subject matter observed in nature only, and further argue not having to adhere to its syllable count because of differences in the Japanese and English language when translated. To my way of thinking, it’s all good. When is it a poem or a haiku ? When you think (and believe) it is, then it is. To quote the Moody Blues, On the Threshold of a Dream, “I think I am therefore I am, I think.” Menage a Haiku French word meaning Greek Japanese getting in Dutch with his/her feelings Cute, maybe, but is it really a haiku ? Is it even a poem ? Will it really matter fifty-years from now ? | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10589 Registered: 12-2003 |
I'm with Gary. Some will like apples. Some will like oranges. Why can't we at least respect it all? You don't have to like something to respect it. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Jan Thie
New member Username: jantar Post Number: 26 Registered: 12-2008 |
Hi Gary, "I suspect it will never be possible to decide what is or what isn't poetry. Why do we want to?" Well, I never feel the need to do so - but, at times, in a thread like this, it's fun to talk about the whole business of writing. Most of the time though, I prefer writing stuff over the whole 'meta' business. It's like many other agreeable pastimes: doing it is almost always better than talking about it... Jan. "The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning." (Mark Twain) | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26772 Registered: 07-2001 |
some like applesauce with orange rind and cloves... Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 194 Registered: 11-2008 |
A-Bear, menage a haiku is a 3 line poem because you say it is and as i have said before a poem is a poem because the writer thinks it is. the reader on the other hand can only decide if they like it or not, not what it is. we can all find everything written in a reference saying it is a poem, somewhere, if we know where to search. now for your 3 line poem, you have no fragment, you do have a connected 2 line phrase so i guess there is a reference somewhere that will tell it is haiku or a senryu because of the personification. now your referring to 50 years made me think back 54 years and can say that it is a haiku of the Contemporary American Haiku style. For CAH, there are no rules. so you would have to re-phrase your question asking if it is classical haiku, hokku, haigai. if your question allows you to accept CAH then it is haiku. again the important question is whether the reader likes it. This whole discussion comes down to what so many readers used as an insult in their critiques. "THAT IS NOT POETRY!!!!" it is a song, it is prose. it is word play or whatever, but we are insulting the writer. far better to say we don't like it and let it go at that. some of the most diplomatic writers handle this in a way i like. they say it does nothing for them, or they do not get it. a straight opinion and no insult. I feel that we have to take away that question and accept whatever the writer wants it to be, but retain the real question. DO WE LIKE IT, OR DO WE NOT LIKE IT? cole cole | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2353 Registered: 11-1998 |
harris -I "like" your response. Perfect sense and only wish I had said it first. Thank you. D | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5283 Registered: 05-2006 |
I'm sorry, I just can't accept that everything in the zoo is a zebra, or that every pill in a bottle is an analgesic. Likewise, I cannot accept that calling everything in the zoo "an animal" is enough information to be useful. I for one place great stock in the difference between "an escaped llama" and "an escaped cougar." Things have definitions and the definitions have boundaries with other words, and if there aren't some kind of commonly agreed upon meanings then one of the primary purposes of language is defeated. "STOP!" spoken to a child means something like "Quit moving your body! Hold still!" It doesn't mean "Run out in the street in front of that car." Yes, boundaries can be fluid and flexible, but "fluid and flexible" does not mean that we should throw away the dictionary. Fred From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 197 Registered: 11-2008 |
fred, certain things can't be restricted by boundaries and poetry is one of them. to set up rules and to say that a writer must follow these rules takes away the freedom of the writer and the joy of what we are doing. since i learned that a poet, nobel prize winner in literature was well known for making up words, i threw away the dictionary and made up a few words myself. it was fun. adults do not need stops from other adults. let us set our own boundaries and write the way we enjoy writing, hopefully from the heart. if the writer calls it poetry, maybe that writer has enough experience to really know it is poetry. maybe the reader does not have that experience. so who is right. i read somewhere that there are a million plus people who write poetry. I prefer to let them enjoy themselves and call it poetry. my choice is then to decide to read it or to decide not to because i can discover what i like very fast and i read what i like. I know you are experienced at this and i respect it and i ask you to respect what others call poetry if they write it, but not necessarily to like it. we all have different tastes, different educations, different experiences and most important, we all have different hearts and what we write should in some way come from our heart. even the face sheet of Wild says that. my 9 year old grand son wrote a book at 4 to 6 years of age. research shows that he was the youngest book published poet ever. there was criticism from some who did not realize his age about whether it was poetry, and to me it was cruelty. i saw his eyes and i saw the fact that it turned him off to book 2. that is not our role. let's encourage everyone to write but let's limit ourselves to not insulting a writer by setting limits on their work. let's set limits on ourselves and only decide what we personally like and what we don't like. look i'm just an old man who gets a good feeling out of writing what i call is my poetry. I already have faced the critics who said it was not poetry but i can usually convince them that it is because i learn from everyone even after 54 years of writing, and i re-write with the same joy that i write. during my life, i have had the wonderful fortune to meet several of today's greats who experienced much of what i talked about here during their years as a writer, esp if they experimented with new styles, and they persevered and their work is still celebrated by us, or at least many of us. open your mind, but mostly open your heart. like what you like, but most of all, please do not tell someone what is the boundary of what a poem is. let them choose. this has nothing to do with a zoo and i can certainly tell you about analgesics. as far as dictionaries are concerned, i had to write the preface to a book and asked permission from Webster's to use their definition of a poem. they agreed for a large amount of money. i found out they list words i would never put in a dictionary and said the hell with it and made up my own definition much of what you are reading in the several notes i have written on this topic. cole cole | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5284 Registered: 05-2006 |
There is a difference, cole, between "setting up rules" and setting boundaries. Boundaries occupy the space of ontology and taxonomy; rules primarily occupy the turf of process. For purposes of this discussion, I am far less concerned about how a poem is written than I am about what is, or is not, a poem. For example, a small child can write a poem that is light-years away from what that same child would write twenty years later. The former would be very simple, and probably rhyming, and the latter might well be a complex piece of free verse. They are both poems. But if the child, at age eight, makes an ordinary list of the people s/he wants to attend his or her birthday party, this is not a poem. The same could be said of the same individual as an adult, making an ordinary list of who s/he wants to attend a wedding. The list is not a poem. Now a list CAN be a poem. List poems are a valid sub-genre within poetry. But if a list is a simple collection of names and the order of the names, or their procession as sounds or fragments of meaning, are not chosen so as to reveal via the order some undergirding of recognition or insight appealing to either cognition or emotion then it is no more than a list. Fred From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 198 Registered: 11-2008 |
fred, we are actually getting closer in this discussion. first i want to say that a young child is not capable of rhyme, that comes later in their maturity. their initial efforts are actually closer to free verse. now neither one of us is talking about the grocery list my wife wrote out today. i would not put it on wild and try to tell someone there is poetry in the list. however, go to the outlaw bible of american poetry and you may be surprised about what poetry can be. look at some of the names and you may be surprised about who passed thru the genre at one time in their career. all i am saying is reasonability is needed and if someone legibly writes from their heart and tells me it is a poem, who am i to tell them it is not because it does not conform to some pre- determined notion in my mind. the danger is that we leave open the judgement of what a poem is by some poets who should not make that decision on someone's work. what they could say is that they like it or not. I am sure that the first translators of Basho's work from Japanese to English were chastised that what they translated was not poetry, but 3 line works of something, but not poetry. it takes a while for a genre to win acceptance. today haiku is a well recognized style of poetry. yet i can still get the same criticism from someone who does not understand the style. all i want to do is bring reasonability to the discussion. only a fool or a jokester or an ass would try to tell me that the grocery list was poetry and they will be outed fast enough by repetitious reviews that it does nothing for me. Fred, I think we have run this topic to death and I for one am exhausted. so let's come to a compromise. i will say the writer says if they have written a poem, leaving the reviewer to say if they like it or not and call that one school of thought. you can lead the next school of thought that defines a poem and makes boundaries and definitions and we will leave the next part of this thread to others who can spend time re-hashing it. I am exhausted. thanks Fred I will bow out and you can have the last word. cole cole | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10591 Registered: 12-2003 |
IMHO a young child's first poem would very likely include an attempt at rhyme. Rhyme is one of the first mnenomic tools children learn. As an example, look at children's books like Dr. Suess, children's songs, poems, and nursery rhymes like Mother Goose jack and jill went up the hill hickory dickory dock the mouse ran up the clock one thumb, one thumb drumming in a drum one hand, two hands drumming on a drum dum ditty, dum ditty, dum, dum, dum left foot, left foot right foot, right feet in the morning feet at night an itsy bitsy spider climbed up the water spout down came the rain and washed the spider out on the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a partridge in a pear tree 'Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house not a creature was stirring not even a mouse BTW, I typed these all from memory. I have 3 children. I lost count of the number of times we read these stories and rhymes, or sang these songs. Rhyme is introduced at a very young age, and children learn to memorize their favorite stories etc through repetition and sound. I think a young child would be very capable of rhyme. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Patricia A. Marsh
Member Username: patricia Post Number: 83 Registered: 12-2007 |
Cole-- My daughter and my granddaughter were "...capable of rhyme...." from about 3 years of age! Could it have been because of their interest and enjoyment in learning to read Dr. Seuss books . . . before they ever started kindergarten? Anyway . . . Check out the following URL for a Child Development Tracker: Literacy from Age 4 & 5 article--- http://www.education.com/reference/article/Ref_Tracker_Literacy_4_5 All best! Patricia | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 877 Registered: 07-2006 |
Ah, the discussion I was hoping would emerge has. For the purposes of continuing it-- W.F. If one of the reasons people don't read poetry, is the restrictiveness of some, let us call everything poetry and claim 100% of the population as readers. cole, I don't think this discussion is really meant to include children. However, my own children have written poems and fiction, and I have, at times when I thought it would be helpful, pointed out ways I thought they could do something better. I still have yet to hear a non-sentimental or non-ego-centric (in the non-pejorative sense of the word)to the following question. If we have standards for good/bad and like/dislike, why not have a standard for is/isn't? Also, a couple mentions have been made of it being disrespectful to the writer not to accept her assessment of whether her own work is a poem or not. My question is then, is the poem ultimately intended to serve the writer or the reader? Walk carefully-- your shoe is what you shine your shadow with. ~Jessica Goodfellow | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 4526 Registered: 10-2005 |
I saw a great interviews with WS Merwin on PBS where he talked about his first urge to write. He was the son of a preacher so at first he wanted to write verse that would be sung. I think this is telling. The writer writes for a reader. There has to be someone out there that the writer thinks would want to read what he wrote. He (Merwin) has a poem in his latest book about that subject and it has been a good meditation for me. Now, you don't want to dwell too much on the reader, but you need to remember there must be reader for the circle of poetry to be complete and that means references should be recognisable, forms should conform (or not, but also in a conforming way) and meaning or emotional content should be conveyed. I'll post the link to the interview later. I think this is a great discussion. Harris- Please don't take the volleys from others personally, it's all in the spirit of learning. BTW I have to ask, did your grandson at 6 tell you that he was writing poetry? Was poetry a big part of his her life? I think the story of the book he wrote is fascinating. I'd love to read an example. -Laz | ||
| Lazarus
Senior Member Username: lazarus Post Number: 4527 Registered: 10-2005 |
Here are the links to the interview. I like where he says how he wants his poems to be read: "I would like it -- if people respond to a poem of mine at all, I would like them to feel finally that they might have written it, you know?" text of interview Link to the discussion where WS Merwin reads this poem: From the Start Who did I think was listening when I wrote down the words in pencil at the beginning words for singing to music I did not know and people I did not know would read them and stand to sing them already knowing them while they sing they have no names You will also find other links to poets and to readings on the poetry project site: video of readings -Laz | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26793 Registered: 07-2001 |
If we have standards for good/bad and like/dislike, why not have a standard for is/isn't? -- Will For a couple of reasons, but the main one being what is/isn't depends on different senses than good/bad - like/dislike. I can see my laptop, these words, that my coffee cup is empty. But for these words to be good/bad, or for the coffee I have had to be liked/disliked, I need to describe why. I might do that with more words, by making a face, spitting coffee onto the laptop (which is bad) - you do not know unless I communicate in some way. And even then, good/bad or like/dislike is relative. You may find the art on my walls bad, even though I think it is good. You may think I make the best coffee ever. If anything falls in a gray area, it is the arts - whether poetry, dance, sculpture, et al. If however, by is/isn't you mean definition, I agree with you that we need definition shift though it may. We need it formost to teach - we cannot teach all those youngsters poetry unless we can tell them what it is, and what makes it different from prose. Over time, that definition may get more sophisticated. What the 3 year old is told, won't work for the 8th grader, that for the high school senior, for the undergrad, etc etc -- until you come to us who aspire to the craft and art when we may find a definition we never imagined earlier and may find another in the years left for us to be poets. But the coffee cup is empty. Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32842 Registered: 11-1998 |
I wish I had time to fully enter this discussion as it's rather fascinating, and certainly engaging and thought-provoking. As to this question, Will: "If we have standards for good/bad and like/dislike, why not have a standard for is/isn't?" We may indeed have "standards" for good/bad and like/dislike, but those standards are individual and fluctuate from person to person. How can you standardize something that refuses to be pinned down? Give two editors/judges the same batch of poems, and I can almost guarantee that what they find good/bad or what they like/dislike will be different. I believe, then, that the same could probably be said for is/isn't. This judgment of is/isn't will also fluctuate from person to person. So why try to standarize? Isn't it a pointless exercise? I am probably never going to be able to convince the person who doesn't agree with me that my "is/isn't" is the way and the light, just as I could probably not convince him in the categories of good/bad and like/dislike. So why bother to try? As to your question of whether the poem is intended to serve the writer or the reader, why must this choice be made? Can't it serve both equally? Or shouldn't we at least keep in mind that it should serve both as we write. I believe that the writer who writes only for himself and ignores his readership, or the writer who writes only for a readership to the exclusion of his own interests, is ultimately going to be a very frustrated writer, albeit in different ways. These are only my opinions, of course. And I have attempted to be non-sentimental and non-egocentric in my answers. I hope I have at least succeeded moderately in my attempt. Love, M | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5287 Registered: 05-2006 |
I will give a reason for why one should bother to try. Here's a giant one. There are a fairly large number of persons in the hard-core performance poetry/SLAM realm who are convinced that their ilk of poetry is the ONLY legitimate poetry in our modern era. Not only that, they are often militant about this and extremely vocal. Put simply, for them the page poem is not only dead but, in these politically charged times and given the mass oppressions of [fill in the blank], page poems are a slap in the face to the common man. To top it off, with the assistance of the popular media, this militant minority has convinced a very large number of people from what might be called the general community of intelligent adults and a smaller number from among the poetry community that in fact their poetry is the only poetry that has social value. Here in San Diego, there have even been poetry hosts who have been removed as hosts because they were not willing to go along with this point of view. Fortunately, this dominance is waning slightly, probably because after a decade this radical and revolutionary ideology as lost its mantle of novelty. * * * * * Now, if you're going to try to tell someone that hard-core performance poetry and SLAM aren't the only games in town, it's useful to be able to state, in concrete terms, what the other games are. In other words, it's helpful to be able to characterize in straightforward terms what broader poetry opportunities the community offers. Fred * * * * * (Message edited by sandiegopoet on January 13, 2009) From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10595 Registered: 12-2003 |
Patricia, thanks for the link to the article. It is great support for the opinion I voiced in the post above yours. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| W.F. Roby
Intermediate Member Username: wfroby Post Number: 562 Registered: 03-2008 |
Will -- Your 100% readership idea is great. From now on, when people lament that no one reads poems, I will suggest counterintuitively that *everyone* reads poems. For does not everyone appreciate the leafless branch of a tree, a toddler's spitty frown, or sod on the face of a footstone? My head hurts. Fred -- your last post was really interesting. Of course, I'd prefer to think that poetry doesn't exist in the minds of various "groups" whose "work" is easily pigeonholed into categories, etc. What the hell is a poetry host, anyway? Does she stand at the door of the poem, handing out aperitifs? | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32843 Registered: 11-1998 |
I suppose that was my point, Freddie. You say this: "There are a fairly large number of persons in the hard-core performance poetry/SLAM realm who are convinced that their ilk of poetry is the ONLY legitimate poetry in our modern era." And who says they are not right? You? And who says they are right? Them? This begs the question, I guess, of who gets to be the final arbiter in this argument? In effect, who gets to play god and decide finally and forever who is right about what constitutes poetry? And does it really matter all that much, for practical purposes, who is right so long as there are, as you say, broader poetry opportunities in the community? Styles come and go. Different ones will take precedence and be dominant at different times. Why does it have to come down to a fight for dominance anyway? In the poetry community here in Portland, there are as many factions of what constitutes poetry as there are poets to write those poems and perform them (on the stage and on the page). There are bar poets, radical poets, traditional poets, slam poets, nature poets, urban poets, lyric poets, narrative poets, form poets, free-verse poets, rhyming poets, song lyric poets, and the list goes on and on. And birds of a feather tend to flock together, i.e., in certain venues with others of their kind. As to the poetry hosts you mentioned who were removed for their unwillingness to go along with whomever was running those particular events, well, I'd advise that they pick themselves up and put themselves down in a venue that is more appropriate for them. I wouldn't read a lyric/ nature poem to a bunch of bar/radical/experimental/slam/urban poets because it would go over like a lead balloon. Nor would I go into their venue and attempt to take over dominance by telling them their poetry is not really the dominant form. I'd leave them to their poems and find the correct audience for mine. You don't show up at a football field with your baseball, bat, and glove, and then wonder why no one's playing your game. They're both "sports," and which one's dominant, which one should be played at the moment, will depend on who you ask and what attendees showed up there to play or to watch. I don't think it's a matter of dominance, or of trying to gain it. I think it's a matter of appropriateness. Go where they welcome you. And if you're going into "enemy territory," perform what the enemy wants to hear. If you don't, you're just wasting your time. Why argue about which slice of cake is the bigger one, the dominant one, at the moment? Just cut off a slice that's relevant to you and eat it. I think most in the general community of intelligent adults and in the poetry community at large realize there many slices to choose from. Love, M | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10605 Registered: 12-2003 |
Well said M. As Basho said: Learn of the pine from the pine, learn of the bamboo from the bamboo. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 201 Registered: 11-2008 |
hi all, a couple of comments. children learn by mimicry. all children's poetry books specific for children only are written by adults and they use rhyme. so the little ones mimic, but ask a child to write a new rhyme and they can't. that comes later in my experience. to answer about my grandson, he had a grandfather who wrote poetry or something, depending on the reader. but papa called it poetry so he announced that he wanted to write a poem and damn if what he recited was not a poem. all i did was put it in the proper structure because at 4 he could not write. the doubter was his mother, but that doubt disappeared one day when he did it in front of her. in the year plus of his reciting and then beginning to write himself. i collected 28 of the works and put them with some of mine and a book "Paul and Papa" resulted. I worked with him on the rhyme, but that had to be forced. i then tried other children and found that they were limited to repeating nursery rhymes only. lastly i don't think that any group can say that they are the legitimate poets and everyone else is not. perhaps that is the danger of the writer as a reviewer and saying what is poetry is and what is not poetry. so it seems that we do have two schools of thought on this topic. me, standing alone and saying it is a poem if the writer says it is a poem while i retain the right to say i like it or not, and then there is everyone else who says they know what is or is not a poem and retain the right to tell the writer that. laz said that i should take volleys personally. i can only promise all that i definitely don't and am used to being on one side of a discussion while the majority are on the other side. i look at the subject with humor and have enjoyed it immensely and have to thank Will for bringing it up. you may all write whatever you do, because you will never see a comment from me that it is not poetry, if you say it is. cole cole | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26798 Registered: 07-2001 |
Actually, Cole, I don't know what is or isn't a poem. Well, I know a manual on repairing VW engines isn't, and those French all gibberish constructs probably aren't. But anything with a smidge of music, why not? Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10617 Registered: 12-2003 |
Cole, I don't believe I ever said I know what is or is not a poem. In fact, and I'm quoting myself from above: "If you just write for yourself anything could be poetry." Which is what you echo when you say: "it is a poem if the writer says it is a poem." I don't appreciate the generalization you make about everyone else. A debate on whether or not young children are capable of rhyme, would be just that, another debate. And what would it accomplish, except perhaps having someone feel alone on their side of the fence. Some people find the need to debate everything just to prove their point. It gets old after a while. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32849 Registered: 11-1998 |
Heck, Kathy. Don't feel too bad. I think I got lumped in there too, even though I posted that big long list that would identify practically anything as a poem, and am even willing to entertain grocery lists as legitimate poems (I've seen people make good poems out of just about everything, though I will admit it does takes a hefty to enormous amount of talent to make a good one out of a grocery list). Oh, well -- what's a day without a good, juicy generalization, eh? Love, M | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 208 Registered: 11-2008 |
kathy, i have to apologize, you never took that side and i did generalize and should have left it open that there are some in both schools of thought. as far as debate on rhyme by children, re-read my note because i said by my experience. that is not asking for a debate. it is only a layer of thin ice, my experience. so please accept my apology for generalizing and look at my words of my experience as being so small that it really can provoke no debate. that surely was not my intent. after this sincere apology, let me paraphrase Rodney King because I don't remember the exact quote. "Can't we just get along?" I enjoy my communication with you even though it may be that you have never come across an MD like me. cole (Message edited by collector1 on January 13, 2009) cole | ||
| harris Vernick
Valued Member Username: collector1 Post Number: 209 Registered: 11-2008 |
M, obviously i should not have generalized and was unaware that my words would upset anyone. you did give a rather complete list of points about poetry and i owe you and everyone else an apology. my words came from analysis of the comments on this poem vs not a poem, on both oil immersion( you can tell the memory of an old MD, can't you?) essential oils and those received on a prose structure that i submitted to see what would be said. I looked at the weight of opinion and saw that most felt that it was necessary to be able to say what a poem was and that my idea that it is what a writer says it is was in the minority. my paragraph, while it did generalize was actually an attempt to bring it to an end peacefully and i inadvertently angered Kathy and you. I apologize to the writers of Wild who took this in a way I never meant. I personally don't like rancor and frankly am too old to appreciate a good argument, nor seek to provoke one unless by accident. I expressed my opinion which I often do and apologize again for making others feel that i was putting words in their mouths. with that done, i shall retire from this discussion now and go back to my reviews and critiques and very few poem submissions. thank you, cole (Message edited by collector1 on January 13, 2009) cole | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10619 Registered: 12-2003 |
M, . cole, I wasn't angry. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 878 Registered: 07-2006 |
Cole, actually, you might be hard pressed to point out where anyone here took a real hard line on "that side". As Laz said, this discussion is entirely in the spirit of learning. Sincerely, Will (un-offended) Walk carefully-- your shoe is what you shine your shadow with. ~Jessica Goodfellow | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32850 Registered: 11-1998 |
Cole -- no upset from me. I've been accused of worse around here. Much worse. Best, M | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5293 Registered: 05-2006 |
If I sound a bit angry, it is because I am. In reading over the replies to my comments, it is clear to me that people are twisting what I have said. I am not advocating rigid rules for how to write poems. I am not advocating rigid rules for what is or what is not a poem. What I AM saying roughly comes down to this: (1) What a thing is called "on the street" and what a thing is called by experts or simply by themore culturally familiar can differ substantially. We might apply the term "poetry" to a modern dance performance, using it as a shorthand for the metaphor poetry in motion. But, once we think about it, we acknowledge that ART is divided taxonomically into different forms, each with a loose, but nonetheless real, boundary: dance, music, poetry, sculpture, painting, prose. (2)Just because poetry is extremely difficult to define and characterized by loose, flexible boundaries does not mean that it has no boundaries, such that nearly anything written or spoken can be called a poem. In my own case, ever since I began writing "poetry" I have heard -- from hundreds of different people -- that one tendency in my poems that people want me to correct is that my work can sound prosy. Now I could have told people, "You're full of shit. If I say it's a poem, it's a poem, and you've all got your heads up your asses" -- and never changed a thing in my poems, or I could've acknowledged that maybe these several hundred people over ten years of time had a point, and maybe I should look at a large number of poems and a large number of stories and note consistent differences in what the two parallel artforms were trying to do as far as embedded craft and expressive devices, and then redraft my own work accordingly. Astonishingly, I chose the second option, though even to this day I often err on the side of prosiness. ***************************** I am extremely troubled by what appears to be in this thread to be a virulent strain of anti-intellectualism. The assertion that certain things do not, by their very nature, admit definition strikes me as either pure intellectual laziness or another example of a sideroad in Western Culture, along which it is claimed, much like the Oracles at Delphi, that truth need not have any basis in reason, and rather stands on the foundation of its own assertive voice. ***************************** ~M~, What was happening a few years ago in San Diego went kind of like this. A poetry host would be running a regular poetry reading, the usual thing, a feature poet along with an hour or two of open mics. Normally, the reading would be held at a coffee house. Your comment -- "As to the poetry hosts you mentioned who were removed for their unwillingness to go along with whomever was running those particular events, well, I'd advise that they pick themselves up and put themselves down in a venue that is more appropriate for them. I wouldn't read a lyric/ nature poem to a bunch of bar/radical/experimental/slam/urban poets because it would go over like a lead balloon. Nor would I go into their venue and attempt to take over dominance by telling them their poetry is not really the dominant form. I'd leave them to their poems and find the correct audience for mine. -- misses the point. These were not a case of hosts imposing their own conception of poetry on a community with a more liberal view. This was a deliberate raid on an established poetry reading, with the intent it taking it down -- and then taking it over. This guerrilla group of SLAM/performance poets would show up and try to take over the reading. They would hog the mic, try to do skits, attempt to coopt the reading to deliver political diatribes, etc. Inevitably, the poetry host would attempt to do the job of host and bring the reading under control. S/he would inform this group that they should sign up and read poetry just like everyone else. At this point, the group would make a huge scene, claiming that the host was a racist, or sexist, or anti-Latino, or anti-feminist, or anti-lesbian. (They couldn't claim anti-gay, because one of the hosts in these scenarios was in fact gay.) They would go to the owner of the coffee house and argue that the host was a bigoted pig, who discriminated against [fill in the blank], and should be removed as host. Three times I know of, the host was removed, twice at San Diego's most popular reading, and once at a slightly less popular venue. In other instances, the host was able to stand up to these assholes. One of the kingpins of this guerrilla group came into my store about three years ago, wanting her CD player to be repaired. I didn't fix the thing. I think she's a dangerous and vicious woman, and I will do nothing to help her life. ***************************** This is about the tenth time I've posted comments to thread on Essential Oils where a number of readers have not taken the time to do a close reading of what I have said, but rather have gone to their own personal stable of prejudices, bigotry and off-the-wall views, and like a rorschach, projected their own twists onto my words. Since I have a mild case of Aspergers, I can tell you this has been happening all my life. I'm incredibly fucking tired of it. Fred * * * * * (Message edited by sandiegopoet on January 14, 2009) From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32864 Registered: 11-1998 |
I don't think people are twisting your words so much, Freddie, as offering their own opinions and trying to understand yours. As you said, "I'm incredibly fucking tired of it," which means you're coming to this already a bit rightfully agitated. No one's against you, Freddie, though it might feel that way when you're passionate and upset about a subject. Everyone's just passing information back and forth. I don't believe any intentional slight is meant towards you. You do have a tendency to be a bit rigid. Take this for example: "ART is divided taxonomically into different forms, each with a loose, but nonetheless real, boundary: dance, music, poetry, sculpture, painting, prose" Yes, technically, you are correct. However, look around. There are a lot of people blending, mixing, distorting, broadening, opening, and in many other ways playing within those definitions. There are composites these days that mix techniques and results of one artist endeavor with another -- dance with poetry, music with painting, and so forth. The real boundary lines between these arts are getting very blurry. As it should. Our job is not merely to practice these crafts as they've always been practiced, but to open ourselves to experiments within, and between them. Let's call it merging. I am quite excited by this. steve is taking art classes currently in which the students are brave enough to bring new definitions and new manners of expression to all of these arts. The results of their mixtures and blending are sometimes breathtaking and often awe-inspiring. I would resist the impulse to be too rigid in definitions. I'm sorry for what happened to this poetry reading in SD. It happens here in Portland all the time. Perhaps not to this degree, but people do come in to established settings with their own ideas of how things should be done and run. And what kinds of materials are appropriate to present. Normally, the shakedown resolves itself. In other words, those who no longer find the established reading to their liking (because of the way it's being transformed) wander away. Some even create their own groups. Life is fluid, Freddie. Things change. While it's not good to have it happen in such a violent, guerilla-like manner, the best response is often to just separate yourself from it. If people stop attending those readings, the guerillas will be left with only themselves to read to. It happened to a reading in a bar around here in Portland that steve and I liked to attend. Unfortunately, that reading was being taken over by drunks who like to get up on stage and spout their drunken, rage-filled, rants. Okay, I've got nothing against that stuff theoretically. But one or two of those are enough for me to stomach. A whole evening of them was too much. So, steve and I just stopped going and found other readings to attend. There are always more readings. And if none of them appeal, you can always start your own. I'm not much for violence or protecting my turf. I just get out and go somewhere else. Let them take it over. If I'm not going anymore, what do I care what they do? Not saying my way works in every case, in this case, or even as it pertains to you. Just sharing what I'd do. That doesn't make me right. Love, M | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1137 Registered: 10-2005 |
"ART is divided taxonomically into different forms, each with a loose, but nonetheless real, boundary: dance, music, poetry, sculpture, painting, prose" (Fred) "Yes, technically, you are correct. However, look around. There are a lot of people blending, mixing, distorting, broadening, opening, and in many other ways playing within those definitions." (M) If I were Fred, I'd be tired of it, too. There seems, to me, nothing rigid at all about Fred's statement. And nothing about it that doesn't complement your own quote, M. | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32865 Registered: 11-1998 |
This is what I was responding to from Freddie's quote, Jeffrey: "but nonetheless real, boundary" In saying there are real boundaries, I think the words could be taken to mean that definite separations exist (or should exist). I'm not sure about that, but that's how I read it. And as it concerns boundaries between arts, I'm not sure there should be any, real or not. Of course, it's helpful when trying to identify something, as in "She's doing a dance, so she must be dancing," and "This is what dance is," but to enforce "real" boundaries is restrictive. I guess I'm just more open to fluidity. I don't need definitions or boundaries, necessarily. I'm a little more comfortable with leaving things undefined. I can look at someone doing a dance, and say "That's poetry," or "That's sculpture," but I don't expect others to do so if they're more comfortable calling it or defining it as "dance." That's just me, though. I certainly don't mean to imply everyone should think or feel this way. And I meant no insult to Freddie by using the word "rigid" (So sorry, Freddie!). Perhaps it was not the best word to choose. I apologize for the word choice, but I was typing fast and it was the first word that came to mind. Perhaps "fixed," "firm" or "set" might have been better choices. I guess I should just stay out of these discussions, eh? Love, M | ||
| Arthur Seeley
Member Username: amergin Post Number: 71 Registered: 12-2008 |
Though we may learn a lot from each other we will never successfully define just what poetry is or is not. Let us accept that if the writer says 'This is a poem' we accept that it is a poem- and so poetry is defined. The question then is, is it a good poem or a bad poem. This, of course, is a matter of taste and brings me to a favourite hobby horse of mine. I believe that with any work of art be it painting, music, prose or poetry, any form of art that communicates, there are at least two versions of the work. There is the work the poet created ( we will stay with poetry but this applies to all art, I think) and the poem the reader creates when he reads the piece. They are both genuine and separate acts of creation. I say separate because if we compare the lives of the poet and the reader we will find that each has an entirely different well of references against which and with which the poem is read/ heard and appreciated. It is of course possible indeed likely that they will share some often many of those references especially if they share the same culture and are aware of the mythos which informs the work. Nevertheless, there will be differences and differences such that a new meaning will be discerned in the work presented, it can be an image, a word, a phrase, that will resonate differently for the poet than it does for the audience. This means that if I listen to a Mahler symphony or view a Picasso my act of creation in listening and viewing are as real and genuine as the original act. Of course this implies that if there are many readers/ listeners there could be as many differing acts of creation as there are members of the audience. I accept that there will be occasions where the seemingly differing acts are one Since my act of creation is equal to and as valid as the original then when the poet says this is a poem I can say this is not a poem and both statements are true and equivalent. Arthur | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 881 Registered: 07-2006 |
I was playing a poem last night on my poem's Nintendo. The poem was 14-3, and I was so happy, I let out a great big poem! My poem upstairs heard me and came poeming down to see what the poem was, but I poemed her down, saying, Don't poem, poem; it was poem, really. (100!) Walk carefully-- your shoe is what you shine your shadow with. ~Jessica Goodfellow | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1138 Registered: 10-2005 |
I'm liking Will's post. I think it's a poem. ;) | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1139 Registered: 10-2005 |
Separations do exist. The definition of poetry may be elusive, and it can certainly be flexible, but there are things that set poetry off from prose and from other forms of art. The subjective matter of taste is relevant here, because we define poetry as a people from a collective standpoint... and different groups with different ideas about poetry come to vastly different opinions about what is and what is not a poem. A good poem, yes... because what they think is "good" is what they will categorize as poetry, the base from which the definition can be stretched. "They" may be workshop-aholics, they may be slam artists, they may be weavers of erudite metaphors, or they may be story-tellers with a bent for the figurative, etc. etc. It is still important to have the discussion. An ongoing discussion, and a definition open to change, certainly. But to say, "Everything is poetry" or, "If the poet says it's a poem, it's a poem"... that's side-stepping the conversation, a conversation that can only serve to illuminate regardless of the variant opinions on the topic. | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5295 Registered: 05-2006 |
Will, Only last week, I went to a group meditation session. Not TMers, not Babayaga minions, not Sri Chinmoy devotees, not Tibetan monks . . . just folks who wanted to do a group meditation loosely in the Eastern tradition. There we were chanting "Ooooooommmmmmmmmmmm!" -- over and over. A great feeling of calm came over me. The knots in my shoulders loosened. My cares fell away, like the leaves of autumn, and blew away in the wind. Then I began chanting "Ppppooooeeeemmmm!" For some reason, people began looking at me strangely, even accusingly. Finally, the meditation leader, a tiny woman in her seventies, came over with a stern expression on her face. "That's OM," she said, "not POEM." "The hell it is," I countered. "POEM is just as good as OM. A poem can be anything. It might as well be a chant." "Well, I can be anything too," she said. "And one thing I am beside an old lady who runs a meditation group is a 3rd-degree black belt in Kenpo Karate." She pointed to the door: "Get out!"  ............................. From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32871 Registered: 11-1998 |
I paid $25 to attend this chick's performance last Wednesday. On the flyer it said: "Interpretive Poetry Reading by Wilma Imapoet." Well, I got there and all the woman did all night was dance. Dancing here, dancing there. She never did open her mouth. Now, it was good dancing, mind you, and the music was nice, but what was I supposed to think? Damn woman. I demanded a refund! Go somewhere expectin' to hear some words and shit, and all you get is this damn dancing woman cavorting all over the stage. What the hell's up with that, anyway? Yeah, okay, I was entertained. But it was supposed to be poetry, I'm tellin' ya'. These people should do their experimental interpretive crap in their own closets. Instead, they're hawking it to the unsuspecting public. Still haven't gotten my money back. *grumble, grumble, bitch, bitch*  | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10642 Registered: 12-2003 |
M, would that be Wilmee Imapoet? I think I've seen her performace too. Wait, I might be confused, that might have been Wilma Mimeapoet. I hope you get your money back soon.  Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5296 Registered: 05-2006 |
Let's look at her name: Wilma Imapoet Now let's break it down wil/maim/a/poet wil maim a poet Be afraid. Be very afraid. Fred From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32876 Registered: 11-1998 |
Ah, you broke the code, Freddie. There's just no gettin' anything past you, is there?  | ||
| Orestes Paramour
Member Username: orestes Post Number: 51 Registered: 11-2008 |
*snicker Since my inbox is overflowing with this discussion I had to come and view and add my 2 cents. There have been some great ideas offered, and a near nose to nose "is to! Is not! Is to!" lol. But, are we any closer to defining what a poem actually is? And M is right, who gets final say on it? Do I have any right to tell the author "What you wrote isn't a poem"? I could tell them it lacks any 'traditional' poetic elements like rhyme and meter, but just because it does doesn't mean I have the right to say 'this is not a poem.' By that broad definition a lot of 'modern' free verse doesn't count as poetry either. lol. But I am not saying that. And I am not ignoring the other poetic elements like metaphor and Imagery. I'm just saying that prose also uses these poetic devices. Does that mean that prose is poetry? I haven't written that to start more controversy. I have written it to show that we all have different opinions on what makes poetry poetry. We will agree in some areas, we wont agree in others. It seems that sometimes what defines a poem is linked to taste and preference. To separate art into catagories like dance, music, poetry, sculpture etc is ignoring the vast differences within the artforms. For example in dance you have ballet, jazz, 50's rock n roll, tango, interpretive, break dancing, hip hop, the moonwalk, pogo dancing. (lol) and all of these have their levels of expertise (ie 'bad' ballet and 'good' ballet). But, just cause I personally want to dial 911 and try not to let them swallow their tongue when I see Krumping doesn't mean I can say this isn't dance. It's only my preference, or my 'like/dislike'. I wont even mention music here. or painting. or sculpture. The point is that you can define it in it's broadest most basic terms, and still you would leave out something that someone counts as a 'poem' or 'poetry'. I see poetry, and indeed all artforms as a rainbow. It's expression (light) defined only by filters, and even then UV and Ultraviolet are left out. What is left is a broad, blurred spectrum of that expression. Some may prefer the blues, some may prefer the greens, hardly any of us might like that mucky, vague expression between orange and brown but preference cannot be allowed to define what is and what isn't. And this poetry spectrum is intersected vertically, diagonally etc with the other art spectrums. And this mass isn't stagnant, it pulsates and orbits and shudders, leading to mixtures of the arts to produce an overall effect. I'm sure we've all heard poetry in lyrics to songs. Some of us put pictures or different fonts and colours to enchance our poems. I've seen ballet in hip hop dance routines, opera performed to rock and reggae, Shakespeare performed as interpretive dance. (I can see how Interpretive Poetry Reading might be still poetic to a very few, but my preference would be to demand my money back too. lol) The argument was raised: "If we don't define it, how will we teach it?" Depends on how you teach it I suppose, but I am teaching me son the spectrum including the ones I don't like or know little about and letting him make up his own mind. If you must define poetry, define it. If your preference/like is for particular styles, write it and read it. But please, keep in mind I am not you, and my likes are not your likes, my definitions are not yours. You must still respect that, even if you don't agree, and accept that your definition and my definition are not the be-all and end-all of what poetry is. Poetry is. That's all I can say. (Message edited by Orestes on January 14, 2009) | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10643 Registered: 12-2003 |
Ah Fred, I didn't see that combination. I went with Will me I'm a poet and Wilma mime a poet nothing as painful as maiming a poet. LOL. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2354 Registered: 11-1998 |
I once interpreted an epileptic seizure as break dancing. “Stand back,” I shouted, “let him do his thing.” I had no idea his performance was a medical condition. He could have seriously injured his self had someone not known the difference and dialed 911. All things considered though, he did exhibit some great moves. He entertained the crowd for several minutes too before the ambulance and medics arrived. You should have heard the applause. Sick, I know, but it's a good example why we should be allowed to define what is and what isn't. And we need to get it right the first time around. Some things don't deserve an encore. | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5297 Registered: 05-2006 |
Do I have any right to tell the author "What you wrote isn't a poem"? * * * * * You have as much right to say that as you have to say to a smoker sitting next to you in a restaurant, "I really don't like second-hand smoke. I would appreciate it if you would either put that out or smoke outside." You have as much right to say that as you have to say, "I disagree with your views about abortion. And I wish you wouldn't try to impose them on my child." You have as much right to say that as you have to say to the waiter, "This steak isn't properly cooked." -- or to a policeman, "You are mistaken; I wasn't speeding." -- or to a physician, "I'm going to get a second opinion." -- or to your child, "No, you will be in by 11:00 p.m." * * * * * What are we? A nation of intellectual wimps, afraid to take a stand? I think of the craven, the bird that was afraid to take to wing, and thus was eaten by the fox. * * * * * From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1140 Registered: 10-2005 |
"preference cannot be allowed to define what is and what isn't" Of course it can. That's how we, collectively, define things. It's the way we first gave things names and the way we first decided what meanings to attribute to words. A lack of preference would imply objectivity... and we have never been able to attain that. Strive for it, sure. But not attain it. By attempting to define poetry, as in attempting to define anything, we are also collectively attempting to define ourselves... and that's part of the way we figure out who we are, both collectively and as individuals. It's part of the way we progress as human beings -- we categorize the world, pull it apart to look at it, then marvel at how poor our definitions are as we work towards more fitting ones. But if we marvel without inspection or definition, we are just deer staring at the moon. It's not a bad thing, but it's not human progress. We are a people of subjective preference. The kind of poetry one person prefers may be different from another, but we can still define what is and what is not poetry. It's a worthy effort. And so I'll return to a post I made early in the thread, as I made some attempt to define poetry through the eyes of poets I admire who did the same. I'll use my own words and see how I do. Poetry is an attempt to illuminate by way of comparison; metaphor is part and parcel of all that is poetic. Words themselves are symbols, stand-ins for the real thing. Poetry takes the hopelessly inadequate symbols and bolsters them through metaphor, shining light on one object by considering its similarities to another. Sometimes the whole poem is a metaphor... my story for your story. Sometimes the metaphors are smaller comparisons, sometimes they are similes (which are just indirect metaphors) or synechdoches (the metaphor that asks the part to stand for the whole), personification (the metaphor that compares something that isn't human to a human)... and so forth. But metaphor is the stuff of poetry. Of course poetry is more than that. Even free verse, to be poetry, must have rhythm and often has rhyme... even when the former is irregular and the latter internal or slant. But poetry is more than that, too. Poetry is beauty, even when it describes the terribly ugly. It is truth, even when its truths are couched in a thousand lies. And maybe that's what Keats was getting at. Poetry is an attempt to make the ineffable... effable. And who wouldn't want to eff the ineffable, anyway? ;) | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5299 Registered: 05-2006 |
Jeffrey, I like your POV. Fred P.S. Check out my new masterpiece in Biofeedback, entitled "I'm a Poem Too." * * * * * * * * * * (Message edited by sandiegopoet on January 14, 2009) From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32888 Registered: 11-1998 |
I suppose I need to learn when to stay out of it, but if I don’t say this, someone not as kind as me will. Jeffrey, prose also includes all those things you used to define poetry. Prose illuminates by way of comparison, and it includes words that are symbols, stand-ins for the real thing. Prose takes hopelessly inadequate symbols and bolsters them through metaphor, shining light on one object by considering its similarities to another. Prose also uses simile, synechdoche, and personification, and so forth. An entire short story or even a novel can be one long metaphor. Lines of prose have rhythm and often have rhyme... even when the former is irregular and the latter internal or slant (I would also add unintentional). Prose is beauty, even when it describes the terribly ugly. It is truth, even when its truths are couched in a thousand lies. Prose is an attempt to make the ineffable... effable. So, if the definition(s) you have applied to poetry can also be applied to prose, have you defined poetry, or have you defined prose? Have you defined poetry to the exclusion of prose? And if you have, then what are the distinctions? Go ahead, Freddie. Your turn. Love, M | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5302 Registered: 05-2006 |
One enormous difference between poetry and prose is that you can make $$$ writing prose. Derf From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| Orestes Paramour
Member Username: orestes Post Number: 52 Registered: 11-2008 |
Okay okay, define away. lol. But, we can't collectively do it, our opinions are too different. So lets find an expert to tell us what poetry should be. Which is expert enough to do that for us? And if s/he does, what if what you write isn't included? M has already posted an extensive list of what experts and respected poets have defined poetry as, funny that not one said exactly the same thing. So which one is most expert so we can take only his/her opinion as definition? Besides, I think so long as people have been creative, other's have tried to pigeon hole the product - ie, make it fit in the box. And I thought that was what art rebelled against in the first place. I'm happy to have my opinion on what i call art/music/poetry/etc, and happy to respect that if someone writes differently from my opinion to say it still is an art according to them. That is not a cop-out, that is tolerance. I'm sure someone will disagree. LOL. | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2355 Registered: 11-1998 |
Fred -yes, you have the right to those and more. I'd still be careful when exercising those rights though, especially to the waiter (we've all heard the stories about what happens when the food returns to the kitchen), and I'd be extremely sensitive to the cop. From personal experience, it's best to just sign the damn ticket and fight it in court (in front of a judge and witnesses where the cop "probably" won't shoot you or hit you with his maze and night stick). Oakland Bart Station, New Year's Day, remember? Rodney King -etc. Best to be a live wimp than a dead one. Save the frustration, anger, and opinion for discussions such as this. You might not win every battle but you're guaranteed to live to fight another day. smiles. D | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5303 Registered: 05-2006 |
Orestes, I can't tell you what a Democrat is, or what a Republican is in a precise, nailed-down way. There will always be people in the Democratic and Republican parties who are contrarians, mavericks, or even renegades. But if there isn't something that a great many Democrats collectively believe, and if there isn't a somewhat different thing that a great many Republicans collectively believe, then it becomes next to impossible for a candidate to appeal to his or her constituency. Both parties do enormous research to find out what values and beliefs most characterize the views of members of their parties -- and they try to speak to those values and beliefs. There is a HUGE difference between the above targeting process and applying a rigid litmus test to party members with the intent of enforcing orthodoxy. In both cases, there is a defining process going on, yet they are otherwise quite dissimilar: one is soft, the other hard; one is loose, the other tight. Yet someone, either Democrat or Republican, who vocally advocates utter anarchy, or that excess female infants should be aborted, would be excluded from "representing party views." These opinions are just too extreme. So, even though it may be difficult, as with my pornography example, to draw the line, on some kind of complex emotional/cognitive gameboard, people DO draw the line. If you believe that Native Americans should be sterilized, you can join the Democrats or Republicans, but you cannot speak for either party. Fred From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| Cosima
Advanced Member Username: ffyredrop Post Number: 2320 Registered: 12-2003 |
Truth is more, is larger than all the words that ever were, could or will be... and poetry sips from it directly. Frances | ||
| Ron. Lavalette
Advanced Member Username: dellfarmer Post Number: 1389 Registered: 05-2007 |
There's no poetry anywhere. Even poetry's not poetry. All is illusion. Everyone smells different except The Polka Dot Kid. --Ron. Eggs Over Tokyo | ||
| Orestes Paramour
Member Username: orestes Post Number: 53 Registered: 11-2008 |
I understand what you are saying Fred, and I agree, people draw the line, but we don't draw the line in the same places. And regardless of whether they 'most characterise the party' or are extreme, they will still call themselves political. Democrat or republican are merely forms of preference for being political and the forms blur and change according to the individual. In appealing to the constituency, you do raise an interesting question, what are we writing for? do we need to define it so that the most appeal of our work is gained? If we are indeed to define to preference, are we only accepting what is most likely to appeal to the biggest audience and therefore sell the most? If so, please, let us all desist from poetry and write prose, after all, more people will buy a novel than a book of poems. I don't write to sell. I don't write to be the voice of the middle of the road mainstream and have the most appeal. I write because it amuses me/pleases me to write like this and allows me to exorcise these thoughts in me. I will still call it poetry even if others do not. | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 882 Registered: 07-2006 |
"So, if the definition(s) you have applied to poetry can also be applied to prose, have you defined poetry, or have you defined prose? Have you defined poetry to the exclusion of prose? And if you have, then what are the distinctions?" If he adds compression/density of language, I think he's fine. Jeffery, thank you for your post. You've inspired a poem that I have great excitement about writing. Hopefully you'll see it here in a week or so. M, recalling your response re: poems serving reader or writer, I think some of what you said applies here as well, and actually meshes with what Jeffrey is saying. I do believe there is authorial choice involved, but I have to believe it is, at least to some degree, dependant on reader acceptance. I think you could take the last page of either The Great Gatsby or A River Runs Through It, and readers would accept them alone as prose poetry. But McLean and Fitzgerald included them in a larger work. We accept and relish them there. In cases like these, the line is blurred. However, humans as a collective have a definition of what poetry is. There are writers, and I genuinely admire them, who rebel against the "boundaries" and seek to expand them with their work. But until a reader/viewer/editor accepts the piece as a poem, it remains poetry only to the creator. The creator of a piece, in my opinion, has no power to command an audience to accept anything as belonging to a specific genre beyond enduing said work with such characterstics as will cause a conscious or unconscious response in the reader of "This is a poem!" (among other responses, of course. I give as an example Michelle Detorie (who is a gifted poet in the commonly accepted sense) and her work with what she calls picture poems. (I linked this above somewhere.) I think her work is beautiful and thought provoking, but have yet to personally accept it as poetry, because it simply does not elicit that response from me. I, however, am not outraged that she calls it poetry. In fact I see what she is trying to accomplish, and even why she would call it poetry, but it simply doesn't work for me as poetry even though I like it. Here then, in this interplay between author in reader, I have to believe, lives the definition of poetry. Again, just my opinion. Will (Message edited by dwillo on January 15, 2009) Walk carefully-- your shoe is what you shine your shadow with. ~Jessica Goodfellow | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32889 Registered: 11-1998 |
Thank you to everyone who responded, especially Fred and Will, who continue to champion defining poetry. You are both so eloquent, particularly you, Will, in what you have expressed. I think what I am reading, Will, from what you have written (and please forgive if my condensation is too brief and/or incorrect), is that poetry is something we know when we see it, something we feel in our hearts and respond to. Will, you said it best when you said, poetry "will cause a conscious or unconscious response in the reader of "This is a poem!" It is something we (as poets, though non-poets are not excluded) know rather than something we can exactly and precisely define. The distinctions between poetry and prose used to be rhyme and line breaks, but even that has been discarded. And compression and density of language can also be applied to prose. I have read passages in novels that have compression and density of the same complexity and degree as any poetry I have ever read. I think Derf gave us the best definition of the distinction: "One enormous difference between poetry and prose is that you can make $$$ writing prose." I LOVE that one, Derf, and pray all the time that it, too, will no longer apply. Love, M | ||
| brenda morisse
Senior Member Username: moritric Post Number: 2934 Registered: 04-2007 |
Now I'm afraid to write. Maybe I'll forget about poetry, take up hula, instead. Where did I put my grass skirt? | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10661 Registered: 12-2003 |
Right now I'm reading the novel Glass, by Ellen Hopkins she has a few others too, Crank, Burned, Impulse (I'm reading it because my 16 yr old dtr recommended it) it reads like a memoir or diary, but each page is set in the form of poetry, some concrete does that make it poetry? one reviewer calls it poetry it is concise and flows fast, there's a sprinkling of simile, a bit of metaphor, it tells a story maybe it's more narrative? I don't know, she's making $$$ is it prose set in poetry form? the subject matter is current and will touch a lot of readers, it's about methanphetamine addiction would it read as well as as prose? I think so so how do you define it? you can't but it's bringing poetry to the public in an unusual way and that's a good thing Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Fred Longworth
Senior Member Username: sandiegopoet Post Number: 5306 Registered: 05-2006 |
9:35 A.M. I open the coffee can, find that mature beans are mating, reproducing. Baby beans everywhere. I place the community in a sieve, separate the infant ones, drop them in the grinder. Ah! Neonatal screams! Or maybe it's just the whirring blade. And now, fresh-brood coffee! A huge bowl of multi-grain cereal. Yum. [here is where the poem makes a turn] But first I go outside, chop wood for an hour, work up an appetite. A surreal task, since I have no axe, no woodpile, no woodburning stove. From Bambi: "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." From me: "Even consciousness, a pastiche of recycled cans." | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1141 Registered: 10-2005 |
I think the point that some are missing is that the exercise of attempting to define poetry is worthwhile, even knowing that the lines are blurred, even realizing that the definition can and will change. Because if we just say, "look at this exception" or "you just can't do it," then we are rolling over... this is the response that led people to see faces in the clouds and call them gods. It took a long time for people to start looking at the clouds and trying to define them, to really look at them. And the questions lead to more questions, but that's fantastic. We like the hunt, we like the questions. The seeking. And M, what you say is true to an extent, in that all those things can be applied to prose... but they are not the core of prose. A newspaper article is prose, certainly, and perhaps closer to the "core" of prose. A well-written novel comes closer to poetry... hence the idea that "all good prose is poetry"... that may be true, but it doesn't help much in the defining. A newspaper article (non-editorial) is the straight facts, presented objectively (ostensibly)... a narrative of straightforward description. And perhaps more importantly, a description on one level and one level only. Poetry is multi-layered. So we could add dense language, as Will notes. Multi-layered. That's good. And what else? What sets it apart? It speaks to a different part of our being, perhaps. But you can also just say, "Who is the expert? Are you? Who shall we assign? It can't be done"... then you can be done with thinking about it. Wash your hands of the matter entirely. Call the clouds gods and call it a day. ;) (Message edited by runatyr on January 15, 2009) | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26847 Registered: 07-2001 |
is it a poem if no wood chopped if no wood stacked if no fire built if no lunch cooked if not bowels evacuated if not butt wiped if no poem written if no hunger s/g Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2356 Registered: 11-1998 |
If a poet reads aloud in a forest with only the trees to listen Who do we ask | ||
| sue kay
Moderator Username: suekay Post Number: 1177 Registered: 11-2005 |
I decided, I needed another email notification so Yes, it is, Is it Yes a poem well of course why Not. It all works for me. I have enhjoyed the discussion. Great minds never think alike. But I have to say I hand the palm d'or to Jefferey for coining the unforgettable ""eff the ineffable." Now that is just fine wordworking. I was laughing at odd moments all day over that one. Thanks all for a very intelligent and informative discussion. regards Sue | ||
| Jeffrey S. Lange
Advanced Member Username: runatyr Post Number: 1142 Registered: 10-2005 |
Glad to have provided a bit of levity, Sue! ;) Jeff | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Valued Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 235 Registered: 07-2007 |
If a poem fell on a planet where there were no readers would it still be a poem? | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26863 Registered: 07-2001 |
If a widow maker fell into an empty trout pond would it still be a poem? Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10664 Registered: 12-2003 |
if a red leaf fell into a empty pool would it be a poem? Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Jan Thie
New member Username: jantar Post Number: 27 Registered: 12-2008 |
It's a bit of a recap, really but A) Anyone who writes anything can call it whatever he or she wants and B) Anyone who reads it can call it whatever he or she wants as well. (W.H. Auden: "For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives") "The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning." (Mark Twain) | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Valued Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 237 Registered: 07-2007 |
If Rod McKuen rose from the dead and wrote a poem would it still be crap? | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2357 Registered: 11-1998 |
Jan -an astute summary. I wrote this many years ago for an Auden challenge using the very line you quoted. Not sure if I did it the justice deserved, or even if the line breaks are the same as I originally posted them, but it is one of my better efforts. I was told it is an "opinion" poem (smile) and I couldn't agree more: Vicissitudes Poetry is copious ideas and chronicles of sin. A seaman's chantey crooned through the ages. For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives the hate of unlearned experience, never exceeds its incalculable demand for love. It endures the politics of religion in breath of pen, and disengaged bones laid bare by grave robbers who seek posterity. It survives solace, solitude, simple answers, and man's serendipitous inventions: hypocrisy, illiteracy, jealousy and zeal. It weathers righteousness, depressed ramblings of madmen, the stimulated minds of intoxication, the verbally challenged, and genius. It survives because in the beginning was the epistle riding the ungovernable rush; rapid water words flowing over river rock as it migrates to the sea of everlasting communion. ~D~ | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2358 Registered: 11-1998 |
Dan -old Rod is still 'rising' to the occasion. He is very much alive and I will be sure to tell him you said hello. Obviously you are not a fan of his writings (i.e., novels, poetry, musicals, symphonies, etc.) but he is making tons of money from his past efforts and that alone speaks volumes. Crap? Yeah, right. http://www.mckuen.com/welcome.htm | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Valued Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 239 Registered: 07-2007 |
Oh; I thought Rod died. Like Mark Twain once said: "The reports of my death have been exagerated." Or something to that affect. I know Rod had quite a following back in the 60's. At least in the San Francisco bay area. My mother loved Rod's stuff. I remember her browsing through and buying his books of poetry when I was in my early teens and her and I would go to book stores together. I bought lots of poetry, but I couldn't stand Rod's work. Still can't. Money makes poetry good? Not in my book. I see his old books of poems for sale in thrift stores, etc., while truly good books of poems are rarely seen on those shelves. Discriminating readers tend to hold on to the good stuff, or at least trade it for other good stuff at used book stores, etc. Anyway-- no poet is loved by all readers. It is thought by some that Charles Bukowski might be the best-selling poet, ever; but I know plenty of readers who can't stand his work. | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10680 Registered: 12-2003 |
I think Rod did die, but he still has a following... kind of like Shakespeare no disrespect intended Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 895 Registered: 07-2006 |
He's 75 and still . . . doing what he does. Walk carefully-- your shoe is what you shine your shadow with. ~Jessica Goodfellow | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26868 Registered: 07-2001 |
Not in my book. I see his old books of poems for sale in thrift stores, etc., while truly good books of poems are rarely seen on those shelves. The reason I love used bookstores - really good stuff in on those shelves. (Amazon too.) Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Valued Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 241 Registered: 07-2007 |
I like used book stores, too, Gar: "Discriminating readers tend to hold on to the good stuff, or at least trade it for other good stuff at used book stores, etc." | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2359 Registered: 11-1998 |
Kathy Not only is he NOT DEAD but I don't think he plans on dying anytime soon (LOL). He has concerts and readings planned for the month of February 2009 - http://www.mckuen.com/concerts.htm ~D~ | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10681 Registered: 12-2003 |
Ooops still no direspect intended all his books at my local library, and I've read them all I dunno, I like Rod Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Valued Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 242 Registered: 07-2007 |
Rod's work is just too sweet and mushy for my taste. | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26873 Registered: 07-2001 |
Kathy, one of my favorite poems is Noyes' The Highwayman, who our cousins from cross the pond dismiss with disdain. Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Dan Tompsett
Valued Member Username: db_tompsett Post Number: 243 Registered: 07-2007 |
Selecting A Reader First, I would have her be beautiful, and walking carefully up on my poetry at the loneliest moment of an afternoon, her hair still damp at the neck from washing it. She should be wearing a raincoat, an old one, dirty from not having money enough for the cleaners. She will take out her glasses, and there in the bookstore, she will thumb over my poems, then put the book back up on its shelf. She will say to herself, "For that kind of money, I can get my raincoat cleaned." And she will. Ted Kooser | ||
| "A-Bear"
Senior Member Username: dane Post Number: 2360 Registered: 11-1998 |
Dan -and with the money saved, well, she should find "several" decent books (traded, of course) at the used book store. Definitely a win / win. Smiles. ~D~ | ||
| Gary Blankenship
Moderator Username: garydawg Post Number: 26877 Registered: 07-2001 |
And don't forget Bargain Books and that kind. I found the best poet ever there. I tried to buy a book at Ikea once. They buy them by the pound, but they wouldn't sell it, even for a couple of bucks. Smiles. Gary Celebrate Walt with Gary: http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/tw10/tw4conte.htm | ||
| Ron. Lavalette
Advanced Member Username: dellfarmer Post Number: 1400 Registered: 05-2007 |
Kooser is god. --Ron. Eggs Over Tokyo | ||
| Will Eastland
Intermediate Member Username: dwillo Post Number: 897 Registered: 07-2006 |
Maybe, but that hair still damp at the neck from washing it always creeped me out a bit. Is that some sort of fetish or what? Walk carefully-- your shoe is what you shine your shadow with. ~Jessica Goodfellow | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10682 Registered: 12-2003 |
Dan, Sweet and mushy has a appropriate times. I found Rod as a teenager, his were better than my angst-laden poems, LOL, So were Danielle Steel's Love Poems (still have that book somewhere). My I'm glad I've learned some new techniques. We all start somewhere. Gary, I'll have to check out Noyes. Kooser is good. So is collins. So are Oliver, Olds, and Gluck. So many, so little time. Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Ron. Lavalette
Advanced Member Username: dellfarmer Post Number: 1401 Registered: 05-2007 |
Kathy: Typo alert! You have an extra "o" in your description of Kooser. --Ron. Eggs Over Tokyo | ||
| Kathy Paupore
Moderator Username: kathy Post Number: 10684 Registered: 12-2003 |
Ron, LOL. I didn't capitalize either. But can Kooser, Collins, Oliver, Olds, and Gluck all be God?  Kathy You're invited to: Wild Flowers Free verse in not, of course, free.--Mary Oliver | ||
| Arthur Seeley
Member Username: amergin Post Number: 80 Registered: 12-2008 |
Is there any way I can exclude myself from this endless chit-chat that this thread has become? You are clogging my e-mail inbox. Arthur | ||
| ~M~
Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 32911 Registered: 11-1998 |
No, Arthur. I'm afraid you can't turn off automated e-mail from just one specific thread. If you turn off automated e-mail on your profile, it affects all the threads on the specific forum and you will receive no e-mail from any of them. But I can turn off this thread, which I think I will do. I think it's gone on long enough, folks. It's now degenerating into something I don't think Will intended when he posed the original question. Anyone who wants to continue to chit-chat can start a new thread. And if you don't want to receive e-mail on it, Arthur, simply don't enter into the discussion. It's been a great discussion, everyone. And thanks for your additions to it. Love, M |
