Forum Poetry What is Poetry?

This is a question that comes up all the time at the Cafe. I recently did an interview with the Del Ray Cross, the editor of the online poetry journal SHAMPOO. He had an unconventional opinion for those interested:

http://darkpartyreview.blogspot.com/2007/03/5-questions-about-modern-poetry.html

So in other words... Like beauty, poetry is in the eye of the beholder.

http://www.mgbergeron.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=192#192 I got a really looooong answer right here.

Poetry is what you conceive it to be.

IMHO poetry is the best choice of words in the best order to transmit the message you wish to share

firs, separate the woods from the trees. there's poetry and there's verse. verse is line-break prose, commented out writing, using line length and geometric space, that has something important to say. poetry is the internal dance and need to make love with words. poetry looks and sounds alive, and uses rhyme and rhythm and metaphor in a contraction of conversational talk. talk is the frosting of thought, and the cake of experience just goes on and on, and you can whip and curl in a conversation and get your point across. poetry talks to no one, but does this dance for someone, and the movements are so smooth that the light breaks into sound waves and sounds like words. poetry is its own grammar, it shapes the writer. verse is dependent on the common wording, the grammar of convention and "interesting word choice", and, sometimes, "such a beautiful way of saying...". poetry is written by poets, verse is written by inspired diary writers. both have their uses.

[quote=G.f. Snell Iii]This is a question that comes up all the time at the Cafe. I recently did an interview with the Del Ray Cross, the editor of the online poetry journal SHAMPOO. He had an unconventional opinion for those interested:

http://darkpartyreview.blogspot.com/2007/03/5-questions-about-modern-poetry.html[/quote]

next question::cool::

Poetry is the "Voice of your heart"

poetry is what you make it and interpret it to be. each poem has a different meaning to alot of people our backround focuses on each key part of the writing and breaks down what would make the most since to us. i believe jennifer said it the best poetry is the "voice of our heart" beautiful :)

so, a "poem" doesn't have to have "words"? ginsburg tried to eliminate words. ginsburg was a vaudville tap dancer, always afraid he was too old and too square. he invented "blow thyself" and other socratic and cosmic gestures.

[quote=Danielle Ryan]poetry is what you make it and interpret it to be. each poem has a different meaning to alot of people our backround focuses on each key part of the writing and breaks down what would make the most since to us. i believe jennifer said it the best poetry is the "voice of our heart" beautiful :)[/quote]

Interesting article and response. Didn't expect there to be a definitive answer so was not disappointed. If 'good' could be defined the limitation of it would be disastrous and poetry would cease to have any value. But that's just my view!

you'all want poetry to be that "time-out" thing that allows you to get away with writing anyway you can, and off the top of your head. but, a good poem is that once in a lifetime thing where you feel so much about someone you love that you can only write in the most honest and conscious manner. that's why there've been only four or five good poems ever written, even though there's fifty gillion "mystery meat" poems squeezed out everyday.

"one you love"? god, a person, life itself. "death be not proud"? "sailing to byzantium"? "sea surface full of clouds"? why not. anything by robert frost or allen ginsburg? probably not and never could have been.



[quote=Steve Scrivens]Interesting article and response. Didn't expect there to be a definitive answer so was not disappointed. If 'good' could be defined the limitation of it would be disastrous and poetry would cease to have any value. But that's just my view![/quote]

poetry is cancerous language

i think i might understand what you mean, if it's that poetry seems to turn conversation back on itself, and seems to isolate "phrases" into "sentiments". or is it simply that you're feeling chagrined about the process?

if it's frustration and ire at poetry, than that's exactly what a poet needs to feel in order to invent poetry. if it's the linguistic thing, than i think it's important to consider that poetry, the poetic movement of connection, is probably the first form of language, both historically and psycho-linguistically. it's the the blah-blah conversation, the pushing of small thoughts in to "meaning", that turns conversation into a closed loop cancer. poets, but not versifiers, are the recreators of language... we give new spirit to the language through our simply using it in radical ways. (saying something "radical" doesn't radicalize language, but saying "whatever" in a different way revitalizes language.)

poets invented language.

[quote=Brett Campaigne]poetry is cancerous language[/quote]

Poetry are words, sentences, verses, rhymes full of the poet's soul.
It may be short and it may be long.
It's experience and fiction. Sometimes it's the reality on a piece of paper.
Poetry is often full of feelings. Feelings of the poet. My feelings...

the voice of our soul....
a voice not confined, to being heard at some places and not others;
a voice that is from our heart and therefore indeed beautiful...
art and therefore in the beholder's eye...

But most of all POETRY IS US.....
Thats what the importance is....it may be a few words or written in a "long form"
some of srick to conventions whilst others dont-
but our poetry is truly what we want to say.....but haven't

i think you might have it backwards. poetry invents the soul.

[quote=Robert May]Poetry are words, sentences, verses, rhymes full of the poet's soul.
It may be short and it may be long.
It's experience and fiction. Sometimes it's the reality on a piece of paper.
Poetry is often full of feelings. Feelings of the poet. My feelings...[/quote]

[quote]i think you might have it backwards. poetry invents the soul. [/quote]

I think [i]you [/i]have it backwards, Michael. Poetry is the expression of what's in our hearts and souls. A person has a soul, without writing poetry, so, to say that poetry "invents" the soul, as to say it "creates" the soul, is an egotistical and completely false statement in my opinion. But you already know my opinions on your chauvenist and conceited views. I mean, anyone who is so full of himself to say that he writes some of the most beautiful poetry in the world or whatever isn't worth my time. But, that's all I'm going to say. And, I actually anticipate what you're going to answer back to this. I know you always have to give your meaningless and superficial two cents.

So, adieu,
Christina.

we're not puppies. we have a way of saying things, but we have to learn to say them. for us, seeing isn't a question of reacting, it's a question of putting things in perspective. the emotions have a history. you can read this history in the history of literature: it's not that we didn't have "feelings" before Horace or Homer, say, but that we didn't know what to say about them to others. we may or may not have a soul, but i didn't know had one until i read poetry, no matter how many times i'd heard that word before, from people older and with bruised souls.

our gift to the world is to give the world a shared emotion, not just a tiny inarticulate hurt. that's all i meant. anyway, you may not have thought that it was ok to read my post in an unguarded manner, since you didn't necessarily think i had a soul.

[quote=The Carpal Tunnel Of Love: Christina Harper.][quote]i think you might have it backwards. poetry invents the soul. [/quote]

I think [i]you [/i]have it backwards, Michael. Poetry is the expression of what's in our hearts and souls. A person has a soul, without writing poetry, so, to say that poetry "invents" the soul, as to say it "creates" the soul, is an egotistical and completely false statement in my opinion. But you already know my opinions on your chauvenist and conceited views. I mean, anyone who is so full of himself to say that he writes some of the most beautiful poetry in the world or whatever isn't worth my time. But, that's all I'm going to say. And, I actually anticipate what you're going to answer back to this. I know you always have to give your meaningless and superficial two cents.

So, adieu,
Christina.[/quote]

Ah, see, now the rewrite of your original thought made perfect sense, it was just the way you wrote the original that seemed, hmm, I can't even remember how i originally put it. And, while we're on the subject, I didn't THINK you didn't have a soul, but you lead me to believe, through your words, that YOU believe poetry creates our soul... or something to that effect. Sorry, I'm writing this while I'm suffering from sinus problems. It messes with your brain cells.

Anyway, the point of that reply, really, was to see if you really were just saying things for argument's sake. I can see, now, that you aren't always like that. You're just confused about your own reality it seems. Anyway, I apologize if I led you to believe I thought you were a strictly bad person. You're just one of these people that I guess our personalities clash to the point where I can't stand you, and you more than likely can't stand me. It doesn't hurt my feelings any.

But back to poetry as an intellectual discussion. [quote]we may or may not have a soul, but i didn't know had one until i read poetry, no matter how many times i'd heard that word before, from people older and with bruised souls.[/quote] I find it hard to agree with this. So, I have to ask you a question, are you a religious person? Or do you feel that it undermines one's intelligence? Just a question. Because it seems as if you aren't, judged on the way you worded that. i could be wrong, but we're just talking here. Anyway, I think poetry is a means that you can find your "soul" or sense of self, or whatever you want to call it. But I know that I also felt myself in other things as well. Music, stories, movies, nature, etc I came in touch with more and more of myself. In fact, I've only been reading and writing poetry heavily for five years. But yet, I just can't see where you're coming from with your ideas. When I started writing poems, it was to relieve my aching heart, to pour forth my feelings and get them out of my head before I were to explode. To me, that wasn't finding my soul, it was freeing it. But, then again, poetry is different for everyone, so this whole discussion may be pointless.