Are you a good judge of your poetry

[rowens]

I don't think of my poetry as art. I don't think of myself as an artist. I use poetic tools to make poems, but that's incidental. That's why when someone criticizes one of my poems, I try to explain what I'm trying to do, as opposed to what I'm supposed to do. I don't get much out of structuring a poem in any traditional form; when I'm doing it, I get bored; and I usually only finish a poem like that if someone I like says they like that kind of poem. There is 'verse' poetry, or 'prose' poetry, and so on. And there is 'poetry', encompassing all of those things. Critics have creative power of their own: They can create opinions and perspectives to influence how others read something. Critics can keep popular poems relevant and in circulation, or can put famous poems out of favor. The wars of opinions between critics and critics, poets and critics, and poets and poets are what intellectuals enjoy. It's part of the spirit. We could just as well say that everyone's welcome to their opinions and practices; but we don't. By "intellectuals", I mean people "in the know", whatever that means. It is philosophy, that's what it amounts to. Like political, social, artistic, religious philosophy. You form your own, and you work with what you believe, and you counter others' opinions with your own. I think it's very simple. I like some of my poems better than others, but those are for purely personal reasons. I have no real opinions about whether my poems are any good or not. You have to have a strong instinct, when you're doing something like making a poem. If you're in the know about the schools of thought and opinion of the philosophy of poetry, then you're going to know who's going to hate what and why. So you can write for your audience. But if you are writing for no particular audience, there's no use beating your head against the wall trying to please everyone. Just educate yourself as much as you can, realize how and why you are affected by the poetry you read, and use your instincts to write for yourself. Then let people critique it.