01-06-2026, 07:45 AM
The Wodehouse reference is from his Mulliner story a dodgy poet who is thrown out by his uncle, owner of Briggs Breakfast Pickles, for writing bad copy.
I think the question of rhyme in English had been dealt with extensively before and I’ve nothing new to add to what I’ve said before.
A more interesting question is, what does poetry today look like?
I read a smattering of modern poets here and there. I don’t mean Rupi Kaur, of course, and to say she’s a poet is to say that it doesn’t matter if you can do the Tour de France or just cycle about in the driveway, because bike riding is bike riding. Let the defenders of Rupi Kaur, though they don’t abound here, eat shite.
So what do I think of modern poetry? For one, it is exceptionally skilful. You have probably not heard of Eileen Chong, but she writes marvellously well: https://pittstreetpoetry.com/poet/eileen-chong/
And there are hundreds of Eileen Chong. Each one of them is a better poet than Tennyson or Wordsworth, and Browning is not fit to shine their shoes. But that’s also because they’ve developed on what came before, and we always look farther than the giants whose shoulders we stand upon.
Yet, there is a bland uniformity that pervades all modern poetry. I can tell Hopkins from Tennyson, but not Eileen Chong from many others. There is a sameness of voice. And this has to do with the death of religion and the death of magic. We live in an intellectual, scientific world. And the intellect is the enemy of poetry. So said Mahomet. No poets, he said, and then proceeded to seed his magnum opus with rhyme.
It’s a ramble, but I type on my phone and default to words that are easier to type or what the iOS dictionary throws out.
Religions is dead, and so is much of poetry. Somehow, the muttering of a single woman living in New York City about her period is not relevant when you think of the millions who died of cholera in the 1800s.
Or a man like Larkin, writing about how he is terrified of death, but then going on to brew his tea instead of fleeing to the mountains of Hira - all poetry today is pervaded with the same mock horror, mock sadness, phoney feeling.
Adonai roi, Lo echsar- that’s the root of all that’s good in western poetry, but it’s a home we can’t go back to. That’s good in an overall sense, but bad for the primitive art of poetry
If I typed on a computer, I’d be able to explain my rants more cogently. I blame technology
I think the question of rhyme in English had been dealt with extensively before and I’ve nothing new to add to what I’ve said before.
A more interesting question is, what does poetry today look like?
I read a smattering of modern poets here and there. I don’t mean Rupi Kaur, of course, and to say she’s a poet is to say that it doesn’t matter if you can do the Tour de France or just cycle about in the driveway, because bike riding is bike riding. Let the defenders of Rupi Kaur, though they don’t abound here, eat shite.
So what do I think of modern poetry? For one, it is exceptionally skilful. You have probably not heard of Eileen Chong, but she writes marvellously well: https://pittstreetpoetry.com/poet/eileen-chong/
And there are hundreds of Eileen Chong. Each one of them is a better poet than Tennyson or Wordsworth, and Browning is not fit to shine their shoes. But that’s also because they’ve developed on what came before, and we always look farther than the giants whose shoulders we stand upon.
Yet, there is a bland uniformity that pervades all modern poetry. I can tell Hopkins from Tennyson, but not Eileen Chong from many others. There is a sameness of voice. And this has to do with the death of religion and the death of magic. We live in an intellectual, scientific world. And the intellect is the enemy of poetry. So said Mahomet. No poets, he said, and then proceeded to seed his magnum opus with rhyme.
It’s a ramble, but I type on my phone and default to words that are easier to type or what the iOS dictionary throws out.
Religions is dead, and so is much of poetry. Somehow, the muttering of a single woman living in New York City about her period is not relevant when you think of the millions who died of cholera in the 1800s.
Or a man like Larkin, writing about how he is terrified of death, but then going on to brew his tea instead of fleeing to the mountains of Hira - all poetry today is pervaded with the same mock horror, mock sadness, phoney feeling.
Adonai roi, Lo echsar- that’s the root of all that’s good in western poetry, but it’s a home we can’t go back to. That’s good in an overall sense, but bad for the primitive art of poetry
If I typed on a computer, I’d be able to explain my rants more cogently. I blame technology