Freedom of expression in Poetry.

[milo]

You speak of an ivory tower
And billy, he wields all the power.
Off in his palace, he
Speaks of the phallacy
And gives you a hot golden shower!

[Heartafire]

I must agree with Ellajam on this, but having learned the hard way,
I will usually pass on confrontation, poetic, political, religious. I posted a rebuttal to a fellow blogger and it turned out to be a flock of "claim your republic" tea partiers and they outed my home address. :-)...
terrorism!

[Leanne]

Wow, Heart, that's a pretty unpleasant experience... but of course you need not fear here, we are all living together in an ivory tower

If 95% (a generous 95%, of course) are not interested in reading what I write, then I will write as well as I am able for the remaining 5% so that they need not settle for something less than what they enjoy. We have all, of course, lamented from time to time that poetry has died -- this, like many other things poets say, is hyperbole. Even if it is dead, we maggots and other parasites will continue to squirm about in its corpse until we are strong enough to infest another.

[Truerenigma]

Wow, Heart, that's a pretty unpleasant experience... but of course you need not fear here, we are all living together in an ivory tower

If 95% (a generous 95%, of course) are not interested in reading what I write, then I will write as well as I am able for the remaining 5% so that they need not settle for something less than what they enjoy. We have all, of course, lamented from time to time that poetry has died -- this, like many other things poets say, is hyperbole. Even if it is dead, we maggots and other parasites will continue to squirm about in its corpse until we are strong enough to infest another.

Brilliant metaphor, Leanne. As usual

But are you saying that you support maggots and the rape of corpses?
It's rather ugly and distasteful. Most people don't like maggots . . .
And are you actually a maggot? I thought you were a middle aged lorry driver?
And i thought your only vice was eviscerating puppies?! This is all so very confusing . . .

[Leanne]

Maggots are good at evisceration on a slightly smaller scale -- so just little puppies. And if it's a very big corpse it stands to reason that maggots would evolve to develop a network of highways and mechanical transport. It's not rocket surgery

[Carousal]

This is a workshop discussion forum Precisely; it means a discussion, an exchange of ideas.
If, as you say, you have no interest in expanding the readership of poetry or more to the point of this discussion, any interest of preventing its decline, then I don’t see any reason as to why you are taking part.

I am not attacking this site or any other site, that’s ridiculous, I am simply addressing an issue that has made the media both in the US and here in the UK.

My little campaign??? www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/.../is-poetry-dead/‎

[NobodyNothing]

Wow, Heart, that's a pretty unpleasant experience... but of course you need not fear here, we are all living together in an ivory tower

If 95% (a generous 95%, of course) are not interested in reading what I write, then I will write as well as I am able for the remaining 5% so that they need not settle for something less than what they enjoy. We have all, of course, lamented from time to time that poetry has died -- this, like many other things poets say, is hyperbole. Even if it is dead, we maggots and other parasites will continue to squirm about in its corpse until we are strong enough to infest another.

Pretty much /thread to me, which does seems to be intended upon being a pissing contest. And, as already mentioned, nice metaphor.

Now, I demand a new poem for my entertainment. You have 30 days. And it better be good. Or else.

[milo]

This is a workshop discussion forum Precisely; it means a discussion, an exchange of ideas.
If, as you say, you have no interest in expanding the readership of poetry or more to the point of this discussion, any interest of preventing its decline, then I don’t see any reason as to why you are taking part.

I am not attacking this site or any other site, that’s ridiculous, I am simply addressing an issue that has made the media both in the US and here in the UK.

My little campaign??? www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/.../is-poetry-dead/‎

Media - now that is a discipline that has managed to evolve and stay profitable in spite of the near bankruptcy of some of the biggest players.

[Truerenigma]

Meh, poetry will be around long after me, with or without my help. I'm interested in preventing its decline though, yes. I'm interested in keeping poetry just the way it is (we already have plenty of diversity, I don't feel that any one group is under represented). And preserving enriched language. And the studious examination of all things technical. I'm interested in the five percent.

And I meant by workshop and discussion that we are more slated toward less visceral matters. Technical matters, and less subjective matters of more veracity. Not so much the exchange of ideas, although we have no rules against it. We don't try to push our ideas and preferences on others, we help each other grow and understand the language and it's uses as they pertain to poetry. I don't think that if everyone wrote poetry the way I would like them to it would some how make the whole world like poetry more, or read more poetry--you don't seem to suffer from such clarity in your perceptions of what you believe the reality to be.

I don't post here to find out what kind of poetry people like, or what subject matter I should be addressing. Nor do I post here to share, or to get more people to read my poems.

[Erthona]

Poets are elitist, just not profitable or important ones. If you want to be profitable open a porn site. What poets need to come to terms with is that poetry is unimportant today. In the world before electronics poetry could have some importance because it had little competitions and readers were willing to put time into it (well at least until the modernist killed it). Poets write because they have to, that doesn't mean there has to be an audience. Sure there are many people on poetry sites, but those are about vanity, which is not unlike the Kardashian effect, in that sycophants abound to support those of no talent, simply to be apart of something, so that they too can feel important (I know it's completely baffling as it defies the second law of thermodynamics, but there you go).

Ah poetry, you have my love, but not my affection.


Dale

[Truerenigma]

I love you
Like a warm summer's day
I love you
I hope you never go away
I love you
Like green leaves on the trees
I love you
When you get down on your knees

Will that get me an audience?

[Carousal]

Poets are elitist, just not profitable or important ones. If you want to be profitable open a porn site. What poets need to come to terms with is that poetry is unimportant today. In the world before electronics poetry could have some importance because it had little competitions and readers were willing to put time into it (well at least until the modernist killed it). Poets write because they have to, that doesn't mean there has to be an audience. Sure there are many people on poetry sites, but those are about vanity, which is not unlike the Kardashian effect, in that sycophants abound to support those of no talent, simply to be apart of something, so that they too can feel important (I know it's completely baffling as it defies the second law of thermodynamics, but there you go).

Ah poetry, you have my love, but not my affection.

I agree mostly with what you say and I take it that the sites you are referring to are the type where everything anyone writes is ‘absolutely awesome’ Yeah I started on some of those sites. Maybe there’s an element of vanity there but also a degree of personally therapy writing. The love and bleeding hearts threads for example are they really what can be described as poetry? And as you have pointed out the changes in lifestyle, but you nailed it when you mentioned the Modernist and even more the move to Post Modernistic writing.

If all you can offer is the stuff that requires the reader to dissect the poem line by line to figure out the meaning, if it has one, the public aint going to bother, end of story.



Dale

---

I love you
Like a warm summer's day
I love you
I hope you never go away
I love you
Like green leaves on the trees
I love you
When you get down on your knees

Will that get me an audience?

Yep, try the gift card makers.

[Truerenigma]

In that case I'm not interested in an audience. I was finished writing it before i finished typing the fist line. And I started typing before I started writing. I'm looking to waste a lot more time than that.

[Erthona]

Carousal,

Please do not put my name at the bottom of your comments, to avoid confusion, not necessarily because I disagree with you agreeing with me It did have me confused at first, I was thinking, "Hey, when did I write that"

Dale

[Truerenigma]

If all you can offer is the stuff that requires the reader to dissect the poem line by line to figure out the meaning, if it has one, the public aint going to bother, end of story.

Dean Young is one of the few pop poets respected by much of the literary crowd who actually sells A LOT of books.

Try figuring out the "meaning" in his poems. In fact, try asking him what they "mean". I don't think even he knows or cares. He's been quoted many times saying (although not in so few words) that meaning is meaningless.

[NobodyNothing]

Try figuring out the "meaning" in his poems. In fact, try asking him what they "mean". I don't think even he knows or cares. He's been quoted many times saying (although not in so few words) that meaning is meaningless.

I don't know. I personally think that's more affect than anything else. Which I can understand, because an artist (did I just say that?) wants their work to stand/speak for itself. I remember Picasso saying that he didn't know what his mural "Guernica" means, or is supposed to stand for (that pedestrian meaning thing). But I don't believe for a second that he wasn't chasing something down, going for something. The painting/mural was practically a modern myth unto itself.

And then there's one of the only mantras I've beaten into my own feeble little mind when it comes to poetry: Never explain, always express.

Anyway...

[Truerenigma]

Try figuring out the "meaning" in his poems. In fact, try asking him what they "mean". I don't think even he knows or cares. He's been quoted many times saying (although not in so few words) that meaning is meaningless.

I don't know. I personally think that's more affect than anything else. Which I can understand, because an artist (did I just say that?) wants their work to stand/speak for itself. I remember Picasso saying that he didn't know what his mural "Guernica" means, or is supposed to stand for (that pedestrian meaning thing). But I don't believe for a second that he wasn't chasing something down, going for something. The painting/mural was practically a modern myth unto itself.

And then there's one of the only mantras I've beaten into my own feeble little mind when it comes to poetry: Never explain, always express.

Anyway...

Yeah, I just don't think that there always has to be a moral to the story. It may mean one thing to you but another to me. Who cares what it means? All that matters is how it's said.

Dean Young
speaking to the centrality of misunderstanding in his poetry: “I think to tie meaning too closely to understanding misses the point.”

Actually he wrote an essay book on writing called the art of recklessness that was recommended to me and I bought it because I enjoy much of his poetry. I can't for the life of me figure out what it means. His prose is awful.

Gurus make me nauseous. But if I enjoy a poem I don't care who wrote it.

[NobodyNothing]

^^^Yeah, I get that. Beauty is its own value. And oftentimes, even usually, it's in the eyes/ears of the beholder.

Anyway...

[Erthona]

In terms of meaning, yes there is, and the author is as clueless as the reader. however meaning should not be confused with clarity. In terms of meaning, I have revisited poems I have written 10,20,30 years ago, and find things in them that I know at the time I had no conception of, so I know I did not intentionally write that into the poem. As far as I am concerned, I am a translator for the muse, whether you call it God, the collective unconscious, or Bullwinkle.

Midwife

Asleep, deep in the twilight part of night, sometimes,
I’ll be awakened by a sleepless poem pacing in my mind.
Knowing that fighting is pointless, I'll eventually concede,
give in, get up and write it down, vowing, "Just this one last time!"
Only to find the lines already formed, cadence set, as well as rhyme.
Though late and despite me, this nascent being never hesitates
in fear: for like a babe full formed does this poem appear.
No part had I in its gestation, nor did it need me to create;
it need only borrow of me that small a priori part of mind.
Thus relegated, I play my role as midwife and womb surrogate,
though an easy labor for this birth had been pre-defined.
Birthed from this mental wasteland, a newly emanate light,
to confound the drowsy darkness and conquer the sleeping night.

[Truerenigma]

In terms of meaning, yes there is, and the author is as clueless as the reader. however meaning should not be confused with clarity. In terms of meaning, I have revisited poems I have written 10,20,30 years ago, and find things in them that I know at the time I had no conception of, so I know I did not intentionally write that into the poem. As far as I am concerned, I am a translator for the muse, whether you call it God, the collective unconscious, or Bullwinkle.

Midwife

Asleep, deep in the twilight part of night, sometimes,
I’ll be awakened by a sleepless poem pacing in my mind.
Knowing that fighting is pointless, I'll eventually concede,
give in, get up and write it down, vowing, "Just this one last time!"
Only to find the lines already formed, cadence set, as well as rhyme.
Though late and despite me, this nascent being never hesitates
in fear: for like a babe full formed does this poem appear.
No part had I in its gestation, nor did it need me to create;
it need only borrow of me that small a priori part of mind.
Thus relegated, I play my role as midwife and womb surrogate,
though an easy labor for this birth had been pre-defined.
Birthed from this mental wasteland, a newly emanate light,
to confound the drowsy darkness and conquer the sleeping night.

Oh, yes, clarity is a noble enough pursuit. As far as meaning though, I'm familiar with the all the "meaning" rhetoric, but what does it all mean?

---

I'm convinced that the fact that Sylvia stuck her head in the oven means she was having a bad hair day and couldn't find a blow dryer.