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Poet or snob?
By Arthur Webster of Ask Old Coot
When I saw the topic for the week I was stuck for a while on what definition I should give to the word 'poem'. Is a poem something that exists as an entity with no relationship to anything else or is a poem an ingredient of life? A recent poem goes as follows:- The dark
curtain
though seldom drawn
will give you
pause for thought.
Does the curtain
keep
light in
or
does it keep
light out? Call me old fashioned but this is not a poem. This is a pair of badly constructed sentences which would be better presented as prose. Unfortunately there is a flawed air of superiority attaching itself to 'poetry lovers'. They will wax lyrical in their praises of talentless offerings that do not qualify as a short story but which can be sliced and diced and put on a page, aligned right or justified. To challenge the validity of labeling a piece of prose 'poetry' is to invite immediate accusations of ignorance of philistine proportions. We, of the older generation, are used to poems that rhyme and scan. We cannot understand the modern wish to deny beauty in the structures created with the written word. Poetry has gone the same way as modern 'classical' music. The more cacophonous it is, the more people will rave about it. If music can be created by throwing bricks in a bin, allowing a cat to traipse up and down the keyboard of a piano and using a violin and double bass to slice potatoes, all while interspersing the racket with 'meaningful' silences, any old garbage can be called poetry and enthused over. In this, the Poem Week, do enough readers feel as I do that a poem should have structure and inherent beauty or is the general opinion that poetry, like all that is attractive, should continue to be brutalised?
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Contributor's Note
I believe that modern poetry is prose, poorly disguised. I also believe that the destruction of the perception of poetry is yet another indication of the dumbing down of our civilisation. Soon, all shall be drab and the thick will still not 'get it'.
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Ask Old Coot
An open invitation to ask questions.
www.askoldcoot.info
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I'm with you, Arthur. Poetry should have structure and inherent beauty.
I love country western music, because it tells a story. So too, a good poem.
Best wishes.
Frederick
CONTRIBUTOR'S REPLY
Don't get me on songs that tell a story, Frederick! I have just spent a very difficult half an hour listening to some rappers. I'm still trying to work out how rappers are not in breach of the obscenity laws. My brother has a lovely, irritating, mind grabbing song as the sound track for one of his videos at http://kevinwalsham.com/?p=1509. I warn you - don't let it get into your head!!
Hi Arthur, The curtain definately keeps the light out. I think your example is a thoughtful poem because it reminded me of a Carlos Casteneda passage that said "a gnat guards the gates of hell" and wonder again about what is being kept in or out. I think that good poetry is buried under reams of bad poetry and what passes for poetry is often catharsis. I'd like to see much more poetry written and maybe our generations could produce some worthy reads. The best poetry of today is found in lyrics. There is not much motivation to write poetry because poetry is out of fashion and does not sell. I always enjoy your Intel. Thanks, Jen
CONTRIBUTOR'S REPLY
Hi, Jen, I fear the dumbing down of our younger generations has already destroyed the ability to appreciate poetry - with it went the ability to compose it.
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