Poetry

Sometimes I am quite uncertain about poetry. In fact, sometimes I am quite certain that I have very little clue what makes a good poem and why we should care about certain poems and ignore (or mock) other poems.  Some poems, by famous authors, seem stilted. They seem contrived—modern poetry also seems that way to me, even though modern poetry is supposed to be liberated from strict literary forms and a stifled list of topics that are appropriate.  I confess that when I read most poetry (even my own—especially my own) I often have this vague uneasiness that I am missing something. I wonder if I am missing the craftsmanship of following a certain form, or miss the beauty of the adopted meter. I wonder if I am missing the moment of passion that led the poet to leap into the flame. I wonder if I am just missing on a moment of the age that caused people to pause and point and proclaim meaningfulness.

I think the heart of the problem is that I want beauty to contain truth, and I like my truths simple. All of friends have also used simple words to convey human passions and fears. The longer words you write and the more complex structure rarely adds anything to the core of the poem. At least the no longer add anything—and I think we live in an age where the only people who read poetry are academics and bored high-schoolers (and a select few with genetic mutations). Without a real live audience to write for, how is it possible to construct meaningful poems that strike at the center of being? How is it possible to pour yourself in the meter and the structure when you know that the only people who will care are crusty academics? In short, I am quite uncertain about poetry.

But I do know that there are certain unpredicted moments that when I read a poem I feel the woosh in my stomach and the cool comfort of beauty mixed with a dash of truth.  They tend to be when I read Rilke or Blake or Dickinson. People who seemed to write entirely for themselves so they might experience a moment of their dreams.