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Discussion: What do you think of poetry that doesn't feel "poetic"?

For me, I don't think it's worth my time to read it. What are your thoughts?

Comments

For many years now, I have written poetry mostly in Rhyme and Meter and have all but been given the death penalty for doing so! I could have wallpapered an entire house with rejection slips from editors back when I used to submit my poems for publishing. I do not claim to be a student of poetry, nor do I consider myself any kind of artist of the craft, but I have always felt that poetry should sound like poetry, read like poetry, and still put forth a logical statement. I feel that poetry one has to guess at the meaning of is a waste of valuable reading time. I can, and have written free verse, and even a few Haikus, but have always tried to make my poetry sound meaningful and be readable to the average person. Again, thank you for bringing this up and allowing me to express my views on it!

> but I have always felt that poetry should sound like poetry, read like poetry, and still put forth a logical statement.

but...what does poetry sound like? That's something I find difficult to explain. I DO know when a poem sounds like a poem, and when it sounds like "chopped prose".

> I feel that poetry one has to guess at the meaning of is a waste of valuable reading time.

I don't agree 100% with this. We'll probably disagree on the meaning of "meaning". Lately, I deliberately obscure my poems so I don't reduce them to just stating facts. I love double meaning and uncertainty, (as a reflection of my state of mind. :-/ ) but...what matters (to me at least) is that it makes sense on some level - intellectually, emotionally, yes!

I'll admit making a poem meaningless is a difficult thing. I've had limited success in that area. One risks losing their audience or sounding like a pretentious little s***.

My biggest gripe is with free verse that's essentially a paragraph broken into stanzas. I don't know...one may argue that it's pushing the limits of what we consider poetry, but quite frankly I utterly detest anything that doesn't feel like the writer put some work into it to make it poem-ish.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

author comment

blank entrance statement....There is no examples of what good poetry is for descript OR what is considered NON-poetic....The Profile gives some profile towards personal taste....
Shakespeare to my humble beginnings was not understandable at all....Nor was Milton whom I love greatly....Plath and Sexton were hard to get into....But I plowed through these...they made sense..it was same stuff we read as children and were read too....Many of the old days and even today do not spend time reading too much....Or constructing words other then Love letters....Job hunting resumes or responses to others..

The classical vend was to have eveything as it was....Rhyme
easily understood storyline and titles..

Defining poetry is easy....If you asked the mean would be that
understanding...The average...

I have always understood Lonnies works
and I like that he expresses his views on comments
A good Poet!

Its like the newspapers for me GLOBE AND MAIL
or my magazines...NEW YORKER...ZINK...WALRUS..
GQ..ESQUIRE.. there are puplication authors I
understand..and those I dont...
and Its true..I myself dont read
unless its a slow day...Im looking for some kind
of meaning....Its its a published work that is..

Published for worth
is another market all together
and a telling factor
that the requirements for its use as a vehicle
are a protocol of Understanding

Poetry as an art medium
an expression medium
is another different perspective

Commercialism is okay
the market venue works
like stock markets that I follow
never buying shares of course
requires one to pick and choose

And most democrasies allow poets
artists to express
and sites to develop for Freedom of
Expression

Like the world..I like things myself that
i can relate too and Understand
and I like stuff that I do not understand
Cell phones and internet
are designed for all to incorporate
into use....

is this Poetry>
a question Beggged
and a ponderance
given!!

Thank You!

the saying "I don't know art but I know what I like. " That like poetry. In my opinion even free verse should read and sound like something beyond chopped prose.
In my opinion
even free verse
should sound like
something beyond
chopped prose.

In my unlearned opinion
even poetry called "free"
should read like an almost song
thus surprising and surpassing
those who write mere chopped up prose

I keep stored in my tired brain
the song of rhyming poetry
written with almost a refrain
which sets my thoughts and spirit free
and is remembered without strain
unlike chopped prose too oft called "free".

A poem without any poetic devices is prose...............stan

Great example of what I'm talking about. There's a prosaic and poetic way of saying the same thing. Poetry should try to use the poetic, imo

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

author comment

How I disagree, in this world with the great variety of writers.
We need to differentiate between:-
A short story of any length.
A classic poem
A write that conforms to poetic form
A write that is free and tells a story in verse
Graffiti on a wall
Or just a write.
When I put my writing onto my own site I had a problem, so have ended up with about 30 different categories of my writing.
I have near 3000 pieces there and 30 odd categories, so I write many in a type of poetry or have been written as such, but I think that in todays writings, we need to read, and see what the author has tried to say no matter what.
Neopoet teaches mostly the classic styles and forms of poetry, not sure if these are taught so much in these modern days maybe in universities, but the average writer never goes there so they have to muddle through.
Always I think that they are great poets, what will we classify them as in the years to come, or will they be lost forever.
Judge today not only the things that are a habit, but embrace the Now,
Yours Ian..

.
Give critique to help keep Neopoet great.
Unconditional love to you all.
"Learn to love yourself first"
Yours as always, Ian.T, Sparrow, and Yenti

...there are a great variety of writers, as there is writing.

Without making an argument that one is better than another, I believe there are enough labels to accommodate all forms of writing. This was the reasoning behind a bold statement I made sometime ago that "Spoken Word isn't Poetry". There, I wasn't saying that Spoken Word was inferior to Poetry, I was just saying it has evolved to become a distinct genre that should be separate from what we traditionally call poetry.

Same thing I'll say here: I wish unpoetic writing that's structured as poetry shouldn't carry the label poetry. But that's just me. Obviously, I am not write. It's just my opinion.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

author comment

I thank you for your reply to my ramble, I think that for a poem to stand tall it needs t be read, as for the spoken word where an audience is involved, well I shy away from those as much as possible.
Jess has done a great job with speaking quite a few of our works.
They sometimes sound as if they are from somewhere else and lose that personal touch you have when reading to ones self.
I once wrote two pieces one was "to my friends" and the other was "to my loves" they were sort of mine, but we lost a friend in Cornwall, so I adapted both of them for an impromptu service held at the "George and Dragon" in Bodmin, though I had written them for me with a few changes they came out very well and then belonged to his memory.
This was a true spoken poem and used in a correct surrounding, but most poems are from imagination so the real effect is shaded.
Strange I can never remember a line of any of my pieces should I try to remember them???
I have lots of things on my site from workshops to short stories, and as I said all are in what I think is their categories, yenti.co.uk will let you in and have a browse, One section I have lots to write in is the Sadie's part, but that's another story.
I have looked at your site and will return thank you.
I feel this discussion will go on for a while yet..
You take care, Yours Ian

.
Give critique to help keep Neopoet great.
Unconditional love to you all.
"Learn to love yourself first"
Yours as always, Ian.T, Sparrow, and Yenti

Its just personal taste
you dont like free form
because it doesnt fall
under the same thing as rhyme
You wrote that
pretention hard work to meaningless
and limited sucess
..
etc

funny but it sounds like
someone raised by headmasters
or private schooling
in the olden days
when all that was driven
from one

Our basis of revolt was the movie
"The Wall" starring Bob Geldof from
a band called "The Boomtown Rats"
He was the vocalist...In their day
long long ago too they were very
good....The movie "The Wall" is
equally Old.....By a Band called
"Pink Floyd" They were quite good
in their day too! The characters in
the wall were put under much stress
by the overbearing authority/father
figure..all creative was crushed.
Physical emotional and other cruelties
was put upon the lead character..

But I can see Free Verse being set up
and torn up....by the ideology of the
past....Because it was new....Freedom
of expression..Of creativity....It is...

The fifties must have been a magical
time...and I say this with the lens of perspectives
How evil was hidden by society in its jack in
the box smile
McCarhyism no freedom for some...intolerance
of most things...racial inequality...
But the poetry...all that was starting up
no one cared what started to get published
and read in the presses..
after the depression of the thirties after the glut
of the twenties people were just starting
to get going....

Pretentious to write expression?
I think not...
Some of the best free verse
is still about
and will continue to come from
many kind of People
be they women..racially different
etc

If you want to call Free Verse
NOT poetry
its been tried long ago
by the very teachers
just waiting to take it out
on those kids

But all in all
we are just all
Another Brick
In the wall

...

Thank You!

There is an empirical way of determining if poetry sounds like poetry- meter. Rhyme without meter is doggerel.
In terms of content, nothing empirical there though "compression of meaning" is a good rule of thumb. Startling imagery, profundity, challenging ideas can all help when prosodic values are lacking.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

I'll keep this in mind anytime I'm critiquing poetry.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

author comment

If you can't sing it, it isn't music.
Meter makes poetry.

W. H. Snow

A poet is a nightingale, who sits in darkness and sings to cheer its own solitude with sweet sounds. Percy Bysshe Shelley

Learn how, teach others.
The NeoPoet Mentor Program
http://www.neopoet.com/mentor/about

With due respect to all opinions...i personally believe that different people have different tastes, likes, opinions..it is up to a person to write the way he likes ...and for the readers to like it or trash it...if they like it's fine...if they don't it's no big deal...having said that, it doesn't stop me for learning and attempting to get better...

Regards...

raj (sublime_ocean)

This discussion is not about telling people what to write and what not to write. This is about calling poetry poetry, and calling whatever whatever.

It's a discussion about classification of works.

.

No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. - TS Eliot

http://www.wsgeorge.com/

author comment

an 'empirical' way of determining poetical efficacy. As I said, this is not too difficult with meter and rhyme however very difficult with other structural aspects and content.

cheers,
Jess
A new workshop on the most important element of poetry-
'Rhythm and Meter in Poetry'
https://www.neopoet.com/workshop/rhythm-and-meter-poetry

Like a box of chocolates...they always call me Obtuse....
reading through it and its like....uh huh..
yep..good one...beautiful..so so.. and then
"what the hell is this?"

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