Originally written in 1998.
Most non-poets shun contact with the P word like the flu. And what is the oldest, most noble and most legitimate of art forms, poetry, has been severely disrespected to the point where people seem embarrassed for you if you openly admit to being a poet.
Ask any one of these people what poetry is, and chances are you’ll draw a blank.
Poetry should reach as large an audience as possible. And it should be judged on the basis of how large an audience responds favorably to it. I routinely hear from people who are exposed to my own work comments like, “I hate poetry, but your stuff is really good,” or “I don’t understand what poetry is all about, but yours makes sense and I can follow what you’re saying.” Not to slam my own work, but it makes me wonder what else they’ve read that they consider poetry.
Market research discovered that a large majority of people, at least in Southern California, associate poetry with fluffy white clouds and flowers, or people in Edwardian dress reciting in dandified monotone. And we wonder why poetry is not a popular art.
Let’s start by defining the term. The word poem comes from the Greek poiein, to create. Poetry is spoken or written language intended to intensely communicate ideas, experience or emotion and to create an emotional response in it’s listener or reader. A poem is one or more lines, with or with out repeating rhythm, that packs as much intense information into as few words as possible.
So we’ve defined poetry. Who reads it? And who writes it? And why?
If the same market research is to be believed, then pretty much everybody reads poetry. And the same research package showed that 95% of all people surveyed had written at least one poem at some point in their lives. (And there are those who staunchly believe that the other 5% were lying.) But how many of those people would admit to this in public, or worse, think of themselves as poets?
Sadly, very few.
As an on-and-off active member of the Southern California poetry community, I’ve watched poets performing for poets. It appears that most poets are writing for their fellow poets, indulging in self-involved tirades, free verse self-involved emotional imbroglios with life, love, politics, that ramble on and offer no conclusions or even clean observations.
And who is the most well-respected, thoroughly read and highly-remunerated poet group in modern American culture?
The copywriter.
Poetry should reach as large an audience as possible. And it should be judged on the basis of how large an audience responds favorably to it. But I find it a sad commentary that such talent is employed, not to somehow inspire or ennoble humanity, but to sell shoes. Rage, rage against the dying of the light!
