Is anyone else as unimpressed by About.com’s poetry page as I am?
Seriously, the list of best 2007 poetry books leaves a lot to be desired. Only half the books on the list are even worth considering. Then there’s the silliness of Aram Saroyan. And what do Bob Holman and Margery Snyder have to say about him?
Oh boy does this book make you happy! I’ll never forget when I first saw a Saroyan poem – in the late 60s, somehow a box of his books found its way to a second-hand motors and tubes sidewalk stand on Canal Street – “lighght” was the poem, one word centered on the page. Go gaga, I thought and did.
Give me a break. Happy? Who does he think he is? John Cage? Why not just give us a blank page and title it “52.6 Lines of Silence?”
Puhlease. I’d have more fun watching fruit flies fuck. And they have the nerve to call his one letter poems a “oeuvre of gems.” How many one letter poems does a person need to write to have a “oeuvre?” Twenty-six? Why not just write the alphabet? Oh, wait. That’s been done. But Ron Silliman is a much better poet. He uses words, not “gems.”
I spent a couple of hours earlier this week flicking through blogs on the edges of the poetry universe. I just stumbled into one and thought it might be interesting. I was really hoping for someone to explain the mindset behind them. That I didn’t find but I did see a few pretty – I want to call them pictures but I guess I’ll have to respect the authors’ definitions and call them – poems. And some of them were pretty. There was one guy who used music staves as the background for his works and, as I think some sheet music could be framed as art, I quite enjoyed the work but it was only poetic for me in the more general sense of the word, i.e. the poetry in motion kind of expression.
I’ve a blog coming up on that old chestnut: What is poetry? – couldn’t resist it I’m afraid – and I even have a crack at defining it myself (in general terms, not my own poems) but a single ‘word’ on a page is pushing it. You’re right, Cage could get away with it, but I like a poem that doesn’t need a set of instructions to understand it. I could live with a poem one word long IF the poem had a title that helped me make sense of it, something like (and this is completely off the cuff):
The Answer to All Questions
Mum
But something like that is gimmicky. I could stick a few like that into a longer collection, a kind of running gag type thing, but – and I’m someone who appreciates the minimal in art – I think a book, even a chapbook, full of these is a bit much. I would love to be proved wrong and I suppose if they were the right kind of koan-esque pieces I’d cough up £4.00 for that.
Thanks, Jim. I was looking for the validation. I didn’t think I’d get it.
I like your example. To me, that’s more like an aphorism. And I could read an entire book of them if they weren’t posed as poems. An aphorism can be poetic, but not all short poems are aphorisms. Nietzsche composed many aphorisms, but he did so as a philosopher. I suppose it depends on what your purpose is in composing aphorisms as to whether you classify them as poems, koans, philosophical musings, or put them in a class all by themselves.
As for poetry, I have few prejudices. Preferences, yes; prejudices, no. I’ve said before that I think all schools and movements have something to be learned from. I’m not a fan of Dada, but I can appreciate the attempt to see the world in a different light, to push the boundaries so to speak. The problem with minimalism is that it can be too minimalist. I mean, would you build a house with a single piece of wood?
I’m all for experimentation and I’ve even gone off the deep end on this at times myself. Visual poetry can be quite joyful if the audience can get something out of the visual element. But a single black dot on a white canvas does not constitute art to me. A piano thrown out a window isn’t music – it’s noise, and the destruction of a perfectly good instrument. By the same token, a comma – or a single letter – on a page is not a poem. It’s a comma on a page.
There has to be a point at which the audience says to the artist – “No, we’re not going to accept that.” Instead, what too often happens is an artist will build up a following with true art in his chosen medium then come out with something that is completely worthless and his audience, based on previous reputation, kisses his ass. It’s unacceptable.
You mean About.com is still writing about poetry? I gave up on About.com– especially their poetry writers– years ago simply because I’ve never seen anything there of any real interest.
Guess they haven’t changed much.
Now if you’ll pardon me I’ve got to go add that link I promised you.