My name is Cassandra. My disease is wonder lust. I question if the best poets are always in transition or can see a stoplight in a thousand different beautiful ways. Right now it is Colorado, two weeks ago it was Texas, and 4 months ago it was Oregon. Each time I promise this time I will really try.
About the concepts of poetry: What is poetry without spontaneity? Does it not lose its soul if it becomes a heavily constructed concept or frame for its intellectual prowess? On the other hand without our censor, how can the unimportant be filtered to give power to the focus. Often it seems that artists are admired by less artistically brilliant intellectuals, and those intellectuals try to duplicate that art but do so on a cerebral level because they cannot connect with the emotional context. To me this is what procedural writing can be at its worst. At its best it is a pure vein of thought not biased by sentiment.
Paper planes,
Paper thoughts
Paper loves
Crumple little plans
Wrinkled secrets
Get well soon they say
Love always
Sincerely,
Yours truly
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I love this poem! Simple, pure, just indeterminate enough to spark the reader's imagination without collapsing into bland abstraction.
ReplyDeleteDo you think it would improve it if it were broken into three three-line stanzas, instead of one unbroken nine-line block? Just a suggestion: I'm not sure myself.
I also like your question about spontaneity. I do think spontaneity is a crucial quality in all art, not just poetry. I don't think, however, that spontaneity is always synonymous with an absence of rules. Ballet, for example, is an art where I would think that spontaneity plays a big role, but certainly not at every level: you generally want it to be rehearsed before performance (unless it's, you know, that kind of "experimental" ballet).
I do feel that there is more pressure on poetry sometimes to be uniquely spontaneous (although there is also pressure--sometimes, confusingly, from the same critics--for it to "make sense"). But why can't some poetry be as tightly controlled and calculated as, say, marble sculpture or silk tapestry?
Beautiful poem! I truly enjoyed its simplicity and complex nature.
ReplyDeleteI do enjoy the spontaneity of writing, however I realize that only though careful editing will I be able to make my writing a truly finished product. It's tedious, but I suppose it is sometimes necessary. Wouldn't it be FANTASTIC if we all didn't have to edit our work at all? I think there might be some beauty to a first draft, however flawed it may be.
On those intellectuals who are not a artistically brilliant and try to emulate great works, I think they mean well and are searching to create their own emotional depth in their writing. Sometimes their work turns out to be okay, and others, I wish I could burn from my memory as they are as bad as a sappy Hallmark card.
Overall, great post! :)