| Author | Message | ||
     Rondall Moderator Username: Rondall Post Number: 19 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
Okay, let's just say that due to the demise of "Def Poetry" and the bards of slam poetry, poetry is now dead. Recently, there was a report that over all the book industry sold 25,000,000 less books last year than the year before. How much of that was the bottom dropping out of an already limited poetry audience? We could not account for this being a bad year for Harry Potter, but also a testament to a shift in preferred media. Poetry seems to be at the forefront of this crime of "ages". We would much rather see a “performance” than to read the works ourselves. We are skewed towards being given what an artist is trying to say rather than interpreting it ourselves. This board for instance gets more attention from hyping a B.S. piece snapping on someone on the sly (any similarities are purely coincidental) than someone dropping a verse in prose. Does anyone really care for or about poetry anymore? Or should it be left in the gutter with a do not resuscitate sign hanging from its bylines? | ||
| Eviana Veteran Poster Username: Eviana Post Number: 70 Registered: 03-2004 Rating: N/A |
I care Rondall. Where you been, man? Poetry is my weakness and it holds a different spot in my heart that just picking up a book could never compete with. And with that said, let me share with you one of poems that I like. Nothing implied but the title is You Are For Me. Okay, here it goes. You Are For Me. A stranger of the night Is what you've become Never uttering a word No, not a single one Just a nod of approval As my eyes slowly see The one who articulately fulfill-somehow The deepest of my fantasy Never seting a date But arriving when I do Always enhances that mystical lust I desire in you Now it's the morning of the eve When my body will feel such pleasure With anticipation up high Knowing no one else could measure I have a need to know more But a weakness I can't deny Wondering if all would be ruin If I simply said hi With a cold rush just from your sight I knew this was a chance I had to take Praying with sincere depth That on my side was the hand of fate So much to my surprise And this I truly was To hear you utter the words I think that I'm in love. | ||
| Abm "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Abm Post Number: 208 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: N/A |
Rondall, I LOVE poetry. And I even used to TRY to do my part up in here. But it seems my every attempt was castigated by...well...you-know-who. | ||
| Cynique "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Cynique Post Number: 450 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
Abm, since "you-know-who" exercises so much power over you, she now gives you permission to go back to doing your thing. Rhyme on! | ||
| Cynique "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Cynique Post Number: 452 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
Below is a poem that has been on my mind a lot lately, what with what's happening in Iraq. It was an epitaph written by the English poet A.E. Houseman during World War I. Here dead lie we because we did not choose to shame the land from whence we sprug. Life, to be sure, isn't much to lose, but to young men it is, and we were young. | ||
| Sisg Newbie Poster Username: Sisg Post Number: 21 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
Eviana, Did you write that? Anyway, a very nice piece. And to Rondall, I too am a lover of poetry, even penned some and posted here under anon. Poetry speaks to the heart and soul of matters. Cynique, a very interesting piece at well, that hit home in the worst way. | ||
| Bookgirl AALBC .com Platinum Poster Username: Bookgirl Post Number: 90 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
Eviana: I enjoyed your poem, it touched me and brought back some bittersweet memories. Please share more.... | ||
| Abm "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Abm Post Number: 210 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: N/A |
Yes, Eviana, that was nice, sweetly innocent and hopeful. I am even tempted to pen a 'response' to it. But the last time I did that it got kinda hot up in here. Oh well... | ||
| Chrishayden "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Chrishayden Post Number: 241 Registered: 03-2004 Rating: N/A |
Rondall: Poetry is alive and well and good--just that it is most alive in advertising and in popular music. Poetry with a capital P is on life support, has been suffering since it began to go to the academy--the last time it was really popular was during the Black Arts Movement--think of a poet today selling albums like the Last Poets--impossible. Poetry is not connecting with people, we are in the age of the very self centered poet--how many poems use "We" or "him" or "she" or are about someone other than the writer--how many use "I" and not in a sense that the poet is assuming the identity of another person, but is talking about someone else. Many of your poets are in the game because, frankly they want to write but they cannot write anything else--poetry being a short form is doable for them. Their poems are not poetry--they have no rhythm. They have tin ears. Most so called poets are writing what I call stanza'd prose. Because this crap, which has been been written and taught for years now, is what most people have been exposed to, when they hear the word "poetry" they go "yuukkk! That crap we had to read in school and tune it out." Sorry. I know you didn't make this world, but that's what it is. Frankly, most poets are talking about their nuroses, their sexual orientations, or the little things that piss them off from their vapid little lives (a South American poet is supposed to have said, "You American Poets. All you write adds up to, "I feel a little pain"") and frankly nobody gives a damn. When most of the people called "poets" have to have degrees and they grew up in the suburbs and teach for a living and the suburbs and the campus and the library is all they know, well, what do you think you would get? Poetry now is in a cult phase, an incubation phase if you are optimistic. If you are not and see what the Academics have done to it, it is in the process of being strangled to death. If you want to revitalize poetry take it out of the academy. Connect it back up with the people. Give them poems that they will want to recite or repeat themselves. Use their language. If not, well-- | ||
| Chrishayden "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Chrishayden Post Number: 244 Registered: 03-2004 Rating: N/A |
Cynique: Houseman. You continue to amaze me. Just when I think I have analyzed you, you defy analysis. | ||
| Cynique "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Cynique Post Number: 453 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
Houseman is one of my favorite poets. Why would that amaze you??? And surely you know better than to analyse somebody you've never met in person. tsk-tsk. Just for that,I will subject you to a Robert Frost poem. Some say the world will end in fire, and some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire, I side with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate to know that for destruction ice is also great, and would suffice. | ||
| Abm "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Abm Post Number: 212 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: N/A |
Thru and Thru by 'ABM' ...and so here they rejoice, swill the finest spirits, and make they of a luscious, ...love in bed, to hearth, and high hill, and wide valley, in, about and thru. Yes, they now know they will enjoy the feast, because the storm has come. | ||
| Abm "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Abm Post Number: 213 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: N/A |
Chris, I agree much of your comments about poetry (though I don't know being bred a suburbanite is an inherent demerit to become a fine poet). Moreover, I think lot of this 'stuff' billed as poetry was never such to begin with. Much of it seem to be more a form of word-based performance art whereby the words are simply a means by which artists can advertise and glorify themselves. Today's poet lacks perspective and discernment (although you can say the same of most of today's artists to varying degrees). Any fine poet can tell a universal story about life by simply noting what he or she observes of what a mother robin does to feed her newborn hatchlings. But today's poet appears so caught up in what they think and feel; they fail to 'observe'. They lack the skill and patience to experience the world outside of their own selfish, parochial designs and inclinations. So there are MANY wondrous things of, about and within the Earth that they will never enjoy the privilege of exploring. Thus, no matter how talented they might be, eventually their fountain of creativity dries up, and they are then soon trivialized, then ignored. Because who wants to endure the rants of an artist who has nothing else to say? | ||
| Eviana Veteran Poster Username: Eviana Post Number: 71 Registered: 03-2004 Rating: N/A |
Thanks All, But no I did not write this poem. Wish I did though it would mean that I had some type of writing skills (smile). This poem was given to me about 9 years ago and because the person who gave it to me passed away shortly after giving it to me I couldn't find it in me to get rid of it. Thanks ABM and Cynique for the poems you either wrote or posted. I enjoyed reading them. | ||
| A_womon "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: A_womon Post Number: 114 Registered: 05-2004 Rating: N/A |
love is a many black legged thang like a spider he is creepin up on me when I should be sleep he dances by gracefully elusive spinning his web not giving me a clue as to where why or whence he came. evasive Thang? For sure but captivate or capture I must, I should I will at least I think I could But then what to do with him when he is within my reach Cage him like the beast he is was and forever will be or set him free who has the power who can tell me | ||
| Cynique "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Cynique Post Number: 454 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: |
Poetry falls into a lot of different categories, some of which adhere to a required amount of lines, or a certain rhyme scheme. Then there's nonsense poetry, limerick poetry, haiku, and free verse; which is just that: free verse. When it comes to assessing poetry, all one can do is express an opinion about whether what someone writes strikes them as bad poetry or good poetry. To do otherwise is to prate. In my opinion, poetry is a creative use of words, configuring them in such an original way as to paint images or frame thoughts. Since it is an expression of the soul, the subject matter ain't that important. | ||
| Yukio "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Yukio Post Number: 363 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: |
My Mama Moved Among the Days My Mama moved among the days like a dreamwalker in a field; seemed like what she touched was here seemed like what touched her couldn`t hold, she got us almost through the high grass then seemed like she turned around and ran right back in right back on in by Lucille Clifton |
