No One Said So!!
Hello, I just wanted to clarify some things. Poetry does not always have to follow a metrical pattern. It could just the poet expressing what they think, without having to count every beat and every line! Since when has poetry become so structured, that a person has to be careful of the length of lines or the usage of words. Also, who defines good poetry? I definitely do not!! Nor does anyone else have that right!!! I believe that the beauty of poetry is that one can do anything with it and feel good about it, but when your work is being dissected and criticized it really takes away from the joy poetry gives to the poet. Why can't we just enjoy and appreciate everyone's differences when creating poetry?
posted by Chrissy G @ 6:44 PM
2 Comments:
At October 27, 2004 at 5:45 PM,
anthonyferreira said…
To a lot of people poetry is more than just amusement - it is literary, and as such it is a craft. This 'crafting' implies exertion to improve one's writing - which requires criticism (both from the self and from others). Criticism helps us to appreciate - without it we'd only be amusing ourselves and that to many is not the purpose of poetry. Sure a part of poetry is enjoyment - but to fully enjoy a poem on many levels, one needs to understand why it does what it does, how it does it, and ultimately if it does it well.
A society filled with people just writing poetry out of 'feeling' and enjoyment, with no standards or 'structure' would be like reading a 10 year old girl's diary - and a lot of poetry reads that way if it has not been crafted. So to sum up… criticism is needed, we all have the right to it and should use it, because it is a vital part of both creating and appreciating poetry in all its complexities. Also, to your request that all of us enjoy and appreciate everyone’s differences in creating poetry, I respond that not all poetry is worthy of being enjoyed, and secondly, in saying this you are encouraging everyone to define poetry in a certain way, which you claim not to have the right to do.
At November 2, 2004 at 7:26 PM,
Valerie said…
I have to admit Chrissy that I agree with you that poetry does not always have to follow a metrical pattern. The last 30 years of poetry has been what many call "vers libre" or free verse, and it is what we, the people of today's society, know to be poetry. Of course, history has shown that free verse was not seen as good poetry. It is all about what is "cool" at the moment. So, I suppose what I am trying to say is that free verse is all we really know right now because that is the way poets have been writing for the last few decades. That also means that we, as poets, don't have to watch meter and use all fancy-dandy wordings and the likes, because essentially, we can write the way we want to write; it's as if there are "no rules". I can say that since I've been writing "free verse" since I was 12 years old, I find it a little hard to break out of this trend. It's all I know.
However, as we've been studying, I have to also agree with Anthony, Aaron, and the others, that having poetry critiqued is important because if we didn't, then we could not improve. It all depends on your boundaries and if you want your poetry to be criticized. If a poet doesn't, then don't show it to anyone, and leave it at personal expression. However, the moment it's read to anyone else, it is being judged, whether we like it or not, and that's just the way human nature is. Of course, there is always an underlying factor of whether or not the poet will take it as constructive criticism or as simply "poem-bashing". That's up to the individual to decide.
Overall, I feel that poetry is personal expression, and speaking as a 21st century poet, I am free to do as I please with poetry, but I also have to be aware that throughout history, and even today, criticism is a part of human nature and it branches out to all things in life, including poetry.
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