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And then take those skills over to the workshop part of class once the students start creating their own poems.
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The randomness is the point of doing a cut-up. That it doesn't always work out is part of the whole chance operation thing. However, after using this methods hundreds of times I can say it always surprises you. Having done both of these, I can say that Exquisite Corpses produce completely different results and neither is better or more appropriate for any given situation.
@Lilnoobs: Where do you teach?
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Fair enough, but this argument is really easy to debunk and pretty annoying to deal with. I'm not saying you have to like it, or enjoy this method of writing, but it has produced work that is exciting and many poets writing today are coming from the legacy of Dada and Surrealism
Craft isn't a fixed concept. What you call craft is only part of a much larger toolbox available to you. I also love the idea of a computer writing books of poems, but I can tell I'm very much in the minority here.
I don't suppose you know what I'm talking about though =p
I guess the ultimate question comes down to the purpose of poetry. Is it a means to convey some message, emotion, image, or theme? Or is it just a random collection of symbols for us to try to find meaning in.
As an exercise, the second is fine. But for the most part, poetry that is generally lasting and largely considered more moving is the former. The same is true with any art at all. I can paint a square of color on a canvas of another color and call it art. But unless the viewer finds some emotion, message, image, or theme that resonates with them, all I've done is put a square of color on a canvas. Generally, things like this are not received well by anyone outside of the closed group that creates these kinds of works and has a specific, and somewhat artificial, set of tools to find meanings. I say artificial not to say that all meaning isn't artificial (it is), but because the types of meanings you need here are specifically designed solely for the purpose of finding meanings in this specific design. Or: they are tools built for the exercise, not those available to the passing viewer without imposing instruction upon them.
As artists, poets should do both, and push their boundaries all the time. But to rely upon randomness and found poetry as methods in and of themselves, rather than tools to get you to inspiration, leads to the sort of perception that (as Quoth said) are the reasons we have so much dislike and distrust of the artistic community. You are building things that are inaccessible to anyone outside of your closed environment and ultimately become exclusionary and stagnant due to the lack of new perceptions.
— Robert Heinlein
That said, I'm surprised by how many poetry aficionados are coming out of the woodwork. Would any of you be interested in posting a piece or two in here?
Sure thing. My position is pretty polarizing, but I'm open to discussion.
— Robert Heinlein
I'd be willing to link to work I've had published that is available online.
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http://www.amazon.com/Triggering-Town-Lectures-Essays-Writing/dp/039333872X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1318535345&sr=8-1
Kim Addinizio in Ordinary Genius says nearly the opposite: poetry is communication and things that don't communicate are therapy.
http://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Genius-Guide-Poet-Within/dp/0393334163/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1318535513&sr=1-1
Rainer Maria Rilke in Letters to a Young Poet implores the reader to write for one's own sake.
http://www.amazon.com/Letters-Young-Rainer-Maria-Rilke/dp/0393310396/ref=sr_1_sc_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1318535577&sr=1-1-spell
All are a good read.
edit: the code is so messed up on this website I'm not going to bother to make this look pretty.
But I could post some if you want
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Ever notice that the decline of poetry as something enjoyed in greater popular culture directly coincides with the rise of need for poetic criticism to understand it? The requirement to obtain an incredibly specialized tool-set, constantly getting more abstract and complicated, directly led to the exclusion of more and more people from reading it as those with the required tool-set grew fewer and fewer. At present, the lay audience is afraid or intimidated by written poetry for this very reason, they perceive that they do not have the tools to appreciate or understand it (correctly or incorrectly based upon the individual poem), and thus shy away from it. Poems that are still read in popular culture are those that convey a specific message, feeling, meaning, or image. They resonate not only with the people writing and reading with critical tools, but also those who have no experience with poetry at all. The more abstract and "unfettered" forms are rarely read by any outside of the English Humanities community, if then.
This is not to say the exercise of writing poetry, to communicate or not to communicate, for some greater purpose or for no purpose at all, isn't worthwhile. It certainly is. But if no one but yourself understands it (nothing communicated), then it is it anything more than an exercise? If it is not explained but still read those with the tool-set might read it as one reads a sudoku puzzle in a newspaper, seeking to fill in interpretation where the spaces allow, but again, that is an exercise. A game that only a handful of people know the rules to, with rules that are constantly changing and not really agreed upon by anyone.
The same is true of poetic criticism itself, and arguably true of all art and all art criticism to varying lesser degrees.
— Robert Heinlein
Those are two poets whom trouble your argument a little bit and do enjoy about as much exposure as anyone outside of Billy Collins gets.
Really though, that's not a very strong argument. Popularity has nothing to do with the strength of a poem. What you're talking about is marketability.
That you claim you need to have a degree to make it through some of the more abstract poetry is not true. I was functionally illiterate in high school. I got to the point where I am today long before I graduated college, and the reason I can behind some of this stuff is because I read and I read widely.
I'll give you this. People don't like being challenged. Any time art threatens what people are comfortable with, they go on the attack. It's the reason the abstract expressionists were scoffed at. It's the reason Tristan Tzara caused a riot back in Zurich when he read random words that he drew from a hat.
On the other side, if you are writing for readership but not with a message, you are making a puzzle. Challenging people. People like being challenged with something they can, with the tools they have, overcome. Hopefully preparing them for something greater to overcome after. When you write a cliff and tell someone who has never walked, much less rock climbed, to have at it you aren't going to gain readership or have anyone hold the act as meaningful. Even if they can climb it, if it has no meaning or message to covey, it's not a poem, but a word puzzle. You are performing a type of cryptology with a specific tool set.
Unless you consider a crossword puzzle as the same as poetry, and then we are getting to the stage where you can call everything poetry and why have any meanings at all (because then poetry becomes the same as "reality" and all things lose applicable signification)?
I guess what I'm saying is there is a difference between abstraction and obfuscating, and a difference between a puzzle and a poem. That difference is desiring to convey something to someone else.
— Robert Heinlein
You completely dodged my mention of two poets who perplex many readers, but still draw accolades, BTW.
@Quoth: Go ahead and post them! In the OP I mentioned that other people can make use of the thread.
@tapeslinger: Zombie poetry, huh? Do it up.
Getting back to things like found poetry and the exercises mentioned here, is there meaning in random words stitched together? I'm reminded of Stanley Fish's exercise where he had written a series of names on his blackboard for a linguistics class, then forgot to erase it when a 17th Century Christian Poetics class came in the next period. He put a box around it, dated it in the period they were studying, and told the class it was a poem and to find meaning in it. They did, coming to all kinds of christian connotations and meanings (drawing upon names like Rosenbaum and Thorne to find allegories to Christ).The exercise was a success, after an hour of discussion meaning was found where no meaning existed at all. In this, I agree. It can be done. I am not arguing this.
What I am arguing is that, if it were a math class this would not be possible. The only reason they were able to find meaning in the random group of names was because they were equipped with the proper tools to do so. If it were given to a math class with no knowledge of Christian poetic of the time, it would not be possible. They would say it's just a group of names, or, perhaps if chained to their desks, would grudgingly find some sort of meaning to escape from the task. It would not be an experience, but a forced task then.
I am also arguing that this experiment is not something someone does naturally or willingly, either. You don't read the back of a soup can and think "this is poetry." You can do so, no argument. But it is not actually done. It isn't marketed as such, to use the earlier phrase. It's not created with that purpose, and isn't looked at as such unless artificially forced upon perception. You might be able to find meaning in reading the salt and tomato paste and hydromoxalinedysulfate as more than just a series of collected terms, but it is not an conveyed meaning, but a play you are forced to by the rules of the game of "find the poetry." It is a puzzle of find meanings. Depending on the context and the level of obfuscation, it may not even be possible without the correct tools to understand it.
Ashbery's Daffy Duck in Hollywood (the only one I am familiar with of his) has levels of meaning that were constructed, even with the name. Perhaps the text was crafted to be random lines, lets assume, with the context of the title there is meaning here (going back to the animated short referenced in the title which Daffy Duck does this very thing to create a film). I doubt that the lines are truly random, though, that Ashbery did not place them specifically to create specific moods and emotions. Even so, without the tools of knowing that film, the average person you give this to would not be able to read it, or would not read it. It is too challenging, too difficult with the tools given. At this point you are only challanging those who have the tools for the challange, and they are really only doing an exercise as (if it were truly random) no real meaning is there to find outside of what they peace together.
I don't expect a consensus here. I just think that all too often those drawn to the abstract forget that the farther you go, the fewer can follow. Specifically with poetry, where in words we have a farther distance to stretch between observation and meaning, rather than visual or auditory arts where this is more intuitive and reactionary (no filtering through language is required).
Spoilered because I had already written it. I'll post some of my terrible stuff to stay on topic:
The rain falling down
can never know that
rain falling down upon
us can break a frail heart.
Rain falling to this ground
will only reflect the streetlight.
Rain is falling down upon
you and I in the night.
The sky is broken,
only fragments of wisp and moon,
Pieces of sky the hidden,
weeping, as the ground is strewn
with fragments of the sky. Broken
and glistening in the streetlight
Rain is falling down upon
us, broken in the night.
If I just told you
why there must be the rain,
if I try to see through
the broken sky's pain,
I would have told you
no one is to blame.
The sky is broken,
it hides itself in shame.
Hide your eyes from
the droplets of falling pride.
Hide your eyes from
the rain falling broken inside.
Hide your eyes, mine
cannot see them. Now
that I hide my eyes, rain
falls broken in shame.
Rain is falling down upon
you and I in the night
with fragments of the sky. Broken
and glistening in the streetlight
I again told you,
but no one is to blame.
Hide your eyes, mine
are cast down in shame.
The rain is falling down
and you will not take my name.
I cringe to see people read this.
— Robert Heinlein
“When sometimes I am reminded that the mechanics and shop-keepers stay in their shops not only all the forenoon, but all the afternoon too, sitting with crossed legs, so many of them — as if the legs were made to sit upon, and not to stand or walk upon — I think that they deserve some credit for not having all committed suicide long ago.”
--Thoreau
In the hot city, nobody walks
without a purpose. The sun at its zenith splits
the sky in two. Men and women sweat seconds
after they exit air-conditioned offices.
Legs bound by pencil skirts end
in thick wedge sandals, sky-scraping
stilettos, strides tight and toe-first,
new world foot binding.
Gray and navy suit pants stroll
one hand in a pocket, the other
wreathed in cigarette smoke, clutching
a Blackberry, telling a story in gestures.
Palm trees drop thin-skinned red fruit,
pits gnarled and thick as walnuts
litter the iron grating beneath, but
no birds stoop to peck at them,
crouched instead beneath crowded leaves.
The air thickens,
moisture teases with hints of rain
denied by an empty blue bowl above.
White stuccoed buildings line the street,
circled by joggers running laps, eyes
veiled in visions of lean muscle
honed, flexed under taut skin.
From restaurant grease traps
at the high-priced mall,
ventilation systems belch
clouds of calamari battered and deep fried,
thick tuna slices blackened outside,
perfectly pink inside, veal so tender
it could love you sweet, never let you go.
Sauteed garlic, thyme, sweet basil, dill,
cumin like a dark lady kissed
under a desert moon, red
pepper’s stealthy heat,
rosemary for remembrance
and a taste like pine needles.
In the center promenade
fountains shoot cold geysers skyward,
catch the returning water in tiled stone basins.
Bistro tables with black seats wait
for backsides to bake. Purple umbrellas
shade delicate skin. New mothers
match Kate Spade purses to shoes,
Dolce to Gabbana, join the J. Crew,
push strollers that cost more than the barista
earns in a week, frothing
milk too hot for infant mouths.
Children old enough to walk run
stumbling forward, laugh, pinwheel hands.
Metal peacocks overlook
imported bamboo, straight-backed benches,
manicured bushes and sculpted grass.
Tourists tote glossy bags, dart
from Nordstrom to Victoria’s Secret
down an open hallway, covered and fanned.
Sunglasses turn eyes into mirrors
reflecting a warped black world
curved as a legging-clad calf.
Heavy thighs unaccustomed to exercise
stand before the base of the elevator, slow
portal to the retail pinnacle. Stairs
encircle the shaft, unused.
The worker drones swarm,
gatherers, hunters who stalk a quick bite
before the sun taps its watch.
For this, the Europeans came west:
a sacred swamp, drained and filled.
Seeking the wild, they found
ring-necked pigeons fat on crumbs,
music soft and disposable as tissues,
potted plants, a brisk walk
back to a small office,
four walls, no windows,
white tile sky.
It's pretty long and I think may read too much like a laundry list of things, which I'm not sure works as intended. But I don't know where to cut and where to add. Help?
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As for smaller cuts, I would consider losing "new world foot-binding." It's clever, but it seems almost self-referential to me. I think you can give us the image of tight strides and bound feet without elaborating on it. In the same way, I'd maybe drop "Stairs encircle the shaft, unused."
Still much better than anything I churn out.
As the amniotic sack unravels among stars
Cold gravity catches you
Slaps your feet and
Makes you king of a lonely universe
Pulleys draw you up to the Milky Way’s rafters
Over chaos stages, ready to fall
Like a cleansing meteor on Sodom or
As a fluttering dove on pediatric wards
The signet ring fillets your finger
Your blood ends up
Stamped on infinite pages
You roll covalent bonds on
Flimsy tobacco paper
You stagger along the treadmill
That spins our dirty Earth
All the while entropy hisses in your ear
Suns are failing, orbits fraying
A boy of six is sinning in Luxembourg
But you have time—all of time
We can do this forever
vis a tergo | Blog | Twitter | Blip.fm | Dropbox
vis a tergo | Blog | Twitter | Blip.fm | Dropbox
The Sun tapping its watch is interesting, but the worker drones and all that has been done and is pretty unnecessary with what you already nicely described prior to it.
I'm ambivalent about the historical reference. I'll give it another read tonight when I got more time, but from what I remember it seemed to come out of nowhere. Are there other historical references glittered within the piece? I didn't feel a natural build up to that conclusion. Did anyone else?
If I didn't absolutely love the last image I would say cut the last stanza and end it on the staircase. However, I'm afraid that is a bit too drastic.
Sweat so much
Bruise so easily
Sleep so much
Hate myself
Love you
Feel dizzy
Crave salt
Why am I so tired
Always tired
Always hungry
Not losing weight
Single
Still single
So ugly
So angry
So dizzy
Why is my eye twitching
My period late
My hair falling out
Why is my tongue white
Why can’t I lose weight
Get pregnant
Sleep at night
Why can’t dogs eat chocolate
Why can’t I get a job
Get wet
Find a job
Why can’t we be friends
Why don’t we just dance
Why don’t we do it in the road
Why don’t people like me
Why don’t you love me
Why should I buy an iPad
Why should I go to college
Why should I believe in God
Cool. Maybe try extending some of the metaphors.
Like, for the first stanza, instead of being "over" think of a way you can transport that feeling by extending what someone might do with a sack or dirty fleshy thing (I don't know how I feel about dirty fleshy thing). What do people do with a sputtering sack or a dirty fleshy thing once they are through?
I understand the last stanza with ash, but maybe since ash is so expected and used you could play around with other ideas? So you have this idea of the sea and pressure and pockets in the last stanza. What lives in those things? What of those things what we might become?
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So I'm now picturing something a little Davy Jones-ish. We are all sailors on a ship.
Is this poem in the voice of Father Time?
Maybe instead of "soon" (3 times in the poem) again you can be more direct, considering the voice of the speaker. I imagine the Devil, the Grim Reaper, or Father Time to be very sure of themselves one way or another. These characters are flat, but I suppose giving them complications might make it interesting, which is pretty much what interesting movies, plays, or poems about them has done (e.g. Paradise Lost). I'm starting to digress a bit.