I have a writing assignment where I’ve got to find a reputable publishing magazine or website or somesuch and write a piece to their submission guidelines. One of the first I looked at, Ambit Magazine, has the following on their website:
ambitmagazine.co.uk/Submit.htm
[i]What rhymes with poem…? Who cares -
now that my car has been a’towen
away, hey.
Moan moan groan (grown…?) slone
ranger wrecked in ragged wrappers
of second-hand fine-er-ree.
twee poem pee on language scree
and steep hills droop under
a tide of mossy inuendo.[/i]
Can I have some money now…?
lol. I think the term “home truth” can have some application here.
What is a poem?
A set of words
Strung together
Like turds.
They can fuck off and write shite novels.
And ‘scintillating’ ‘opaque’ ‘crystalline’
Basically, don’t submit unless you’re good, is what they’re saying.
I like it.
hmm… so I guess they won’t accept my sonnet.
To play soccer is to write a sonnet:
all players’ play within a rectangle,
they can’t ever stray beyond boundaries:
boxed in, they’re always surrounded by walls,
self-imposed and otherwise, four-man-walls,
sometimes, really insecure eight-man-walls,
– with no poetic balls! – just phonetic
formulations, those disciplined, well-train’d,
syllable formations; and the moves, well,
they never surpise, if not for the end-
less combinations, like a sissor trick
followed by the flick: the word up in air
lands on a lifted chest, rolls to the toes,
and what you’ll do with it, nobody knows.
Humm… all that syllable countin’ for nothin’. Oh well, it was still fun.
My initial reaction was defensive…largely because I appear to write precisely the type of poetry they are at odds with. Terrible poetry…poor pottery…
Your stuff is completely unique Colin. If anything, my writing fits their rejection list closer. But either way, who gives a damn? We’re not writing for them.
True enough! Don’t you just get the feeling siatd put that up here to wind us up, I know how much he laoths poetry, and he is clearly nudging and winking with this message saying - see, ‘you’re all rubbish’
Well I don’t really know SIATD but yes, that’s the impression I got. My guess is that he secretly wishes he could write poetry.
Ooooh, how intuitive of you… (c’mon, that’s an Oprah Winfrey type of comment)
I do write poetry. I used to write poetry as my primary form of creative writing, before I switched to fiction because my ideas are best manifested in narratives, and poetry can be narrative but fiction is easier to work with for what I want to do.
Of course, I occasionally say things like ‘I hate poetry’ or ‘poetry is just an excuse for not being able to write good prose’ and such things, but I don’t really mean them. Show me any one of a thousand poems and I’ll declare it wonderful, as with other art forms. I’m a big fan of Colin’s work, and he knows it because we’ve discussed it at some length. Now Colin is perfectly capable of conveniently ignoring that whenever he’s in the mood to think I’m getting at him (as on this thread, as we can all see) and this may or may not say something about his poetic temperament.
That Rainey would also read into my post in such a way (i.e. reading far more into it 0than was intended) perhaps illustrates that these two poets, at least, do not respond well to what they perceive as criticism. I didn’t have any poet here in mind when I posted that, I just thought it was funny. I was hoping the poets would be able to have a laugh about it. Some did, some didn’t.
Bull-shit. You don’t write that sort of poetry, well, most of the time. Everyone’s capable of producing the odd piece of duff, cliched work from time to time. I’ve got fuckin’ pages of it hidden away in a box to be discovered after my death and laughed at. But your best work is more than publishable, no doubt in my mind about that. I keep telling you this. Eventually it’ll strike a chord and you’ll realise that my flip and glib comments about considering all poets the literary equivalent of drunken tramps singing as they piss themselves are not serious.
Put simply, and this ties in with Gamer’s thread in the philosophy forum that all of the poets here should read, poetry suffers from being the most accessible literary form. Any idiot can write poetry. Likewise, any idiot can write a short story. And it’ll all be crap. But poetry takes less time. In an era where attention spans shorten as culture keeps on accelerating this is of utmost relevance. To write a shit poem and put it on a website takes no more than 5 minutes, if one is so inclined. A short story, maybe 20 minutes. A novel? A play? I suppose there is the equivalent in poetic form, the epic poem, but people don’t write those much.
That’s not to say that writing a poem in 5 minutes guarantees that it’ll be crap, just that that choice is more likely to be made by those lacking the talent or attention span (will) to work for longer.
Again, this is not a personal jab at any of the poets here, it’s a set of observations about poetry and common attitudes among the stupid. I am a literature student, so I do read some bloody good poetry from time to time. The best I’ve read this year, apart from TS Eliot who I’ve read before, was by Christopher Okigbo. Google his name, you’ll find tons of material. Please do. Hopefully that will put to bed the foul rumour about my being a literary fascist who seeks the genocidal elimination of poets.
My insecurities and paranoias could become a serious problem if I don’t lighten up. I suffer from self-doubt never more so in many aspects of my writing. This needs to stop.
Poetry is perhaps the most accessible form of writing but it is the least read - it is the ‘minor art of appreciation’. In the day and age we are ever more aware of the internet-poets, the Towering Forums of the poets of Mediocrity…it makes for some horible writing and some clear signs of ‘Stoopid people’.
Possibly true: God knows I could put a bit more effort in, dedicate more time and energy into a coherent scheme. Thing is I am happy to fly with the muse right now. At this age my embarassing poetic is a kind of catharsis of learning, getting rid of a lot of bullshit openly, in order to write better as I build my character. Unlike siatd, most of my laughable poems and poetics are not in some dodgy cupboard (many are, but most of on this macine) are open for all to see.
If I make it at this writing game
I want a clear legacy
from degenerate illiterate prose
to Word-Cutter par excellence…
I guess we all have a little Oprah in us, eh?
For the record, criticism is fine by me. My larger point is that we do not write for the critics. Nor do we write first and foremost to get published. We write because we write. That’s the point I wanted to make to Colin.
I have no doubt you like poetry, SIATD, and I’m sure you are capable of writing it. My experience has been that those who criticize it the loudest are those who are incapable of writing it, mainly because they do not understand it. That’s my other point. I should not have used you to make it. You just happened to be standing there.
Damn it…
That describes me so well, it hurts.
-Thirst
Yeah I think I hit the nail on the head, Thirsty. Sorry.
(Except you don’t criticize it.
And you are capable of writing it.
And you do seem to understand it).
Let’s just say that after reading quite a number of bad poems on the internet, I was reminded once more of this thread, and “inspired” to write some lines myself. (And no, I don’t consider the following to be a poem - but god-damnit! it needs to be said!)
[b]This is for all you poets[/b]
And all you wannabe poets,
And all you, I'm not a poet but I write poetry poets,
And all you, I'm not a poet and I don't write poetry
but I write little snippets of my life for all to see, poets,
(I have compiled a list)
You will NOT write about your cats!
I don't care how cute you think they are,
I don't care how beautiful the words you spin are,
There is NOTHING poetic about whiskers
sauntering around your living room.
And you will NOT write about your pups!
Again, I don't care how cute you think they are,
I don't care how beautiful the words you spin are,
There is NOTHING poetic about little Sammy
or Mary, picking her nose for the first time. Stop it.
Don't do it. Not even on a postcard to aunt Beulah. I said No.
And please, for the sake of readers everywhere,
do not go around butchering your awful prose
that you began writing because you were inspired
by some hackneyed moral sentiment, into verse.
#1 It isn't good prose to begin with.
#2 It's worse as verse. (Nearly as bad as the rhyme in this line)
- but not quite -
#3 You only butchered this spoiled raw meat in the first place
because you don't know how to cook. You can't write prose, so let's start there.
Now poetry, the kind you should be writing, but aren’t, is twice as hard!
Your prose-poems, just don't cut-it. Got it?
#4 Do not write poems about how to write poetry.
We have Pope and Bukowski for that.
(I am here simply as a reminder)
Now, if you're really serious, then take this advice religiously:
Don't write about God, breakups, loneliness, philosophy, love,
sex, the moon, the crescent of the moon, the smile of the moon,
moss, dandelions, water-lilies, sunflowers, in fact, no flowers,
and the mirror. The next time you begin writing about the mirror,
go bash your skull into one, and then, maybe, (and this is a big maybe)
I'll consider reading about your experience of fragmentation, literally.
Doth ye understand me now? Yes, see I knew you were a quick learner,
Do not doth anyone! And don't alliterate your words because you believe
alliteration is poetic. Alliteration only works when it's imperceptible by the reader,
unless they decide to make a close examination of the poem. Which, for you,
will never be if you keep on writing about your cunt-cats!
I think this one should be titled FLUSH
Nels.
Another no-no word that I understand is on the blacklist b/c it is used too often in relation to the subject of rain is: sluicing. Additionally, poems simply titled RAIN are notorious among editors for automatically winding up in the trashcan without even being read b/c it’s such a generic title for poems of, at best, mediocre quality - or so I’ve heard.
Nels.
Although, as a poet, I primarily write in open/free verse, I do occasionally tackle more structured poems either in already established forms (like sonnet, haiku, limerick, epigram, etc.) or ones that I come up with my ownself. Modern English, especially the American variant, is not a form that lends itself well to metered rhyming poetry anymore - only the really good poets can write strict rhyming metered poetry in English and avoid forcing the rhyme and not sound pompous and intentionally archaic. Most of it does end up sounding and reading like someone pretending they live in the 19th Century or earlier and not the 21st. Those that manage to write a truly great rhyming metered poem that actually holds my attention and doesn’t cause me to roll my eyes from boredom or pay attention to the words chosen and how they rhyme and follow the meter and established pattern of the poem get serious kudos from me.
Nels.
ps: One form that fascinates me I’ve attempted to write in but haven’t had satisfactory results is the sestina. I think it’s a happy medium between metered structured poetry and open/free verse poetry. While it is a more open-ended format than say the sonnet and allows for more creative leverage since you don’t have to observe a strict meter and/or rhyme scheme, it is arguably a more challenging form than some of the other metered and rhyming poetry in that you have to recycle the same end words in every stanza using a particualr pattern.