What is Poetry?

I have seen many people struggle with this. it would seem that poetry is actually rather difficult to define, yet we can usually identify it when iwe see it. Make sense? I have belonged to several poetry review websites. I currently don't hang my hat anywhere with regards to that, but my time spent at those sites has been interesting.

There seems to be many ideas about what constitutes poetry. There are some who say that if you write something from the heart it is poetry. Well, I can write the words, "I hate my mother!" (in actuality I love my mom, but go with me on this example) and mean it straight from the heart. But I wouldn't call it poetry. Would you? I believe I have seen some people who probably would. Remember, if the criteria is to write something with emotion, then anything should suffice, right? Wrong.

Then there are some people who think that a mish mash of nonsense words thrown together equates to poetry, and there I would disagree again. In fact, I would emphatically state that it is not poetry, but merely people trying to mimic what they believe poetry should be ala abstract art. But what about The Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll? As nonsensical as it may seem due to the words coined by Carroll, it is actually a strictly structured poem that creates an thought thread, has a beginning, a middle and an end. It is metered, has rhythm. It is a poem.

Then others may point out the work of E.E. Cummings as a sort of reference for "abstract" poetry. But once again, there's far more to Cummings than meets the plebian eye.

When poets forsook traditional, classic structure and style for more experimental types of poetry, this opened up a whole new world to people who couldn't be bothered to work the meter and rhyme. They justified what they did as good because poetry no longer needed to rhyme, nor did it require assonance or consonance - it could be whatever they wanted it to be. There is a grain of truth to that, but it still isn't necessary poetry. Or if it is, it's not good poetry. The same thing happened with "abstract expressionism" in the art world. With its advent, it freed up people to simply fling paint at a canvas and call it good. You see, it is supposed to reflect something deeply emotional for that person and, as such, becomes sacrosanct. You are not supposed to criticize it. The same holds true with freeverse.

Here's the thing. There is good abstract art just as there is good freeverse. But they still have to follow certain rules to make them effective. Throwing out the rules because one is either unwilling or just too lazy to learn those rules will always be revealed in that person's work. Or should I say lack of work? Because real creativity takes work.

There are essays that can be written about this, probably have been. And I may touch on it from time to time.

Cheers, Jeff