Writing Meta: Why don't I get poetry?

[amanuensis1]

During insomnia night this week, I read a professional insititution's glossy creativity publication that had been given to me. The photos were pretty, the essays...not as horrible as they could have been, the poetry I thought was appalling. Schmaltz, doggerel, sentimental claptrap. Amateur pirouettes on a page, terribly proud of themselves for showing off their cut-apart structure and boring as spit. These students didn't even know how to write limericks; there was a two-page spread of them and not one of them had the correct scansion of a limerick. God. I read through the book thinking, what the hell did they reject?

Is it just me? I always admit that I don't have a poet's soul; I have no inclination to write poetry other than funny doggerel, and very little poetry resonates with me. Sometimes it does. The moments are rare, but wonderful. Is it just me, is most poetry dreadful cloying crap? Just because you're grieving or in pain, that doesn't mean you can create good art.

Comments

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

'Kay, let's see. The lyrics on the page don't reach me, they just don't. If I didn't know they were song lyrics I'd look away instantly. It looks a little familiar, this set of lyrics.

*clicks* Oh, of course, this song! Eh, I don't think this one will work for me; it's a song I've heard and the music itself isn't dreadful but it just doesn't move me.

[geoviki.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's my take on the lyrics, too: lame by themselves.

It's the pop hook, the repetition of "sacrifice" with increasing urgency and then the resolution that does it for me.

[geoviki.livejournal.com]

Anyway, that was fun and confirmed my opinion that my love of lyrics would totally fall apart without the music driving it.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I was thinking last night about song artists I love and how I love to sing their songs, though for the most part, unless what they've written is a ballad--something telling a story--I don't necessarily care about the meaning of the lyrics. I mean, I haven't the faintest idea what "little fascist panties" are, but they're great to sing when it comes to that line in "Little Earthquakes," yanno?