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

[melpemone.livejournal.com]

I love good poetry. Something about the way the words fall together and evoke such intense emotions gives me goosebumps (of course, sometimes it's the emotions and sometimes it's the talent. I'm an okay writer, but an appalling poet).

I appreciate the classics (except John Donne! Bane of my high school years!), but I can't connect with them. My favourite poets are Charles Bukowski, Leonard Cohen and Sylvia Plath, which probably says more about me than I'm willing to admit. :)

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

Plath had some good s**t in there. No question. Not everything she wrote connected with me, but a few did.