Poetry is a load of horse **** waste of time and most people intrinsically know it.

paleoperson

The whole point of language is to communicate, to be clear, and sometimes to provoke feeling. Meanwhile poetry is about making vague statements that are supposed to be "symbols" of something else.

Poetry is all pretentious nonsense. It's elitism in its purest form. People feel like they "get it", they're part of an elite group of people.

If a single person here has respect for or actually reads or even buys poetry - what do you get out of it? How does it improve your life?

Everyone else, what do you think of poetry.

"poetry" encompasses anything from roses are red through ogden nash through the iliad through prufrock through howl through anything else ever written down in a rhythm verse meter or rhyme that pleased the person writing it

your rant makes literally no sense, and no sense literally, because poetry is a million things and you seem to have a very specific bee in a very specific bonnet.

id just not read the poetry thats annoying you so much. im sure theres other things you like.

Gremlinertia

What is your opinion on writing? Not necessarily poetry, just writing, news journalism, instruction manuals, fiction all make no sense to some and stir emotions in others.. I'm genuinely interested in this because i don't 'get' many types of writing and wondering if there's anything you like reading.

paleoperson

Deleted User wrote: »

"poetry" encompasses anything from roses are red through ogden nash through the iliad through prufrock through howl through anything else ever written down in a rhythm verse meter or rhyme that pleased the person writing it

I'm glad you brought that up. When I say "poetry" I'm not talking about the Iliad or Shakespeare or The Raven or anything where there was a sensible story in it but it was written in rhyme.

I'm talking about books you buy where each page or two is a different poem that is barely decipherable and go something like "small tower, overhanging abyss - the beautiful view, oh lonesome joy", that sort of thing.

bodhrandude

I'm not a mad poetry fan, but it can be many things, rap and hip hop: urban streetwise poetry, lots of traditional songs were poems with a melody added. Rock music: A great example being The Sleaford Mods. Just my two cents as I wouldn't know too much about poetry itself some of my siblings would like it more.

Gremlinertia

paleoperson wrote: »

I'm glad you brought that up. When I say "poetry" I'm not talking about the Iliad or Shakespeare or The Raven or anything where there was a sensible story in it but it was written in rhyme.

I'm talking about books you buy where each page or two is a different poem that is barely decipherable and go something like "small tower, overhanging abyss - the beautiful view, oh lonesome joy", that sort of thing.

Oh i understand that, the more abstract is over my head a lot of the time, then there;s the likes of siegfried sassoon war poetry which i love but like anything many forms for many people?.

Peregrinus

paleoperson wrote: »

I'm glad you brought that up. When I say "poetry" I'm not talking about the Iliad or Shakespeare or The Raven or anything where there was a sensible story in it but it was written in rhyme.

I'm talking about books you buy where each page or two is a different poem that is barely decipherable and go something like "small tower, overhanging abyss - the beautiful view, oh lonesome joy", that sort of thing.

So what you're really saying is "poetry that I think is a load of horse*** is a load of horse****, and most people intrinsically know it".

Nah. Most people don't "intrinsically know" what you think. They only know if you tell them.

sabat

There once was a paleoperson
Who wasn't too keen on men versin'
Oh why open this thread
When I should be in bed?
Or fapping to Gina Gerson

Abstract art is an expression of how the human mind works. It's the only thing that separates us from animals.

gigantic09

Fallen hero's of long ago would more than likely be forgotten in the mists of time but for having been eulogised in verse. #never forget, Humpty Dumpty or Jack & Jill.

kippy

paleoperson wrote: »

The whole point of language is to communicate, to be clear, and sometimes to provoke feeling. Meanwhile poetry is about making vague statements that are supposed to be "symbols" of something else.

Poetry is all pretentious nonsense. It's elitism in its purest form. People feel like they "get it", they're part of an elite group of people.

If a single person here has respect for or actually reads or even buys poetry - what do you get out of it? How does it improve your life?

Everyone else, what do you think of poetry.

There are lots of things in life than can be perceived as a waste of time. Watching sport, watching music, this, etc etc.
Each to their own.once no harm comes of it.

Gruffalux

paleoperson wrote: »

I'm glad you brought that up. When I say "poetry" I'm not talking about the Iliad or Shakespeare or The Raven or anything where there was a sensible story in it but it was written in rhyme.

I'm talking about books you buy where each page or two is a different poem that is barely decipherable and go something like "small tower, overhanging abyss - the beautiful view, oh lonesome joy", that sort of thing.

I get that. There is a lot of poetry out there that is boring, reaching, indulgent, narcissistic, formulaic, intellectual pretense, nostalgic, morbid unreadable. Having said that I read a couple of poems most days, returning to old favourites, discovering new poems with delight. Poetry uplifts me and moves me emotionally. Anyone from Anna Akhmatova to ee cummings, I read 'em all. "Poetry comes nearer to vital truth than history."- Plato.

sbsquarepants

paleoperson wrote: »

The whole point of language is to communicate, to be clear, and sometimes to provoke feeling. Meanwhile poetry is about making vague statements that are supposed to be "symbols" of something else.

Poetry is all pretentious nonsense. It's elitism in its purest form. People feel like they "get it", they're part of an elite group of people.

If a single person here has respect for or actually reads or even buys poetry - what do you get out of it? How does it improve your life?

Everyone else, what do you think of poetry.

I love poetry, i love song lyrics, i just love words in general.

You'd never guess it from my monosyllabic, rambling, rants on here...but i do:D

That being said i'm not a fan of blank verse, that to me is just prose, mostly pretentious, badly written prose, not poetry. The skill in poetry, or song writing - is to say what you want in a flowing, melodic way.

Expand your horizons OP.



Now for your homework, go read some Maya Angelou, Edgar Allen Poe, Byron..... and Bruce Springsteen:D

CharlesMartel

paleoperson wrote: »

The whole point of language is to communicate, to be clear, and sometimes to provoke feeling. Meanwhile poetry is about making vague statements that are supposed to be "symbols" of something else.

Poetry is all pretentious nonsense. It's elitism in its purest form. People feel like they "get it", they're part of an elite group of people.

If a single person here has respect for or actually reads or even buys poetry - what do you get out of it? How does it improve your life?

Everyone else, what do you think of poetry.

You probably really enjoy poetry, just you are too thick to recognise it as poetry

Blondini

Rage, rage against threads that are shight ....

sbsquarepants

spook_cook wrote: »

I want to disagree with you but thinking on it, as a regular reader I have never bought nor read any poetry in my entire adult life.

What's a song, if not a poem set to music?


I mean a real song, not an "ooh baby you getting it all night, al night, all night, all night" shítefest we have to endure. I mean something more along the lines of


Johnny was sitting on the fire escape watching the kids playing down in the street
He called down, "Hey, little heroes, summer's long, but I guess it ain't very sweet around here anymore"
Janey sleeps in sheets damp with sweat,
Johnnie sits up alone and watches her dream on, dream on,
And her sister prays for lost souls and breaks down in the chapel after everyone has gone,
Janey moves over to share her pillow, but opens her eyes to see Johnnie up putting his clothes on,
She says "those romantic young boys, all they ever want to do is fight"
And they're calling in the window, "hey, Spanish Johnnie, you wanna make a little easy money tonight?"

sydthebeat

Oh I wish I'd looked after me teeth.....

Blondini

sydthebeat wrote: »

Oh I wish I'd looked after me teeth.....

A poster named Sydthebeat
So wished he'd looked after his teeth
Brushed them till clean
Flossed till they gleamed
And avoided the covid nineteenth

The Mighty Quinn

spook_cook wrote: »

Agreed. I remember we did Simon and Garfunkel's... well some song of theirs in school English exams.

But even so, I don't really do music. Cannot tell you last gig I went to or album or whatever I bought.

If I recall correctly it was for junior cert, where you were presented with 2 poems, "I am a rock" by Paul Simon and "No man is an Island" by John Donne.

Earthhorse

paleoperson wrote: »

I'm glad you brought that up. When I say "poetry" I'm not talking about the Iliad or Shakespeare or The Raven or anything where there was a sensible story in it but it was written in rhyme.

I'm talking about books you buy where each page or two is a different poem that is barely decipherable and go something like "small tower, overhanging abyss - the beautiful view, oh lonesome joy", that sort of thing.

80% of football matches are dull affairs. It's the 20% that make up for that.

And so it is with pretty much everything; restaurants, movies, poetry, music, film, books, TV shows, plays, comedians or whatever you're having, the vast majority of it will leave you cold or even put you off. It's the remainder that makes it worthwhile.

Wibbs

sabat wrote: »

There once was a paleoperson
Who wasn't too keen on men versin'
Oh why open this thread
When I should be in bed?
Or fapping to Gina Gerson

You won the internet on this day.

weldoninhio

Poetry is excellent. I write a bit, it's not high falluting or anything like that. How can something like this not move you??


Mid-Term Break
BY SEAMUS HEANEY
I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close.
At two o'clock our neighbours drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying—
He had always taken funerals in his stride—
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand

And tell me they were 'sorry for my trouble'.
Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside; I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,

Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple,
He lay in the four-foot box as in his cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.

A four-foot box, a foot for every year.

TheIrishGrover

I never got poetry in school where it is beat into ya almost mathematically: This is good because of X Y Z and this is bad because of A B C. But I do like what I like (As a matter of fact, Pat Ingolsby has a poem about that exact problem and is why he constantly refuses the department of education's requests to add his work.

But I do "likes what I likes": I like the Nationwide ads in the UK. They are not rhyming couplets about tripping through fields of gold in ancient times. They are simple, relatable situations/thoughts. I also enjoy Pat's books and it is always a joy to meet him on the street, have a chat, and buy his latest book. Last time we met, we had such a fun and interesting conversation that he gave me a poster of one of his poems with a lovely inscription on it. Politicians and the whole world fawn over Joyce etc and ignore or look down upon him. the same people who will be wailing crying with arms raised when he's gone.

So yeah, never liked it in school, mainly due to the method of instilling mathematical appreciation but I do likes what I likes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENVBtxAMOFk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahr9_4l-Fok

storker

weldoninhio wrote: »

Poetry is excellent. I write a bit, it's not high falluting or anything like that. How can something like this not move you??


Mid-Term Break
BY SEAMUS HEANEY
I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close.
At two o'clock our neighbours drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying—
He had always taken funerals in his stride—
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand

And tell me they were 'sorry for my trouble'.
Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside; I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,

Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple,
He lay in the four-foot box as in his cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.

A four-foot box, a foot for every year.

I was going to reference this very work. I'm not into poetry at all, and with regard to a lot of it, I can't escape the feeling that there's a lot of admiration of the attire of a buck-naked emperor. but that Heaney poem is so powerful, its last line like a punch to the solar plexus, that it's hard to imagine someone not being moved by it.

I'd add this:

DULCE ET DECORUM EST - Wilfred Owen

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

And, inevitably perhaps, but its powerful message is still relevant:

OZYMANDIAS - Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.


Very tangential anecdote...

Spike Milligan recalled that when his unit commander wanted to instill a bit of culture into the men, his sergeant, known to be a bulsh1tter, announced the first lecture as follows:“Right, you lot – tonight Lieutenant Wilson will be giving a talk about Keats – and I bet not one of you ignorant bastards knows what a Keat is.”

Feisar

Blondini wrote: »

Rage, rage against threads that are shight ....

I was at a funeral and the dead mans son read Do not go gentle into that good night as a eulogy. Given the man in question it sort of hit the spot.

Yis now have to suffer my own favorites:

Bingen on the Rhine

A soldier of the legion lay dying in Algiers,
There was lack of woman's nursing, there was dearth of woman's tears;
But a comrade stood beside him, while his life-blood ebbed away,
And bent, with pitying glances, to hear what he might say.
The dying soldier faltered, as he took that comrade's hand,
And he said, "I never more shall see my own, my native land:
Take a message and a token to some distant friends of mine;
For I was born at Bingen—at Bingen on the Rhine.

"Tell my brothers and companions, when they meet and crowd around,
To hear my mournful story, in the pleasant vineyard ground
That we fought the battle bravely, and when the day was done,
Full many a corpse lay ghastly pale beneath the setting sun:
And 'mid the dead and dying were some grown old in wars—
The death-wound on their gallant breasts, the last of many scars;
And some were young, and suddenly beheld life's morn decline—
And one had come from Bingen—fair Bingen on the Rhine.

"Tell my mother that her other son shall comfort her old age;
For I was still a truant bird, that thought his home a cage.
For my father was a soldier, and even as a child
My heart leaped forth to hear him tell of struggles fierce and wild;
And when he died, and left us to divide his scanty hoard,
I let them take whate'er they would—but kept my father's sword;
And with boyish love I hung it where the bright light used to shine,
On the cottage wall at Bingen—calm Bingen on the Rhine.

"Tell my sister not to weep for me, and sob with drooping head,
When the troops come marching home again, with glad and gallant tread,
But to look upon them proudly, with a calm and steadfast eye,
For her brother was a soldier, too, and not afraid to die;
And if a comrade seek her love, I ask her in my name,
To listen to him kindly, without regret or shame,
And to hang the old sword in its place (my father's sword and mine),
For the honour of old Bingen—dear Bingen on the Rhine.

"There's another—not a sister; in the happy days gone by,
You'd have known her by the merriment that sparkled in her eye;
Too innocent for coquetry—too fond for idle scorning—
O, friend! I fear the lightest heart makes sometimes heaviest mourning!
Tell her the last night of my life (for ere the moon be risen,
My body will be out of pain, my soul be out of prison)—
I dreamed I stood with her, and saw the yellow sunlight shine
On the vine-clad hills of Bingen—sweet Bingen on the Rhine.

"I saw the blue Rhine sweep along—I heard, or seemed to hear,
The German songs we used to sing in chorus sweet and clear;
And down the pleasant river, and up the slanting hill,
The echoing chorus sounded through the evening calm and still;
And her glad blue eyes were on me, as we passed with friendly talk,
Down many a path beloved of yore, and well-remembered walk!
And her little hand lay lightly, confidingly in mine—
But we meet no more at Bingen—loved Bingen on the Rhine."

His trembling voice grew faint and hoarse; his grasp was childish weak;
His eyes put on a dying look; and he sighed and ceased to speak;
His comrade bent to lift him, but the spark of life had fled;
The soldier of the Legion in a foreign land—was dead!
And the soft moon rose up slowly, and calmly she looked down
On the red sand of the battle-field, with bloody corpses strown;
Yes, calmly on that dreadful scene her pale light seemed to shine,
As it shown on distant Bingen—fair Bingen on the Rhine.

Caroline Norton

corner of hells

In school , years ago , our class bully was about to kick the bollix out of me , when I defended myself with a bit of Kavanagh , " O stony grey soil of Monaghan" , swiftly followed up with a bit of Yeats , " the Lake Ilse of Inisfree".

Bit of poetry calms the mind.

TheIrishGrover

I always thought four weddings and a funeral was overrated. But The Funeral was fantastic. I don't care your sexual orientation or preference or your opinion on poetry, this was an amazing peoem delivered fantastically:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDXWclpGhcg

Interestingly (To me anyway). When I was looking for the above clip I found the one below. Same poem but delivered in what I would consider a more traditional school way. To me, the version below is FAR inferior: Delivered in an ACT-ORly delivery. All Shakesperian oration.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mifAhvkcJU

OscarMIlde

spook_cook wrote: »

Agreed. I remember we did Simon and Garfunkel's... well some song of theirs in school English exams.

But even so, I don't really do music. Cannot tell you last gig I went to or album or whatever I bought.

I always think of Paul Simon's lyrics as a series of little epiphanies. There is something so striking about the mood he evokes with each song, I don't think he gets enough credit for how skillful it is.

Gruffalux

weldoninhio wrote: »

Poetry is excellent. I write a bit, it's not high falluting or anything like that. How can something like this not move you??


Mid-Term Break
BY SEAMUS HEANEY
I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close.
At two o'clock our neighbours drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying—
He had always taken funerals in his stride—
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand

And tell me they were 'sorry for my trouble'.
Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside; I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,

Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple,
He lay in the four-foot box as in his cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.

A four-foot box, a foot for every year.

I listened to Seamus speaking that poem in a big tent in Monaghan some years ago. The vibration that went through the people assembled when he finished was powerful. It was a palpable atmospheric swell of the shared human experience of love and grief. He was a true gentle giant among men.

Dr. Bre

Poetry in motion

s1ippy

I had a dream last night that an old German teacher from my school who I never even had teaching me (because I didn't do German) was doing a poetry class on John Donne's love poetry and instead of talking about the poems they were giving out to me for not ruling my copy properly and correcting spelling mistakes.

I think that pretty accurately sums up what poetry is about in this country. Getting the Seamus Heaney beaten out of you. An American I met actually showed me what an incredible poet he is.