What is poetry? Poetry, or pure prose is everything that breathes and sleeps, everything that feels left out, beat out, sun down, low down. Poetry is the celebration of the little things. Poetry is all the memory keeps, and all it doesnt want to. That glance. Your quickening heartbeat. That argument. That joke no one got. That feeling of something about to happen. That feeling of loss. Those lonesome hours at night. That morning not so alone. Her hands. His voice. The dreams, the regrets. Poetry is love. Poetry is pain. Poetry is all motions of the soul, great, sad, vast, small, subtle, perfect. Poetry is everything that someone gave you, and everything they took away. Poetry is a revolution of the self. The cultivation of the soul. Poetry is keep in secret scribbled note books. Poetry is carried as a comfort, as a guide. But it becoming lost in the the haze of what is, and what isnt.
We undoubtedly live in the most cynical of times in modern human history. True currency of the soul is now measured out in smaller and smaller teaspoons while we work, and screw, and drink, gather this great collection of WHAT?, scratch our heads and gaze contentment in salaries, mortgages, careers, marriage, new kitchens, television sets, boasts, and hangovers yet all the time wondering, is this the way it really turns out? The fall of writing as an art, and in that I mean pure prose (which has many different forms), and in that I mean pure poetry (many different forms too) has a direct collation with the growth and pursuit, in the last forty years, since the sad death of a sad, bitter and lonesome Jack, of the 'empty dream' (thank you Jack - and his sad eyes above).
Poetry is perhaps the holiest of all art forms. In a single sentence, or verse, it can capture pain, beauty, heartbreak, joy, frustration, little nothing and everything moments – the pure dark sundown of the soul. A poet will suffer deeply in what he or she is so aware of, and for little redemption, just the notion of a cause nobly served, for to write is to live. A true poet will know what loneliness really is. Not the distance between lovers but pure melancholia. The big emptiness. But also in his or her gift, pure joy and freedom. He or she must know what longing truly is, physical longing, absence of love, and a longing for a life worth living. BUT a poet will celebrate and nuture love more than anyone else, when love indeed crosses their path. And finally, a true poet would never intend to make any material gain out of his or her work.
And so there in lies the problem of the artist in the modern world. The desire or attraction we are ingrained in is to consume, to gather, to gain, to talk, to be proud (ah so, bound in the definate limits of the western world!) where as the obligation of a true poet, a true artist, is simply to learn, to experience and expect little else. To take nothing for granted. The journey of an artist should be indelibly poetic and melancholic, and rely very little on material gain, or motion. And so it’s gonna be so damn difficult to find the twenty-first century’s Jack (the last pure artist), or Federico Lorca, or W.B. Yeats, or Walt Whitman, or Pablo Neruda, when we are all expected to find a well-paying job, get the girlfriend (or the girls, a boyfriend), travel, save up, buy a house, marry ... ah, i hate to rant but you know the game. You know the routine. The ill finger, the good crime. We've all been handed the same deck of cards. But what about the soul? It needs direction. Without poetry and art, the soul grows small and sad, and the fire burns low.
We undoubtedly live in the most cynical of times in modern human history. True currency of the soul is now measured out in smaller and smaller teaspoons while we work, and screw, and drink, gather this great collection of WHAT?, scratch our heads and gaze contentment in salaries, mortgages, careers, marriage, new kitchens, television sets, boasts, and hangovers yet all the time wondering, is this the way it really turns out? The fall of writing as an art, and in that I mean pure prose (which has many different forms), and in that I mean pure poetry (many different forms too) has a direct collation with the growth and pursuit, in the last forty years, since the sad death of a sad, bitter and lonesome Jack, of the 'empty dream' (thank you Jack - and his sad eyes above).
Poetry is perhaps the holiest of all art forms. In a single sentence, or verse, it can capture pain, beauty, heartbreak, joy, frustration, little nothing and everything moments – the pure dark sundown of the soul. A poet will suffer deeply in what he or she is so aware of, and for little redemption, just the notion of a cause nobly served, for to write is to live. A true poet will know what loneliness really is. Not the distance between lovers but pure melancholia. The big emptiness. But also in his or her gift, pure joy and freedom. He or she must know what longing truly is, physical longing, absence of love, and a longing for a life worth living. BUT a poet will celebrate and nuture love more than anyone else, when love indeed crosses their path. And finally, a true poet would never intend to make any material gain out of his or her work.
And so there in lies the problem of the artist in the modern world. The desire or attraction we are ingrained in is to consume, to gather, to gain, to talk, to be proud (ah so, bound in the definate limits of the western world!) where as the obligation of a true poet, a true artist, is simply to learn, to experience and expect little else. To take nothing for granted. The journey of an artist should be indelibly poetic and melancholic, and rely very little on material gain, or motion. And so it’s gonna be so damn difficult to find the twenty-first century’s Jack (the last pure artist), or Federico Lorca, or W.B. Yeats, or Walt Whitman, or Pablo Neruda, when we are all expected to find a well-paying job, get the girlfriend (or the girls, a boyfriend), travel, save up, buy a house, marry ... ah, i hate to rant but you know the game. You know the routine. The ill finger, the good crime. We've all been handed the same deck of cards. But what about the soul? It needs direction. Without poetry and art, the soul grows small and sad, and the fire burns low.
Now let me not discount the fact that there has been some eloquent, beautiful prose created in the last forty years. Poets such as Leonard Cohen, Maya Angelou and Charles Bukowski spring instantly to mind. From this country, we have crafted a gem in Kapka Kassabova.
In popular music, that other holiest of artforms, the likes of Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, Ian Curtis, PJ Harvey, Stevie Wonder, Kurt Cobain, Michael Stipe, Jeff Buckley, Ray Davies and Nick Drake could all qualify, in their particular forms, as poets, or as Crazy Jim might say ‘erotic politicians’. And some, though fleetingly, even true artists.
There’s 'still room for someone to step in here’, Bukowski once said. I agree, but a great shift in the collective soul of men and women must occur for poetry, and true art, to regain its spot on the right side of perception and the great sad satori journey that is life.
1 comment:
For an ex-engineering student you have an uncharacteristic love for satori and the great medium of poetry. You put it so well, yet I would simplify it somewhat. In my view, poetry's power lies in its ability to portray us, our condition in this obscure joke of life so well to one another. The medium is rivalled in this regard in music only and in both we must rejoice.
But must the true artist endure the "pure dark sundown of the soul" by necessity, must melancholy be the curse of all those willing to scratch into the hard crust of indoctrination and breath the fresh air of a free mind?
I for one would like to see you laugh in the face of such ideas, do your utmost to spread satori to those of us unwilling or unable to think beyond the next paycheck, the next lay or the next material acquisition. And to smile into old age, senility, disease and finis.
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