Teaching Poetry.

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Teaching Poetry


‘I take it you have read some poetry Bill?’
‘Well, bits and pieces like’.
‘Such as?’
‘Er- one by that sailor bloke, forget his name, I must go down to the sea again—‘
‘Yes, yes. John Masefield that’s old tat now Bill; poetry today is all from the modernist and post modernist school, it’s like this. The poet writes a poem then it’s up to the reader to make sense of it. Now, I downloaded the latest poem by Sebastian Peasemold, read it through and tell me what you think’.


‘Well’?
‘Its gibberish’
‘Yes of course its gibberish but its intelligent gibberish’
‘Oh right’
‘Some call it Do it Yourself Poetry without a construction manual’
‘Sounds bloody hard to me mate’
‘Yes well, sometimes you have to move your mind to another dimension’
‘Beryl says I’ve got enough trouble living in this one’
‘Never mind, what does this line mean to you? Goats conventionally emblemize lust’.
‘Randy goats’?
‘No, No. you can’t take the meaning from how it’s written. Look, take it home with you and I’ll give you a bell next week’.

A week later.

‘Hullo Bill, its Cyril, about the poem, you got the meaning’?
‘Yeah’
‘Thought so, simple wasn’t it. A mimetic representation is merely a representation of a social construct’.
‘I didn’t get that’
‘No? What did you get’?
‘Coconuts’
‘How the bloody hell did you get coconuts’?
‘Line 24. Answers lay in the kernel of my palm-- Kernel=nut, Palm= palm trees,= coconuts’. easy peasy
‘Bill, you’re a bloody Philistine’.

[Delta40]

Ha ha. Nice dialogue.

[Calidore]

I enjoyed this. I also sympathize with Bill, as I have as much use for that kind of poetry as he does.

[Steven Hunley]

This is a funny bit thoughtful bit. Good start for a story. Give us a story.

[108 fountains]

Very nice. Excellent humor and it comes in at about 250 words. Those who aspire to flash fiction could learn from this as an example.

[YesNo]

‘Yes of course its gibberish but its intelligent gibberish’

I am going to have to remember that concept of intelligent gibberish.

[AuntShecky]

Funny, yes. But wouldn't the professor say "it's intelligent gibberish" with an apostrophe in "it's"? Also, he'd use end punctuation also, wouldn't he?

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Maybe, but I don’t think either were a professor and I am certainly not.

[DATo]

I enjoyed this. I also sympathize with Bill, as I have as much use for that kind of poetry as he does.

Totally agree with this. When poetry becomes so reliant upon the reader's interpretation that it lacks any semblance of practical meaning one would be just as engaged, for all practical purposes, reading the telephone directory. I will never understand people who find this sort of poetry to be of any significance whatsoever. The phrase "The king has no clothes." comes to mind.

I like the story, by the way!

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Well this little piece I wrote as a light hearted dig at modern poetry has opened up a can of worms and it seems that some of the views expressed on modern poetry are not without support as this quote from Neil Astley editor of Bloodaxe Books.confirms.

The sideswipe wasn't directed as those who see poetry as intellectual snobbery, but at the poetry snobs themselves - they don't really care about who reads poetry as long as it's the kind of poetry they admire, but much of what they like is incomprehensible anyone outside academic or poetry circles. Modern poetry has a negative image with the general public. People think it's irrelevant and incomprehensible - they joke about daffodils - so they don't bother with it, not even readers of literary fiction and people interested in other arts which use language, such as theatre and film. Not even people who read Shakespeare and the classics: one of the most surprising findings of that Arts Council report was that only 5% of the poetry books sold in British bookshops over a two-year period were by living contemporary poets.

5%!! Aren’t those who think there’s no problem with today’s contemporary poetry are sticking their heads in the sand?.

[YesNo]

The kind of intelligent gibberish that I find the worse is not what is obviously gibberish. That can be entertaining if it sounds good. The worst gibberish has to make enough sense to make the reader wonder if there is something being communicated that the reader is too stupid to understand. That's when the verbal abuse does the most damage.