Does Poetry Make Anything Happen?

[MorpheusSandman]

Then I guess it's really just a personal thing. Very little art moves me deeply, but I can name works in all mediums that have for a variety of different reasons. I might say that, in general, plays, prose, films,--narratives and fiction in general--moves me more frequently than non-narrative/fictional work does, including painting, photography, and poetry. Yet I turn to the latter because they also offer things that I don't get from the vast majority of fictional art. As I said, I think poetry is better at capturing the beauty, feeling, aesthetics of small moments and more abstract experiences of life when compared to fiction. Even Shakespeare, whom is far-and-away my favorite writer that I idolize, I think more of as a writer of fiction than as a poet, mainly because most of his "poetry" is serving a larger purpose in the realm of his plays' fictions. The pleasures that Milton offers in his short, non-narrative works can't be found in Shakespeare's plays, and vice versa. In the realm of film, I wouldn't want to be without the "poetry" of Stan Brakhage or the supreme narrative craftsmanship of Hitchcock. That's why I think poetry and the fictional arts compliment each other so well.

[Ezekiel 4:9]

People, this forum is a waste of everyone's time. No one is interested in what anyone else has to say. Literature networks are very much like graduate seminars in which students try to impress their peers rather than converse with them. The study of literature is essentially a solitary activity, which explains why people instinctually regard others' insight as an annoying intrusion. Now be annoying and disagree with me!

[JCamilo]

Nope, you did waste my time quite well.

[Buh4Bee]

I'll be polite not waste anyone's time by digressing from the OP's question, "Does poetry make anything happen?" Yes, poetry makes things happen. I know because poetry makes things happen in my life. I read it, think about it, understand it, and share it. This is the lighter side of poetry. But does poetry, do something bigger, like move humanity toward finding world peace? I know it does, because it helps shape thought and philosophy from an emotional vantage point. Isn't deep-seeded knowledge our greatest tool when we seek a positive place of advantage?

[tailor STATELY]

Wikipedia - Humanities:

The humanities are academic disciplines that study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural science.

"Does Poetry Make Anything Happen?"

IMHO:
Poetry, as all literature does, evolves. Poetry pushes, prods, and kneads language linguistically, phonemically, and artistically in the present sense.

Poetry is evocative (from thefreedictionary.com: (adjective); expressive, moving, striking, revealing, pointed, pregnant, vivid, meaningful, poignant, eloquent, indicative, suggestive.

The study of poetry can fire the imagination to times past unlike an history book can; and allow one to explore other realities, or sensibilities.

IMHO.

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY

[The Ol' Man]

People, this forum is a waste of everyone's time. No one is interested in what anyone else has to say. Literature networks are very much like graduate seminars in which students try to impress their peers rather than converse with them. The study of literature is essentially a solitary activity, which explains why people instinctually regard others' insight as an annoying intrusion. Now be annoying and disagree with me!

True enough. I've been posting on this forum since October and I've never
been recipient to one response, the discussion simply floats up over my posts
indifferently. Taxing as that can be when a participant, that manner of posting
is fairly enlightening (sometimes) when an observer.

In response to the question posed: 'Does poetry make anything happen?'

Yes, it does. But nor is Auden incorrect.

[chipper]

i think poetry makes "something" happen but not anything

[AuntShecky]

People, this forum is a waste of everyone's time. No one is interested in what anyone else has to say. Literature networks are very much like graduate seminars in which students try to impress their peers rather than converse with them. The study of literature is essentially a solitary activity, which explains why people instinctually regard others' insight as an annoying intrusion. Now be annoying and disagree with me!

Well, there are only three things one can do with books-- read them, talk about them, or, as the original Ezekiel did, eat them!

[Paulclem]

Well, there are only three things one can do with books-- read them, talk about them, or, as the original Ezekiel did, eat them!

There is a fourth if you are bereft of a certain paper.

[PSRemeshChandra]

It is like asking whether The Iliad, The Odessey, The Mahabharata and The Ramayana influenced and shaped human minds and caused things happen or not. Poetry do influence people and do cause things to happen in the long run. In fact they mould the national mind and character without which history, the record of happenings, never occure. Poetry is the moving force that makes the human mind kinetic enough to initiate and make things happen. There is no use denying the impact and influence of powerful poetry on human minds forcing him into action by parading before his intellect excellent examples of similar actions happened in the past. Let powerless and weak poems remain there as inert as the minds of those who created them. But we have in lterary history before us to cite thousands of powerful poems in almost all ages and in almost all languages which stormed people and brought about slow and steady strings of incidents culminating in their final attainment of objectives and fulfillment of mission. As a simple example we shall take the example of the poems written by Alexander Pope while living in London.

Being born a Catholic in the Protestant England he and his people were forbidden to live in London city and was liable for paying a double taxation. To combat these social handicaps and also his physical handicaps from a series of diseases, he possed more than the courage of a lion, which reflected well in his poetry, which were actually acrimonious attacks on his society. We now know whether those ill practices and inhuman legislations of the society in his times still stays there or have been forced to be flown to the Thames, and within how many years. Poets, many of them far high-calibred and cunning visionaries than the ordinary statesmen, law makers and petty politicians, are not day dreamers but determined intellectuals who are determined enough to forcefully make things happen and bring about changes. Pointing out more such examples from other cities, countries and ages alone would make this discussion creative.

[Theunderground]

It can and does move peoples emotions. what more do you want from art?

[MarkBastable]

Well, yes, it does, according to a friend of mine who used to swear that a sufficiently grave rendition of 'To His Coy Mistress' would make Eng Lit undergrads sleep with you.

[OrphanPip]

Al Purdy

AT THE QUINTE HOTEL

I am drinking
I am drinking beer with yellow flowers
in underground sunlight
and you can see that I am a sensitive man
And I notice that the bartender is a sensitive man too
so I tell him about his beer
I tell him the beer he draws
is half fart and half yellow horse piss
and all wonderful yellow flowers
But the bartender is not quite
so sensitive as I supposed he was
the way he looks at me now
and does not appreciate my exquisite analogy
Over in one corner two guys
are quietly making love
in the brief prelude to infinity
Opposite them a peculiar fight
enables the drinkers to lay aside
their comic books and watch with interest
as I watch with interest
A wiry little man slugs another guy
then tracks him bleeding into the toilet
and slugs him to the floor again
with ugly red flowers on the tile
three minutes later he roosters over
to the table where his drunk friend sits
with another friend and slugs both
of em ***-over-electric-kettle
so I have to walk around
on my way for a piss
Now I am a sensitive man
so I say to him mildly as hell
"You shouldn'ta knocked over that good beer
with them beautiful flowers in it"
So he says to me "Come on"
So I Come On
like a rabbit with weak kidneys I guess
like a yellow streak charging
on flower power I suppose
& knock the **** outa him & sit on him
(he is a little guy)
and say reprovingly
"Violence will get you nowhere this time chum
Now you take me
I am a sensitive man
and would you believe I write poems?"
But I could see the doubt in his upside down face
in fact in all the faces
"What kind of poems?"
"Flower poems"
"So tell us a poem"
I got off the little guy reluctantly
for he was comfortable
and told them this poem
They crowded around me with tears
in their eyes and wrung my hands feelingly
for my pockets for
it was a heart-warming moment for Literature
and moved by the demonstrable effect
of great Art and the brotherhood of people I remarked
"the poem oughta be worth some beer"
It was a mistake of terminology
for silence came
and it was brought home to me in the tavern
that poems will not really buy beers or flowers
or a goddam thing
and I was sad
for I am a sensitive man.

[Ecurb]

Well, yes, it does, according to a friend of mine who used to swear that a sufficiently grave rendition of 'To His Coy Mistress' would make Eng Lit undergrads sleep with you.

I've been able to recite "To His Coy Mistress" by heart for several decades now, and I can assure you that your friend is lying to you.

[Ecurb]

I've been able to recite "To His Coy Mistress" by heart for several decades now, and I can assure you that your friend is lying to you.

Jane Austen (who shares our birthday,Mark) chips in. Mrs. Bennet is speaking:

"When she (Jane) was only fifteen, there was a gentleman at my brother Gardiner's in town so much in love with her that my sister-in-law was sure he would make her an offer before we came away. But, however, he did not. Perhaps he thought her too young. However, he wrote some verses on her, and very pretty they were."

"And so ended his affection," said Elizabeth impatiently. "There has been many a one, I fancy, overcome in the same way. I wonder who first discovered the efficacy of poetry in driving away love!"

"I have been used to consider poetry as the food of love," said Darcy.

"Of a fine, stout, healthy love it may. Everything nourishes what is strong already. But if it be only a slight, thin sort of inclination, I am convinced that one good sonnet will starve it entirely away."

Darcy only smiled; and the general pause which ensued made Elizabeth tremble lest her mother should be exposing herself again.