Non-traditional poetry

[WillJ]

We've had threads on modern art and what qualifies as "art," but never poetry.

Poetry, like any art, is hard to define, but regardless that's what this thread is about: your definition of it. Do you consider "modern" poetry poetry? An example of traditional poetry:

Oh Captain! My Captain!

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up--for you the flag is flung--for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths--for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You've fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

***

An example of modern poetry:

Crescent Moon

The
   moon
     is shy.
       You can
          find her
           peeking out
            at the world
            from the edge
           of my fingernails.
         When I cut them
            the moon slips
             out, no bigger
            than a nail
          clipping as
        she hangs
       up there
    in the
sky.

Or, even less structured:

Things I Hate

chicken skin
the crust on pudding
country music
Dick Cheney
homework
picky people

Discuss.

 

[Archer 007]

I write poetry that doesnt rhyme. Is that "non-traditional" to you?

 

[WillJ]

Originally posted by Archer 007
I write poetry that doesnt rhyme. Is that "non-traditional" to you?

If it has absolutely no rhyme and no rhythm or any other elements clearly distinguising it from prose (besides the lack of grammatical structure), then yes.

 

[cgannon64]

Doesn't need to rhyme or have rhythm, but if it does it is superior in my book.

 

[Archer 007]

Originally posted by WillJ
If it has absolutely no rhyme and no rhythm or any other elements clearly distinguising it from prose (besides the lack of grammatical structure), then yes.

Then my poetry is non-traditional.

 

[WillJ]

Originally posted by Archer 007
Then my poetry is non-traditional.

Then your poetry sucks. j/k

As for my opinion, I voted the second option. For me to consider something poetry, it has to have something pleasing to your "literary sense," something more than just expressing thoughts, which would suffice in other forms of writing. Whether this be done through rhyme, rhythm, being done in the shape of the subject, whatever, it doesn't matter; just something. Otherwise it's prose or a lazily-written bunch of words, IMO. (No offense to anyone.)

 

[Archer 007]

I only right poems because chicks dig it.

 

[Toasty]

Art is art is art. It's only judgement is based on the effectiveness of getting its message(s) across, or the ideas it incurs in the viewer, depending on its goal.

 

[WillJ]

Originally posted by Toasty
Art is art is art. It's only judgement is based on the effectiveness of getting its message(s) across, or the ideas it incurs in the viewer, depending on its goal.

I didn't ask about art, I asked about poetry. (And poetry is a type of art, of course, but it's not the only one.)

 

[Archer 007]

His point is that its about emotion.

 

[WillJ]

Originally posted by Archer 007
His point is that its about emotion.

Oopsie, you're right.

 

[KaNick]

"Things I Hate

chicken skin
the crust on pudding
country music
Dick Cheney
homework
picky people"

Technically poetry, but I would never buy a book of this person's work.

 

[Dark Ascendant]

Ok, that 3rd one is crap. I'm sorry, but it is. A poem doesn't need lots of words to make a point. In fact, poems try to say more with less. But "Things I Hate" is the most superficial piece of trash I ever saw as a poem. Replace the words and you get a recipe, or an enemy list, etc. Very deep meaning.

I think poems can do without rhyme and meter. As long as they make a point. The moon poem does that.

 

[amadeus]

Ripple chips Microsoft,
Baking soda fascist,
Sweaty bear claw,
Old bananas.

Man, if I submitted this kind of stuff to the NEA (either one,) they'd $#%^ gold bricks.

 

[Achinz]

The arts have to evolve to reflect the "tempo of the times". And literature is no exception. The final criteriia are sincerity and conviction and that mysterious quality, "poetic insight". One can find these in modern forms as in the old.

 

[Souron]

I have absolutely no idea what defines something as poetry beond the line structure(not prose).


The jabberwaki(sp?) does not even consist entierly of words!

 

[RoddyVR]

if it doesnt rhime, its not a poem.
if it doesnt have rithm its not a good poem.
if the lines are all different length (sound, not letter wise), it should be in prose

and i dont particularly like the ones that use some sort of alternation of rythm either. they can be hard to read if you cant guess the rythm right away.

 

[Souron]

A little surching led me to

Cousin Nancy
by Thomas Stearns Eliot

Miss Nancy Ellicott Strode across the hills and broke them,
Rode across the hills and broke them--
The barren New England hills--
Riding to hounds
Over the cow-pasture.

Miss Nancy Ellicott smoked
And danced all the modern dances;
And her aunts were not quite sure how they felt about it,
But they knew that it was modern.

Upon the glazen shelves kept watch
Matthew and Waldo, guardians of the faith,
The army of unalterable law.

Thomas Stearns Eliot lived (1888-1965)

 

[addiv]

It depends on the poem I think. It doesn't necessarily need to have things like rythm, rhyme or metaphor, but the poem as a whole should make at least some sense.
Although the 'Things I hate' thing makes sense, but I don't consider it poetry... It also differs from person to person. You can't make a universal definition of poetry.
Maybe the best 'definition' possible would be 'poetry is anything that doesn't fit in any other literary category'.
BTW, I don't see why we need to define poetry anyway.

 

[addiv]

Originally posted by rmsharpe
Ripple chips Microsoft,
Baking soda fascist,
Sweaty bear claw,
Old bananas.

Man, if I submitted this kind of stuff to the NEA (either one,) they'd $#%^ gold bricks.

Seriously, I like it!