The Craft of Poetry

One of the few journals that has accepted my work has recently gotten a new editor. This editor has stated that there will be less attention to 'free association' writing, and more to the 'craft of poetry'.
Phew!
I know what that means.
It means he's not likely to publish me in future issues.
Not that my poems are 'free assocation'. They aren't. I work reasonably hard on each and every one, giving great thought to the nuance and meaning behind each and every word and image, after the initial inspiration that burst forth. There is a clear form, even if it is not an established form.
There is an addiction to phony formalism in poetry that sickens the soul. An adhesion to a formalism that does nothing to further meaning or expression.
It's interesting that I reject the standard forms of poetry, because I don't reject the standard forms of song - the 12 bar blues, the 32 bar song form, the 3 chord country songs. It seems like a contradiction, but it isn't really - I expect more from poetry, or something different. Songs can almost be poetry, but mostly they are just songs. I don't mean that in a demeaning way, because they are tied to music - the greatest art of all. Poetry is something else however, and if it is forced into the confines of an accepted form that will only be recognized as such if coming from a practitioner of the 'craft of poetry' it is as dead as snakeshit.

Is there craft in this poem?

Art

One must believe that there are modes of expression

that pull back the curtains

that cover the core of life.


I think so.

Advice

What is it with people and their penchant to hand out advice? Who asked for it? Do the people giving advice have any expertise to back up the advice that they give?
Generally, the answer is no. That includes the people who have 'credentials' and are supposed to know how to give advice.
The problem is that advice is not what is needed, and there are very very few who are in a position to hand out advice in a credible manner. The advice givers seldom really have the street cred that lends real meaning to their pronouncements. They are operating from a menu, a recipe book.
For example, a useful review of any of my writing would not say:
'You should do this...'
'You should do that...'
Rather say:
'The book bored me.'
'I got bogged down around chaper 13.'
'I found too many adjectives.'
or,
'I laughed my ass off.'
'That scene at the dock was cool.'
'The bit about meeting the woman at the bar knocked my dick in the dirt.'

That's enough for me. It'a all I ask for.
Do not give advice. You do not know what you are talking about.
Reactions work for me.

Big Projects

Well, it's been awhile since I've posted anything on this wildly popular blog. I have the twinge of an urge to do so now after watching a Frontline show on a proposal for an open pit copper/gold mine in Alaska. The CEO of the mining consortium lamented about the obstacles to executing 'big projects' brought on by people with environmental priorities. There's a stink of backroom scheming and dark alley salivating over profits behind these kind of proposals, however rational and considered are the concerns about 'coexisting' or 'making it work for all concerned'.

But that's not what I'm on about.

There is a subset of the population, in almost any field, where people are intoxicated by the idea of the Big Project. In my own field of science I've been around people who pushed for Big Science - ever larger, highly collaborative endeavors, across disciplines, involving large numbers of researchers in projects requiring huge amounts of money. They get delirious about these Big Science projects. Their eyes glaze over as they fantasize and proselitize about the many wonders and benefits that will rain down on all. Somehow they seem to think that good science will not get done without huge amounts of money, massive inputs of infrastructure, vast numbers of graduate students, all pumping out paper after paper - not to mention large amounts of PR. All the better to get more research funding.

Well, it's good to get students trained, and it's good to get research done and published. But face it, most research papers are garbage, and Big Science only increases the depth of the dump pile. It gets to be like a treadmill, and it's dubious how much value derives from the Big Project mentality.

It's really all about Big Prestige. With Big Prestige comes Big Funding, and with Big Funding comes more Big Projects, and with more Big Projects comes more Big Prestige.

Oh well...that's the way it is...it isn't pretty, and if one looks through history at the most elegant and insightful science one will see that little of it came from Big Projects.

It's a kind of sickness that has its roots in the bowels of the capitalist system and the marketplace. I see that as a problem.

Bigger is Better...

or not.