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Do you like poetry?

Do you like poetry?

  • I love it.

    Votes: 14 34.1%
  • I hate it.

    Votes: 6 14.6%
  • It's okay, I guess.

    Votes: 7 17.1%
  • Some poems I really like, Some I don't like.

    Votes: 14 34.1%

  • Total voters
    41

Ivy

Strongly Ambivalent
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Apr 18, 2007
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Love it. I don't think loving it means I have to love every poem ever written, though, so I didn't bother clicking the fourth option even though it's also true for me.
 

GZA

Resident Snot-Nose
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Def Poetry Jam is an awesome show!

I like some poetry, but not others. I almost never like poetry that doesn't rhyme... so most of the poetry I like is in the form of song lyrics (and music gives it a second and even third dimension to the work, anyway). I said "sometimes I like poetry".
 

INA

now! in shell form
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Jun 6, 2008
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I feel exactly the same way (bolded part).

So I am not alone in this. nice.
I will say though that it is possible I have just not heard the really good slam poetry sessions. Come to think of it, the ones I have heard were amateurs, not established poets.
 

The Ü™

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If there were poems about me, then I'm sure I'd like those poems.
 

Eileen

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I like smart poetry that has layers that you can pull back... plays on words, carefully placed symbols, perfect metaphors... I love the economy of language in a great poem, and the way that a great poem can be like a puzzle.

The poetry that I tend to loathe is that which just spills over with words and overt statements (especially of love or despair). It has no skill about it, no cleverness. I like clever poetry.
 

Ivy

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I always like to characterize what I consider to be crappy poetry with this line from Shelley's "Ode to the West Wind":

Percy Wusshe Shelley said:
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!

Not all of Shelley is this bad, btw.
 

INA

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"Dancing is a disease
because it makes me weak in the knees"
:dont: Deep brah
 

Eileen

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I don't much like slam poetry for its quality of poetry-ness, but I respect the performance aspect of it and when freestyling is involved, I can be impressed by that.

It's because I am a teacher, but also because he's really pretty good, that I enjoy Taylor Mali:

YouTube - Taylor Mali on what teachers make
 

Geoff

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I always like to characterize what I consider to be crappy poetry with this line from Shelley's "Ode to the West Wind":



Not all of Shelley is this bad, btw.

I grew up in the road he lived in, with she of Frankenstein fame. Only recently did I realise that this is why it was called Shelley Road!

You are right though about the over dramatic romanticism.
 

Jasz

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i answered "love it" but actually like some, not all.
if longer than 15-20 lines i lose interest
there are some that i really like and appreciate though
 

pure_mercury

Order Now!
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Feb 28, 2008
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6,946
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I write poems and songs occasionally. This is a poem I wrote last autumn.

"Drowning in place"

Here I am again,
pocketful of happiness,
bottles of love.

Disappearance is a virtue,
Jean Renoir on mute.
How many angels fit on the head of a syringe?
I lost count again.

Thinking of you,
thought goes to bed.
Sports and music and politics,
all the trappings of the integrated: gone.

My reel runs out in bliss,
a valediction to the pain which I no longer deem necessary.
 

SillySapienne

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No, I haven't. I've only seen amateurs. Who would you consider to be a 'good quality' slam poet?
Ani DiFranco.

And to be honest, I just watch Def Poetry Jam and some of the slam poets, (whom I don't know by name) startle me with their passion and *insight*.
 

INA

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Maybe I don't like being startled with passion like that :coffee:
- sincerely,
cold british fish
 

Ivy

Strongly Ambivalent
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I was a hater before I actually watched a DPJ episode. It was really impressive. It's not beatnik snap poetry or spoiled brat whining. It's really quite cool. Like Eileen says it's more performance than poetry (I don't think most of it would translate well to the page) but that's one aspect of poetry.

Poetry is really hard to define, especially when you consider that a lot of prose has poetic elements. I had to define it in a 6th grade language arts book a year or so ago and it was a real bitch. I think I eventually settled on something like "Poetry is the artful arrangement of words in a way that expresses a concept or feeling," but IMO that doesn't really hit it.
 

Eileen

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Poetry is really hard to define, especially when you consider that a lot of prose has poetic elements. I had to define it in a 6th grade language arts book a year or so ago and it was a real bitch. I think I eventually settled on something like "Poetry is the artful arrangement of words in a way that expresses a concept or feeling," but IMO that doesn't really hit it.


I usually go with "writing that uses the line as a unit of composition."
 
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