I disagree. I believe that a lot of the people who write poems do it because they also love reading poems, and further, people exist who love to read poems without attempting to write any of their own. It might not be so wide a market as popular fiction, but there is a market for poetry. Not that there aren’t scams, and people who only care about getting a slice of recognition for themselves, but the real deal is out there, too.

I had the same experience with those stupid poetry competitions. It’s like, so you learn about poetry in high school, and it’s really impressive stuff, it’s a way of using words to make big deep sounds and actually communicate things that words normally seem to glide over. So you start writing a bit, and join a poetry study group or whatever, and receive some encouragement. And then yeah I wrote in to one of those “contests” and felt so insulted when it came back asking me if I wanted to buy a book with my poem in.

I don’t think poetry in general is merely vanity though. I mean there’s a lot of vanity surrounding poetry, but like Julia said there is the real deal too. I tend to read the same things over and over so I don’t get so much exposure to different contemporary poets, but there is some good stuff out there.

There was talk a while ago about a blogmass creative zine. I wonder if people would still be interested in that. I know I really loved the zines that people made and handed around in high school.

I liked your description of discovering poetry, Erika.

You’ve engaged in a bit of hyperbole, Nate. Doesn’t the internet change that rather significantly? Or does “anyone” have to be “strangers?”

HB: I don’t consider what I wrote to be hyperbole. I grant that I may be wrong, but I do not intend it to be exaggeration.

The internet, if anything, is aiding the death of poetry, in my opinion. Where are the popular poem memes? Who are the popular poet bloggers? Oh, there are poem memes and poet bloggers, but their readership is infinitesimal compared to the things that truly belong to the zeitgeist. Movies, discussion of movies, videos, animations, illustrations, comics, brief essays, articles, debates - these are alive. Poetry is not. It’s not extinct, but it is largely irrelevant.

I certainly do not mean that there is not “good stuff” out there, or that great poetry is not being written. I think it’s likely that, in a certain sense, some of the best poetry in history is being composed right now. The problem is that it doesn’t matter any more.

Erika: the idea sounds interesting to me. I agree, too, with hb’s appreciation of your description of discovering poetry.

When did poetry ever matter? How many poets have ever been able to put food on the table with poetry? I’m sure the Sonnets got around even in his day, but Shakespeare himself survived by selling tickets to the bloodbath — and, with any luck, ennobled a few souls into the bargain. But I doubt so many were showing up for the pretty words.

The history of professional poets is largely one of private patronage, of wealthy benefactors & poet laureates. And not since the teeming masses have been elevated to literacy and allowed more participation into the “zeitgeist” that gets recorded for posterity have many poets thrown around much weight. I’m not sure how many did even before.

You can still find very good published poetry, but its writers generally support themselves with professorships or novel-writing. And their audience, I suspect, — judging, at least, by the continued interest in poetry in high-brow magazines alongside short fiction and long-form journalism — is larger than it’s ever been, both in real terms and as a percentage of the population (though much, much smaller as a percentage of the literate population). And on the whole, this is probably a positive historical development for the practical sustainability of poets.

Allow me to recommend “The Correspondence School Instructor Says Goodbye to His Poetry Students” by Galway Kinnell.

“And their audience, I suspect, — judging, at least, by the continued interest in poetry in high-brow magazines alongside short fiction and long-form journalism — is larger than it’s ever been, both in real terms and as a percentage of the population (though much, much smaller as a percentage of the literate population).”

Journals printing poetry doesn’t mean people are reading it, actually. Publishers don’t make money off of poetry that’s not written by Jewel, but they do fear a loss of prestige if they leave off printing it. Ditto the “high-brow magazines.”

What role might music have in the decline of the popularity of poetry? I suspect the decline happened as recorded or broadcast music became more readily availablie. At some point, instead of people sitting around reading Shakespeare to each other, they turned on the radio or put on a record. While this may seem like downgrading, the lyrics to some songs appear to me just as poetical as any poem. Poetry more so than any other literary form is meant to be heard, and it was also common for poems to be published with accompanying sheet music. Though a song is different in kind from a poem, many of them still manage to use language in sublime ways.

I’d go further than Missy by claiming that popular music is poetry, and seems now more than ever matter to a great many people. That we think of poetry as something to be read and not heard is a modern confusion. It’s not for nothing that we have a species known as “lyric poetry”, even if the guitar is a more common companion these days.

After all, if it’s as poetical as any poem, what cause have we to deny it that name?

Jess,

Surely you are right, and surely it is true that purchases of any sort cannot guarantee consumption. For all any of us can say, perhaps hardly anybody reads a word of most of the magazines they buy. It certainly seems likely that the total number of words read is vastly smaller than the total number of words purchased.

But my suspicion was wholly personal and anecdotal: through an unusual turn of chance, I’m currently receiving weekly or monthly mailings from five popular magazines; you’ve heard of all of them; 3/5 publish poetry in every issue (one of the remaining 2/5 is a science magazine, the other political and economic); and I do, personally, read them (though not all of them), and sometimes find in conversation that others have, too. Maybe my experience is very peculiar, but there it is.

This is an unrigorously justified position, but my point was that the other one is, too. And I wonder if the other is not something like those concerning the sizes of the rocks our grandfathers could heave over their heads. I’m ever suspicious that the sky is falling. I would not be at all surprised to learn that even of the very small percentage of people who read such magazines, a still smaller fraction read the poetry; I just don’t see reason to expect that more did or would have in some earlier, golden age of literacy. The poet used to seek patronage from the duke or lord; now he seeks it from the university writer’s workshop. In almost no case is he living off public enthusiasm for his craft.

Robbie,

Thanks for weighing in on this.

This is an unrigorously justified position, but my point was that the other one is, too. And I wonder if the other is not something like those concerning the sizes of the rocks our grandfathers could heave over their heads. I’m ever suspicious that the sky is falling.

Yes, certainly! I don’t have any problem with your bringing an unrigorously justified position to the table, just as I hope you won’t blame me for bringing my own initially; I took your riposte to be a perfectly interesting and useful response to my own perception, both of which are necessarily limited in rigor. I’m hoping our ability to sometimes say broad, sweeping things that are necessarily risky but quite possibly true isn’t being called into question.

To segue into Missy and Odious’s points, I should make clear that the dour tone of my post is not because I think civilization is going to hell in a handbasket due to the passing of poetry, merely that I am personally saddened by its diminution. I like poetry a lot. I like writing it; I like reading it. I find, though, that I have a tremendously underdeveloped appetite for its regular consumption. I have a stable of favorite poems, but do not regularly ingest much that’s new. I know many people like me, that similarly have a kind of knack for poetry (don’t think I’m claiming too much, here; merely some kind of native ability for engagement), but have what seems to me to be a characteristically small place for actual poetic life built into our days and weeks. And we’re the ones who stand out in almost any group for really liking poetry!

Music is definitely part of the zeitgeist, and Missy and Odious are right, I think, to claim its similarities to poetry. It’s not exactly the same, though—lyrics are not a song, as much as they are an integral part of it. A kind of poetry has certainly been subsumed into what is a successful democratic enterprise: the writing of three-minute songs. I think this is great, and not necessarily inferior to having pure poetry in a similar position. I just don’t happen to be as much a part of it, and find it sad to have the particular strengths of non-musical poetry fading away.

My sense of the publishing of poems in magazines and journals is what Jess pointed out. Your experience, Robbie, is certainly contrary to that. I think, rather than argue about how many people you represent, I’d rather just note that I’m jealous. What you describe sounds great.

I am a poet and a teacher of poetry and I have found this discussion quite interesting. I advise my students to write first for themselves, for that audience is prime. Yes, the US has never honored the poet as much as they do in other cultures, where poetry and politics and the power of the spoken word seem to matter more. I say there is a resurgence going on - poetry slams, interest in Rumi, the contemporary humorist and poet, Billy Collins. However, it will never be honored and appreciated as much as it deserves. Poetry has the power to transform and to heal. Poetry will not die, although it may go underground - and emerge in lyrics, in experimental works, etc.

Here is one of my favorite quotations about poetry: “Poetry is a tool, a net or a trap to catch the present; a sharp edge; a medicine; or the little awl that unties knots.” Gary Snyder

And here is a joke birthed at a workshop I attended sponsored by the National Association for Poetry Therapy:

Q: How many poets does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: None. Part of the beauty of poetry is its willingness to embrace the darkness, and of course, in this brave move, it generates its own light.
credit Jonathan Young for that one.

Lisa

Just anecdotally, I first discovered Billy Collins when I heard him reading some of his stuff on A Prairie Home Companion one Saturday night many years ago. I became mildly obsessed with him for awhile, and was able to purchase - via the mail - an audio CD of his poems. Some were recorded in a studio, but some were performed in front of a live audience, where his wit and timing were really showcased. I think I would say that his writing of poetry had a definite influence on my writing of lyrics and how I approach pre-song banter in live settings. I do think it was important that I HEARD him first. Part of my trouble with finding new (to me) poetry is that I don’t really want to discover it in a book or The New Yorker. I want to listen to a beautiful woman recite it under the shade of a big tree on a spring afternoon. I know Collins is on the “lighter” side, but I think this principle holds with much poetry. I never cared for Shakespeare until I heard it spoken well.