Yeah. I do have some random thoughts and some observations about the inauguration of the 46th President of the United States. “Bully for you..” I hear. Yeah. “Take a number and have a seat.”
On Poetry:
For a little while (week? ten days?) poetry will be all over the place. CNN will regurgitate one or two lines of a brilliantly yellow-clad strong and fragile songbird’s work ad nauseum. Little girls will run for their ebook sellers, some will even dash into a -gasp- library. The ‘influencers’ will be rhyming like crazy, hip hop and rap will make a teensy bit more headway on the pop charts. Perhaps Dylan Thomas will be temporarily wheeled in from the mortuary halls of academe’. (Where art goes to die…LOL) Maybe even Arthur Rimbaud can struggle back? He has a definite appeal to the young and he tells their story with his tragic/romantic/emotional life. He was cute as a button, in the same way that Ms. Gorman is! I can hear the clicking of one million virtual keyboards, right now. Poetry is sexy of a sudden. Poetry is on the mind of movers, in the wiggle of shakers. Think ‘Tik and Tok’. A young, very traditionally good looking woman who reads very well and conducts herself with elegance in a public setting has been chosen Poet Laureate of the U.S. and she read to the nation, the world from her work. Just like that, poetry is famous.
My brother accused me of ‘puffery’ when I wrote that my resume could now include ‘Featured Soloist’ because my name appeared in the church bulletin. …but it was true! I was an advertised soloist at St. Mark’s! I was a feature of the program. Yes. I, too was a yellow-clad songbird for a moment. I strode up to the podium and jotted the fact down in my curriculum vitae. Puffery? Indeed not…er um. Well, yeah. In the same way that calling myself a featured soloist is puffery, so is CNN’s calling Amanda Gorman ‘the first youth Poet Laureate of the United States’. It is puffery that many of the TV newscasters swoon at the words she read. Sorry, Youth Poet Laureate isn’t a first. It is only a first because there is no such category. In fact, the young woman discussed is 22 years of age and has graduated Harvard. She isn’t a ‘youth’ anymore, really. She is young, yes but she is not a youth. Her poetry, ‘brilliant’…? Her poetry is maybe of Laureate quality but perhaps capable is a better description and puffery the word for the week. Uh oh.
I think few read or respect poetry. I used to do. I was drawn to the flame by the seductiveness of the idea of living an important creative life. Reading journals from the capitols of the art world in my distant, isolated heart of America got me caught up in a then-current well spoken of mystique. The beats were ‘in’. The poets were cool. Greenwich Village, Emma Goldman, Pete Seeger, Laurence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan – I was impressed by and took seriously. Their images, ideas and depth changed art and politics for the better, I thought. It meant something to me to wander in and be thrilled by the dark garden paths of Edgar Allen Poe or the sado-masochistic boudoir of Franz Kafka. I read Steinback cover to cover and delighted in meaning. All of those folks’ work was in the limelight of the hour. From far away and nowhere, I could sense a something extra. Intriguing. I wanted to be a part of it, the viral scene that was spreading. I knew I would be an enriched human being… if I could only understand what the H was going on. “…ah sweet mystery of life (I’ll never find thee)”.
So, the jazz, classical and folk (now ‘roots’) music that shadowed the alleys of ‘The Village’ was ‘better’, more important music than popular music. The poetry of Ginsberg/Rimbaud/Verlaines/Plath/e.e. Cummings, the short stories of O. Henry were serious art. All of that set fire to my soul. I struggled through some of it, enjoyed viscerally some of it and prided myself on my choices. I made up my mind what to expect from good, well crafted, insightful art. I developed a standard. I was drawn in by an image. That image was partly created by the popular press. That image was partly created by the elites of education. (the critics the academics) The press and the learned voices helped steer me to my beliefs about creative art. I made my analyses by that guidance.
I don’t read poetry much anymore, don’t follow music as well as I wish I did. I am a bit lazy. It is hard work to sift through the respected poets (thinking Pablo Neruda/Phillip Larkin as examples) so I am one of the masses who don’t read poetry. I know they are great, I can smell it, I read reviews, people I respect say so. Also, I can see the difference between their work and the work of folks like (new, young, fresh, capable, educated, accomplished) Amanda Gorman. I know the difference from my experience but I don’t read poetry much anymore. I don’t have the kind of deep education that you need to pack as a lunch when you travel to the library and I know it.
The fawning talking heads don’t read or, I should say haven’t read poetry, either. It is obvious to my understanding of what constitues great poetry. Those expressing astonishment at the ‘utter brilliance’ of what is an ‘all the right words’ banality reveal this. Yeah. I think ‘The Hill We Climb’ is banal. Wow. What an asshole I am. My reasons for thinking and saying so are many. A look at the text reveals a whole lotta platitudes. Oooops. My bad. ‘norms’? in an original poem that is heralded as art? Becoming light? The title ‘The Hill We Climb’ itself is simplistic metaphor. It is a capable piece and well written. True. There is another truth. The language is common, the depth a surface one that I could swim in without fear. I probably wouldn’t even get wet. Am I making stunning criticisms or an open-minded assessment? Who am I to talk, since I don’t read much anymore? Well, I used to read and I criticize my own poetry in exactly the same terms.
I would guess that the press is the birthplace and nursery of hyperbole because it is supported by advertising, kept alive on euphemism or cheerful, fact disguising claims. “New” “Improved” “Better Waste Management” (that’s garbage disposal) Shit. It is in the best interests of the media to whip up excitement, to drive the buffalo into the pound and over the cliff. That is how multimillion dollar organizations pay the bills. It is how political parties gain power. It is how art gets diluted and used. How about one little platitude more, “..putting lipstick on the pig.” The pig is still a pig and the poem is still uninspiring, no matter how it’s puffed up. This is a thing I know.
I got an ad for poetry books in my Facebook Newsfeed this morning. I ignored it, just as the many thousands or millions of other scrollers will and did. For a while there will be a rush on bookstores and a shortage of writing paper. People will see that poetry gets you the girls — for a while. The respected poets and the majestic ones will be read again — for a while.But hyperbole…calling a thing something it isn’t will pop. The spotlight will reveal cracks, faults, reveal puffery when the real thing finds it’s way out. Overstatement by the press is the first step in pricking Ms. Gorman’s poetry fame bubble. For a little while, little girls and boys across America will be drawn in to poetry. Ms. Gorman looks young, like them and is being feted. “Hey, I want to do that, I want to be her, poetry looks easy..” They will discover something they have not seen. In short time, folks will step away from believing that they, too could be beautiful, articulate, measured Poet Laureates. When Charles Bukowski starts getting compared to Amanda Gorman, folks will say to themselves, “Whoa…I don’t think so…” and go back to Beverly Hillbillies re-runs and McDonald’s meals.
Robert On The Air 