To celebrate National Poetry Month, today’s post will focus on the importance of poetry as a literary and artistic form. While I was a student at University, I was lucky enough to take a modern poetry class under the tutelage of Trinidadian-Bahamian poet Christian Campbell. As an ardent poetry lover (and sometimes, writer of poetry), I went into the class excited and curious. Poetry is often an underrated or underappreciated art, and I think this is because there is a correlation with shortness of length to lacking substance. A poem, generally, is much shorter than a novel, as well as maintaining an entirely different literary structure than prose.
One of the most important lessons I learned in Campbell’s class, however, is that the notion of poetry having less substance than prose is completely untrue. It is in fact due to the more limited space or stricter structures involved in poetry that each word used must be carefully chosen. Whether the poetry is focused on flow, rhythm, rhyme, or even abstraction, there is no room for superfluity.
My suggestion to you, whether you love poetry or are new to it, is to read a poem multiple times in order to come up with a profound interpretation of the meaning, feeling, or flow. This is because a word, cluster of words, or a sentence might take on duality or deeper meaning than what was initially thought. Another piece of advice that Campbell taught us is that poetry is meant to be read aloud in order to truly understand the flow and gravitas of a work.
To me, poetry is a way of commenting on a topic – be it social, political, historical, sentimental, introspective – while exploring the nuances of language in ways that we are unable to get in any other form of literature. It’s not just the meaning of the words, but the words themselves. The sound, the tangibility of the verbal and aural, the way we can utilize them so many different ways to evoke a myriad of emotions. The inherent conciseness of poetry is what makes it such an incredible form of writing; that a poet can spread awareness, analyze the human condition, can move us to tears or make us laugh, most importantly make us think, by using limited space and time.
Poetry can be found in so many different mediums, that I find we often forget. Spoken word, written poetry, plays, music, and visual art are just a few.
Some of my favourite modern poets are Derek Walcott, Seamus Heaney, Robert Lowell, Frank O’Hara (his collection Lunch Poems is pictured above), Gwendolyn Brooks (The Last Quatrain of the Ballad of Emmett Till, The Mother, and We Real Cool are works of genius) and Philip Larkin, who focus on diaspora, violence, colonialism, gender, society, locality, and politics. If you want to go further back there’s Shakespeare (Sonnet 130 is my all-time favourite), Sappho, Chaucer, or Beowulf. If you’re partial to epic poetry, read Milton’s Paradise Lost or Homer’s The Iliad. Shelley, Byron, Keats, Wordsworth give you the romantic; Swift, Pope, Montagu give you the satire; Whitman, Eliot, Yeats, Frost, Tennyson, Poe, Auden, Thomas give you modernism; the list can go on forever.
I’ll leave you with a link to a Def Poetry Jam playlist on YouTube. The HBO show Def Poetry Jam, hosted by rapper Mos Def, aired from 2002 until 2007, highlighting various diverse and extraordinarily talented spoken word poets. I highly recommend, for any of you readers, to watch at least one of these videos (be sure to check out Saul Williams’ Coded Language). Spoken word is astonishing because while the poetry is being read aloud, we are also able to visualize the actions and vulnerability of the speaker, which play a huge part in the work as a whole. Big names like Kanye West, Dave Chappelle, Jamie Foxx, Erykah Badu, Common, Tracy Morgan, Lauryn Hill, Alicia Keys, John Legend, and Wyclef Jean appeared on the show. Amidst these big names you might recognize notable poets, as well, or even become exposed to new artists. The beauty of Def Poetry Jam is that every single poet brings something innovative and important to the table. Give it a watch, and I promise you won’t be disappointed.
Whether you’re a poetry lover, have read only a little poetry, or none at all, I hope you leave feeling more interested or curious to explore this incredible art form. Be it in an anthology, a collection, online, in spoken word or in music, poetry is everywhere, and is a reminder that the power of words can be formidable.
~ Z ~
