Poetry's Inadequacy

[e_dog]

has a poem ever truly expressed the emotions that motivate it? I doubt it, even for the master poets, it doesn't seem that any poems can convey the depth of feeling of such passions as love, hate, horror, pride, etc. That is not to say valiant efforts haven't been made, and it is not to say that poems cannot express a great deal, but some remainder of reality is left out, the ineffible, not because it is a feeling or thought or event that is obscure and uncommon, but rather because it's too intense and profound for words.

[stilltrucking]

Say what?

have you ever had a post you were dieing to make but there was no place to put it?

"i too have drunk and seen the spider"

tweak testosterone and gasoline
and adrenlin going sour
viet nam vet with a silver star hat, yellow shield with a horsey on it, they used to ask him at work "have you killed anyone"
and he would answer "not today"

http://www.smilingjacky.com/13.htm

[perezoso]

has a poem ever truly expressed the emotions that motivate it? I doubt it, even for the master poets, it doesn't seem that any poems can convey the depth of feeling of such passions as love, hate, horror, pride, etc.

Herr E-Hund is sounding a bit like a traditional expressionist here. I would agree to some extent, with stipulations. The poem is certainly not the emotion or sensation itself, nor does it necessarily convey the emotion or perception or thought to another person.


Yet a master scribe such as Shakespeare, who composed poems for various occasions, might not share or even experience the sensation he is writing about; say a Bard writes poems for a wedding ( epithlanium) and yet does it for cash. But in reality he despises the couple.

Is there any way to measure the poem's authenticity or verify if the poet is tellng the truth about his own thoughts and mental "schema"? I think not. In fact most naive readers of poetry seeing the first person "I" in poem immediately think, "oh he or she's expressing his inner-most feelings," yet that is obviously not necessarily true. Narcissism is a problem with much, if not most, literature and art anyways.

An expressionist theory is workable to some extent, but I think the real writer has to ask "what are the most important things I should write about?" (Or he is taught that.) It may not be simply personal confession ala Plath or some of the Beats: Perhaps there is a duty to write about historical and economic events, about war and technology, about poverty, about corruption and NOT about self, except in relation to much weightier social phenomena-- my own view is that poetry cannot do that anyways, indeed Michael Moore, however flawed, or 60 minutes, non-fiction, or documentaries and photojournalism might be much more effective methods of communication than literature......

[Zlatko Waterman]

The question of self expression is only one question, and not necessarily the most important one, for a poet. A public poet ( like Allen Ginsberg in some of his work) might, coincidentally or deliberately, seem to speak for some of the population at large, as in "Wichita Vortex Sutra." The question of prophecy is a separate one. Ginsberg and Whitman both spoke about "their country" in rather broad, "prophetic" ways.

But Perezoso brings up an important point in affirming that poems are not emotions, nor do they "contain" emotions, the word "emotions" being richly metaphorical by itself, of course. Here I don't wish to wax post-structuralist.

To be briefer than Polonius, I hope.

On the material level, "emotions" or "feelings" are electro-chemical processes. As Hamlet says ( Bill being inserted into the discussion by Perezoso . . .), " . . .thinking makes it so . . ." The outcome, or "so" is how we frame the meaning that emerges from a poem, be it an expression of love, passion, hate or whatever. We usually do this framing with more words, if we do it at all.

Pictures of feeling, as the Elizabethans would have called them, whether poems, paintings, songs or exempla from other media, depend on their receiver to evoke emotions.

Poems and most other art media fall short, as Poe argued, because their ability to conjure their effects is so transitory. Hence his postulate that a poem or story ought to be digestible in one sitting.

You may both argue with these brief observations, of course. I don't pretend to "know" how poetry works on people. Emily Dickinson said she knew she was in the presence of poetry when she "felt the entire top of her head" was taken off. Nabokov said the reading of poetry and fiction ought to be done "with the spine."

These are visceral metaphors. Since I prefer poetry to be somewhat visceral, their measurement appeals to me. But is "The Dunciad" visceral? Certainly the bludgeoning of fools in Pope's poem is effective.

But words and phrases like "effective" and "it works" depend on the reader. I can capriciously claim to have been "moved" by a work of art the same as I can claim to have heard or seen angels.

Nice topic, discussion and observations, e-dog.



Zlatko

[perezoso]

On the material level, "emotions" or "feelings" are electro-chemical processes. As Hamlet says ( Bill being inserted into the discussion by Perezoso . . .), " . . .thinking makes it so . . ." The outcome, or "so" is how we frame the meaning that emerges from a poem, be it an expression of love, passion, hate or whatever. We usually do this framing with more words, if we do it at all.

Tan romantico! Padre ZlatCo waxes empirical. I agree tentatively, though of course in Shakespeare's time the Neo-Platonists would have objected to this reading; the meaning --only apparent to other classically-educated aristocratic men--somehow referred to -- and indeed partook in-- a transcendent realm of Forms: Beauty, Reason, Justice, etc. Though I object to platonic idealism I think there are still grounds for holding to some view on "agency"--your reading, and framing, of Hamlet is going to be a bit more accurate than a 16 yr old skater punk's reading, interpretation, and framing. One must learn the language of literature.

Poems and most other art media fall short, as Poe argued, because their ability to conjure their effects is so transitory. Hence his postulate that a poem or story ought to be digestible in one sitting.

Though I respect Poe's critical writings immensely, I am not sure I would agree to this. Crime and Punishment is not digestible in one sitting, yet I hardly think it is less powerful (to the cognoscenti) than say, The Raven, or any short poem you want to name. Hemingway, I think it is fair to say, believed this to some degree--and an immaculate short story such as Soldier's Home is at least as powerful as any second-rate novel by say Irwin Shaw or somebody......

[Zlatko Waterman]

Or "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place", which shines luminously beside the best poems . . .



--Z

[mousey1]

"has a poem ever truly expressed the emotions that motivate it?"

Oh ya, I do it all the time!!!!!! GAG GAG SPEW SPEW

You get as close as you can....and that's half.....nay, all the fun!

Some things are just completely inexpressible in the verbal. That look of adoration in a loved ones eyes, for innistance, hard to pin down no? with mere words. You'll come close, but no cigar, some things you just got to see to truly feel, actually experience in order to get the full savour.

"The eyes provide a text of their own....."(Rosenblatt)

Anyway, you can only take a poem at face value(I think). The reader's gonna walk away from it with his or her emotions expressed, if their lucky, very unlikely, very rarely, will you ever come close to really getting what the poem poser was on about. And yes, some valiant efforts, the really good writers, can bring us awfully close to experiencing their truth.

Off the top of my head, this poem comes pretty close for me: "The Forsaken" by Duncan Campbell Scott. Made me weepy. What motivated him, I have my ideas, he sure nailed the emotions tho, imho.

Anyway, just my undeep opinion on da subject.

And thanks for askin'.

[Lightning Rod]

from my book--Inktricks


MY BEST POEMS
I ALWAYS FORGET


Even a Poet great as I
can't sell you the best poems

they are free
and all around

anyway my best poems
I always forget.

the best poems fly from words
elusive as what makes
a woman's charm
subtle as the tilt of a nose

they lean in the shadows
like latent vandals then
disappear in a blink
fine as the sun on spider web dew
quick
as the soul takes snapshots
they hover like bouquets
about old and certain
trees in brandy night
in brief, forgotten smells
and muffled, distant sounds

poems on paper seem to me
like fireflies in a jar
caught by Poets like dirty little
boys for pets
but the brightest ones are
also the fastest
and my best poems
I always forget
no matter how deft with
my metaphor
or deadly with my epithet
an epic might last half a second
so my best poems
I always forget

So I went and confronted
God
the Main Man
BIG CHEESE
and of course this always
angers the old thud
so he riled and then
comforted me
for being such a miserable
weak
mutherfucker
and then the sombitch.......
forgave me again!
just to prove he was God
I bet
And still my best poems
I always forget

So it rains in twisted loads
of hellious yellow
in my imagination a vague
& feverous vision:
my breath against your
tender neck breaks
in a moist and floral
dawn
while the cock & the sunrise
play a duet
and the best of my poems
I always forget
like gingerbread Kremlins
with spinning minarets
all my best images
I tend to let slip
I guess it's my Karma
some romantic debt
My very best poems
I always forget

[perezoso]

(this is not meant as a criticism of your poem, L-rod, but refers to the earlier posts)

There seemed to be an agreement that poetry and literature cannot be relied upon as a means of effective communication. I don't care to say it, but I am beginning to think literature is, for the most part, useless, except as hedonism, entertainment, or a somewhat shallow portrayal of political and psychological issues. Heart of Darkness is powerful , yet what is far more powerful is reading about the actual horrors of the Belgian congo. Hemingways depictions of war are moving; reading the battle history is much more sickening. A Dreiser's or Fitzgerald's or Chandler's cities are corrupt and dazzling and full of brutality; the historical reality is worse and has the added merit of being true.

So the question is somewhat hypothetical: does a revolutionary group--comprised of say marxists, greens, and technologists, maybe some disgruntled medical students--raze the literature departments of colleges ? What about theology departments? Philosophy? Art? What is left after mind and spirit and God have been removed, after the ghost has been eradicated (thankfully): pretty much the physical sciences, technology, math, perhaps history, economics, perhaps logic , and behavioral sciences..... Harsh, but true

The agrarians might protest-- universities should be next to factories, the fields, shops; perhaps the student-workers after a day's work can stage plays or play beethoven or be- bop, yet they are skilled workers, not aesthetes.....

or ya could just find yr 707 and pilot it into a skyscraper

[e_dog]

we keep returning to the question of the value of literature or the humanities for revolution or social justice -- ask yourself this, perezoso how many revolutionary or leftist thinkers do you find in econ depts. or engineering or physics in comparison to literature and art and philosophy?

your pal Georg Lukacs was inter alia a literary theorist of the novel. Marx, trained as a philosopher. Che Guevara, wrote poetry in his early years. Subcommandante Marcos was a philosophy prof. by most accounts. the list goes on. where would french radicalism be without surrealism and other arts n literature movements (situationism being an offspring, etc.) not to mention the (perhaps even much more effective, activist) role of liberation theology of the latin american or the american black christian sort. when these are the produce of the arts and sciences of "spirit" why are you so eager to be Geistlos?

literarature can be a lense through which we see or a way of being attuned to real historical phenomena: for example, Kafka and Orwell are i think good exemplars of the sorts of tendencies of modern bureacracies and governance, law and war, that can throw some light on real developments to highlight issues.

[perezoso]

your pal Georg Lukacs was inter alia a literary theorist of the novel. Marx, trained as a philosopher

Marx repudiated philosophy, nearly completely; he detested idealism, and admitted that the dialectic was only an explanatory model, not some massive structure of transcendent Reason or God. Yes, he starts with philosophy, but his ideas are empiricist--in Die Heilige Familie he admits his project is based on material causality as was Hobbes'--and then of course he takes on political economy, not as philosopher, but as a critic of economics. He wanted to be read in the economic tradition=--though opposed to it--of Adam Smith, Ricardo, Malthus.

Marx was not discussing ethics or metaphysics, or logic--he's making arguments about commodities, how value and prices are set, about labor and management, about finance and speculation. Capital is pretty boring to literary types--and that's my point. Lit. types don' t want to do the dirty work of econ, or history or science--they want the romantic struggle but not the detailed analysis and solutions.

Marx's project does have errors--and of course the historical application of marxism is quite f-n awful-- and is primitive in many aspects, as were Lukacs' ideas. The depiction of the class struggle is quite questionable, as is the labor theory of value.

A current problem is that there aren't enough leftist or green economists, people that who can see the absurdities of speculation or money markets, or corporations, or the exchanges. There are liberal or leftist Keynesians who also questioned capitalism and the free markets as well. Its the dismal science to be sure, but it has to be dealt with, and poetry isn't going to be of much avail when analyzing the oil or agricultural markets................though I will agree realist and naturalist writers such as Dresier, noir guys such as Hammett, or EL Doctorow, perhaps later hyperrealists such as Pynchon may perform an educational function.

[Zlatko Waterman]

Art is, I would argue, more than an ornament on society.

Napoleon may have been right that diplomacy comes only at the point of a gun, but art, freed of the necessity to put food on the table and cultivate the clods ( bumptious pun intended), can liberate the mind the way Richard Feynmann's raptures over sub-atomic physics became their own sort of poetry. The highest mathematics approaches poetry. So does deep-space astrophysics.

Here's an interesting swatch describing Feynman which, for me, also describes good poetry-- that is, poetry in which the "planes land":


(paste)


"Relentless Pursuit of Knowledge

Above all, in and out of science, Dr. Feynman was a curious character -his phrase, and the double meaning was intentional. He was never content with what he knew or what other people knew. He taught himself how to fix radios, pick locks, draw nudes, speak Portuguese, play the bongos and decipher Mayan hieroglyphics. He pursued knowledge without prejudice, studying the tracking ability of ants in his bathtub and learning enough biology to study the mutation of bacteriophages.

In his youth he experimented for months with trying to observe his unraveling stream of consciousness at the point of falling asleep; in his middle age he experimented with inducing out-of-body hallucinations in a sensory-deprivation tank.

But Dr. Feynman was no mystic, and he despised all kinds of fake learning, particularly pseudo-science. In that category he placed a good part of modern psychology, calling it ''cargo cult science.''

Certain Pacific islanders, he explained, wanted the cargo planes to keep returning after World War II was over. So they made runways, stationed a man with wooden headphones and bamboo for antennas, lighted some fires and waited for the planes to land.

It is the same, he said, with cargo cult scientists. ''They follow all the apparent precepts and forms of scientific investigation, but they're missing something essential because the planes don't land.''

For Dr. Feynman, the planes almost always landed. "

( end paste)


It's easy to romanticize away the ( for me) necessity to make sense with poetry and art in general. The mystical raptures in which some artists claim to work no doubt are partially effective.

I suppose that, for me, the best poetry is the infused mixture of the real and solid with the dreamlike.


Zlatko

[e_dog]

say more about this Feynmann fellow, will ya?

also, doreen's apt to get mad if you don't credit the excerpt you quoted (or is this rule only applicable to visual pictures, i don't know).

[perezoso]

Before you wade into Feynmann's system, man, you might want to review your Special and General Relativity, the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum physics, and perhaps some Heisenburg, as well as of course integration.

Feynmann, certainly an interesting and brilliant person, was a physicist and professor at Cal Tech, who also dabbled in the arts--

[e_dog]

sounds intriguing.