Short Statement on Poetics--#4

[Lightning Rod]

What is poetry if not Word Music?

Words represent ideas but the words themselves are solid objects because they each have a Sound.

When we see a whole note written on a music staff, it means something, it describes pitch and duration but it doesn't have the same impact as when we hear the note played into the air. At that point it becomes a tangible thing and not just an idea. The little hairs inside your ears actually feel the vibration, they touch the note.

This same thing is true of words. They have more impact when they are heard from the air. They become tactile objects.

How a poem sounds is as important as what it means.
This is why nonsense rhyme works. It means nothing but we all remember slithey toves, the bandersnatch and ob-la-di-ob-la-da.

Final test of a poem---how does it SOUND?

[Doreen Peri]

Betty Boughta bought some butter
but she said, "This butter's bitter!
If I put it in my batter,
it will make my batter bitter!"
So she bought a bit o' butter
better than the bitter butter
put it in her bitter batter
made her bitter better better.
So 'twas better Betty Boughta
bought a bit o' better butter!

....

Oops! I'm givin away my act! Not to ruin the show or anything.

True dat, Lightnin! Poetry is Word Music.... i've said it for years.... but you said it better.

Ladidadida.
mi mi mi mi mi
bebop diddly doo!
i've got some pomes fer you!

[mtmynd]

many years ago i gave a local, published poet several of my poems. Asked if he'd read them in his spare time. He's a busy guy. About a month later or so I received the poems back in a mailed brown envelope with a note that said (among other things) "your writings sound more like songs than poetry."

I made a chapbook... years before the internet. Sold three, maybe four copies... $7.00 each. Good $$$ at the time. Gave the remaining six or so away.

I have a collection of this poet's books. I like his style.

"Thanks for the memories ..." Bob Hope

[hester_prynne]

I dunno LRod, for me everything has a beat, breathing in and out, walking, driving, sleeping, snoring, thinking.
It's all poetry of a sort, this life.

H

[stilltrucking]

Clay wrote:

Final test of a poem---how does it SOUND?

So you are saying it is your ears that make you a poet not your eyes?

I am getting pretty stupid in my old age, or something, or maybe it is synesthesia.

When I read "pink elephant" I see a pink elephant. When someone writes about peeling paint, I see peeling paint.

I suppose I am just a slave to to meaning and images.