On Verse Versus Not
Not to give too much of my new book away, because after all, I do want you to spend five bucks to buy your own copy in order to support my extravagant lifestyle of living in a three hundred square foot bus, I thought I’d share with you the very first poem and its format from “A Narrow Painted Road.”
My intent with this book is to educate and entertain and provoke, but we start light.
I call this, “an adventurous collection of provocative poetry as a colorful social art form.” I know some of the poems in this collection will challenge your perception of what is normal. Are you up to it?
Each of the seventy-one poems in this collection follows this format (advice, image, poem, essay) after sharing a brief “field guide” to understanding poetry where we explore poetic terms and italicize them wherever they’re used in the remainder of the book.
By the way, I realize nobody reads a book of poetry in a single sitting, no different from how most people take days, or even weeks to read a novel.
Poems are bite-size chunks of literary license that make for sensible reading in bed or on the throne. I get it, and I’m okay with that.
Someday someone could carry this little book to another planet while starting a new colony. This might even become the pivotal encyclopedia of human vagaries. I’d be okay with that too.
This first verse begins chapter one (of eighteen) entitled, “Of Poets and Other Writers.”
Please remember you’re supposed to be enjoying this. Otherwise, go do something else. Please.
On Verse Versus Not
Author’s advice: Let’s have some fun by kicking off this collection with a poem about poetry written by a novelist. If you read or write prose, you know poetry is so very different.
If you are like me, you will delight in poking at these differences with a curious finger, and your eyes might then lead your brain to do the same—to give you the curious finger.
I had fun penning this verse, sometimes with my tongue embedded in my cheek (the left one).
Before proceeding, might I suggest you grab a properly steeped cup of English breakfast tea? Or perhaps you prefer something stronger. I like coffee—strong.
Ready? Go!
On Verse Versus Not
I am much more prone to pen verse, versus prose, these days.It fascinates me to taste the myriad ways
poets must say so much more with much less,
I’d like to think no more cleverly obsessed
than me…
or than you.
It’s curious what draws me to this unique brand of insanity.
Is scrawling my novels at length as dubious a vanity?
Why not, I say loudly to you? Is it not frivolous to think
that songwriters, poets, like singers, don’t tread close to the brink
of light…
or her foe?
Look, my obsessed friends, don’t you gaze hypnotized,
a haunted scribe writes, and you drink, still surprised
by terse verse that slams you with rhythm or some rhyme,
that sustains, so immune to razor ravages of time,
of heart…
or of trivia?
Re- joice
our voice!
Poet’s Notes: On Verse Versus Not
I practice Transcendental Meditation. TM helps me tap creative resources that would otherwise remain inaccessible. The image that introduces this poem captures my resonant optimism as I emerge from a deep meditative state. Did you notice the coffee stain? Caffeine helps too. More to be said about that later.
I was meditating early one morning outside Newport in coastal Oregon, thinking of my new friend and acclaimed poet, John Sibley Williams, my muse of verse.
I come from a tradition of writing prose. Narrative is complex, poetry even more so, and I believe the latter may be the ultimate written and spoken art form. The wonder of it all consumes me.
So I wanted to play with asymmetry in stanzas and typography. For example, the last stanza reflects and reinforces the extreme brevity of poetry versus prose, and that poetry provides unique advantages over prose, such as the art of the line. Content integrates with form.
Likewise, the first three stanzas do something not possible in any other word-based art form: they explore the shape of words in lines—every last line of each of these stanzas comprises precisely three words, and each line preceding those, just two words, fading into ellipses. What does that mean? Ask that of your own imagination. Perhaps it satisfies a subtle desire for spatial symmetry. I don’t know for sure. I just work here.
Poetry, at least some if it, is fun to read or listen to the sounds it creates. It can be even more fun to write if you’re motivated and willing to take risks with a quill, a pen, or a keyboard.
I learned as much as I could about the craft of poetry as I allow the imagery to flow onto the page. “Poets tread close to the brink of light… or her foe; gaze hypnotized; haunted scribe; grabs you; razor ravages of time.”
What’s preventing the page from gulping my ink like a glutinous puppy slopping water all over the kitchen floor? Is it not wondrous?
As I wrote this and all the poems in this book, constant vigilance required I eliminate the few clichés to which I had fallen victim. For example, in this piece, “dear friends” became “obsessed friends” and “the passage of time” became “razor ravages of time.” You can see and hear the remarkable difference, right?
Poetry also differentiates itself from prose with an array of powerful sounddevices in our tool box. You read about these in Chapter Two. Examples of alliteration (prone to pen; verse versus; rhythm or rhyme),assonance (taste ways; cleverly obsessed; brand of insanity),consonance (prose… days; gaze hypnotized) and onomatopoeia (slams, scrawls).
We also see words or phrases echoed to craft an effect. For example, “Poets must say so much more with much less,” and “than I… or than you.” Used with care, it just sounds good, don’t you think?
I keep the pace of this piece moving along quickly by using back-end-emphasized words, iambs and anapests, combined with short lines of short words. Can you feel the words brush by like a fresh wind tickling your hair? The notable exception is the third stanza which begins with an emphatic trochee – “Look, my…” Yet notice that the third stanza, uniquely, is one long sentence as if while asking the reader to slow down at the start of the stanza, then asks her to rush through to the final brief stanza, which further rushes to a celebratory conclusion.
This piece embodies some fun literary devices too, like a simile(“songwriters and poets, like singers…”), and metaphors (“tread close to the brink / of light… / or her foe?”). This suggests that not unlike other art forms, the poet takes risks in choosing subjects and how to portray them.
Also, the double-negative here (“Is it not frivolous to think that songwriters, poets… don’t”), combined with the preceding boisterous declaration (“Why not, I say loudly to you?”) signifies that fine poetry, at least mine, trends toward high drama.
Add a pun or two (“Is scrawling my novels at length as dubious a vanity?”) where “at length” could refer to either the lengthy passage of time or a lengthy work of prose, and a little personification (“light… or her foe?”).
Finally, although I apply a liberal use of anapests (ta-ta-DAH) and tetrameters (four beats or feet per line), this foot and meter are muted by liberal substitutions of other feet and meters, frequently returning to anapestic pentameter (five beats per line) as our “home base.” This is my way of not treating myself or the topic too rigidly.
Oh, and did you notice the not-so-subtle rhyme pattern (aabbcd)? But remember, not all poems must, nor should, rhyme. I just felt the first one in this book should rhyme, but that’s just me slinging artistic license.
Is that not a lot packed into a little poem about poetry? Smile. It don’t hurt!
C’mon, y’all… ride along.
With pen in hand, Gene
