Yesterday morning, instead of settling into a few good hours of research, I found myself lost in the latest hub bub coming out of the poetry world.  It started with the announcement of the Forward Prize shortlist and the fact that Derek Walcott’s latest collection was not included, whereas Seamus Heaney’s was.  Then there was the statement, as discussed on Tania Hershman’s blog, that too many poetry collections are being published.  It ended with my discovering on Carrie Etter’s blog a fascinating roundtable discussion by UK and US poetry publishers about the future of publishing poetry. By the time it was 10.30, the muscles in my hands were tensed into claws and reaching past my third cup of coffee for my computer so I could write what you are reading now.

As some of you know, besides novels and plays, I also write poetry.  Quite a lot of it, really.  Many have been published in magazines.  One collection, the poetry play Dreams of May, was published and has been performed dozens of times.  I have just finished a second collection.  This does not make me an expert, by any means.  I don’t teach poetics in an MFA program.  I have never won a prize that anyone has ever heard of.  But poetry is something I do and care about, and something I have been thinking about for so long now that I have a certain perspective that comes with time and attention, if nothing else. So here it goes….

Poetry, at it’s best, is the art form that links modern man with his ancestors.  From religious recitations of epics like The Odyssey to tomorrow’s slam competitions, poetry is man’s way of finding connections with an intangible past and an inscrutible future. It is also the link between music and language — which, for me, are the two sides of the human heart.  Poetry belongs to all of us.  I believe every human being has, at one time or another, felt that urge to write poetry.  Like the urge to laugh, no human being should be denied the experience.  Yet most people do not write poetry and, so they say, even fewer read it.  I believe it is fear that keeps people from approaching poetry and it is the fault of “Poets” that that fear exists.   Notice, I have put those obnoxious quotation marks around the word because there is and has always been an intellectual snobbery within the poetry community.  From a young age we are all taught that poetry is “hard.”  “Real” poetry is hidden within a cloud of forms and theories. You have to be brainy to understand it, much less write it.  This insidious form of intellectual elitism is rampant in the poetry world and always has been. The fact that I felt the need to proclaim my credentials at the start of this discussion shows how much this still holds true.  

Who’s to say that a poetry collection should or should not be published? I think the only person who has a right to say that is the person who decides, for whatever reason, to actually publish it. If someone is moved by a body of work, and believes that others would react the same, and believes it strongly enough to want to put their time and effort into bringing that collection to the public, then – to me – that means the collection ought to be published. Everyone bemoans the fact that nobody reads (and therefore buys) poetry. If the poems themselves were more accessible or more varied or less fearful, than they would be read by a greater number.  If poet’s stopped closing the doors on other poet’s work and stopped metaphorically measuring who’s dick is larger, then the poetry world would be healthier, both artistically and financially.
Poetry that demands time and thought not only to write it, but also to read and understand it, is important.  There must always be a place
for that sort of work.  Very often it is that most difficult sort of poetry that is the impetus for moving the artform forward.  But academic poetry (for want of a better word) is not the only sort of poetry that is to be valued.  Believe me, I am not so much a republican as to say that any bit of dashed off drivel has a right to be published.  Writers who decide to devote their artistic time to the creation of poems need to study and practice as much as any other practitioner in any other field of art.  Standards can be maintained and judgments need to be made.  But although, for example, the violinistic artistry of a Joshua Bell is very different from that of a Stephan Grapelli, I don’t think anyone would say that one is more correct or of greater value than the other.  I believe music has become more comfortable within it’s own skin, more open to its varied styles.  Poetry needs to finally, finally, after all these generations of moaning and sniping, get to that same level of acceptance of itself.

UK poetry publishers say that sales of 250 copies of a collection is considered excellent.  I’ll end my rant by saying that although I’m sure no one in the poetry establishment has ever heard of Sue Guiney and that they may not like her poetry very much even if they did, I will humbly point out that Dreams of May sold nearly 400 copies in two printings.