Who’s Your Favorite Poet?
Very few people buy books of poetry anymore.
In our age, poetry is something you’re required to read in sophomore English class, or perhaps you attempt a few verses yourself as an angst-filled teenager. After that, poetry ceases to exist. Maybe you pause to read a poem in The New Yorker as you flip through the pages, if it’s not too long. But seriously, when was the last time you read a poem?
Since the 60’s we’ve been getting our poetry from Dylan and U2 and Jay-Z. Or at least that’s what we tell ourselves.
“I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.” That’s from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock–perhaps one of those poems you had to read in sophomore poetry class. It’s a glimpse into the insecurities and impotence of a man who resigns himself to loneliness rather than risk rejection. Although much of the poem is hard to decipher, the imagery of a life measured out with tiny coffee spoons is crystal clear.
Poets use imagery in ways that rappers, rockers and divas cannot. Poets are not bound by 4/4 melodies and choruses. They make up their own meter, as T.S. Eliot did in Prufrock.
Eliot said “the progress of an artist is a continual self-sacrifice, a continual extinction of personality.” That’s definitely not how today’s artists operate. Self-promotion and image have replaced the introspection of the poets. Great literature makes true statements about the human condition; timeless observations on what it means to live and struggle and learn.
Where are the poets today who can share these lessons and reveal the truth? And who is listening?
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