The Continuing Case for Poetry

As the calendar, if not the weather, ambles toward spring, my thoughts turn to poetry. I know that today, as a means of personal expression, it faces formidable competition from texting, tricked-up mySpace pages, YouTube videos, podcasts, and all manner of other glitzy electronic applications. I realize full well that few read poetry these days; fewer still would ever buy a volume of verse. However, I believe that in the midst of today's digital clutter we need more than ever the clarity and beauty of a well written poem.

While the digital media mentioned above are easily accessible and decidedly entertaining, none of them is what I would call word-centered. Most of them rely to a great extent on graphics, still or moving images, or music to make an impact. The explosion of blogs, though, demonstrates that communication by mere language continues to matter. Such communication can be difficult. Theodore Dreiser lamented that "words are but the vague shadows of the volumes we mean." Poetry represents a different way of casting those shadows, maybe a way that is not quite so vague. At its best, poetry reveals more of the essence of the entity we are attempting to describe or convey-- whether it be an observation, a truth, an idea, or an object-- than prose ever could. But don't take my word for it; let a poet explain what poets are able to do. Beat poet Gregory Corso ( http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/creeley/corso.html ) said of poets: "They can help you realize something you could not understand before-- they can illuminate the spirit with long forgotten beauties and uglies."

This capacity means that poetry is still relevant, still powerful, especially to teenagers, who are often struggling to understand who they are and what is truly important. Illuminating the spirit never goes out of fashion, does it? Our students, though, are not going to accept on faith that poetry can assist them in better comprehending their inner beings, or in beholding the world with a bit more acuity. We need to show them.

To do this we need to put a great deal of thought into how we present poetry. We, as teachers cum poetry mentors, should select poems that we know well and about which we are passionate. When we read poems aloud--and we should since poetry is meant to be heard-- we have to make sure we read them well. We need to practice ahead of time and be prepared to explain clearly what we like about each poem, what really grabs us, or what we are intrigued by but can't fully understand. Students will pick up on our enthusiasm. They may not, in fact they probably will not, connect with all of the same poems that we do, but they will see how a poem can create a spark of inspiration, a better understanding, or maybe just a heightened curiosity. If we make the case that poetry is cool, and we argue convincingly enough, students might just believe us. Stranger things have happened.