Meaningless mythology
9 08 2007What you write is meaningless,
Never to be legend, lost in myth.
Dear Sir,
We’re afraid to say, that there is something
obscene
about your work.
We’re afraid that we can’t publish it until you correct it.
There’s something about those lines, so thin to be almost truth
that we can’t accept.
We hope you understand
that in our agency, in our world
we must have substance, we must have life
and your paper-thin truth, stark as bone
just won’t do.
makoto
Neither truth, nor faith. If I were to hold an emblem, what would it be?
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If a poet has any obligation toward society, it is to write well. Being in the minority, he has no other choice. Failing this duty, he sinks into oblivion.
Society, on the other hand, has no obligation toward the poet. A majority by definition, society thinks of itself as having other options than reading verses, no matter how well written.
Its failure to do so results in its sinking to that level of locution at which society falls easy prey to a demagogue or a tyrant. This is society’s own equivalent of oblivion. — jb
Yet, how do we define a poet? Someone who merely writes verses? Someone with the desire to write verses? Someone who has some skill in the writing of said verses?
Furthermore, despite being in the minority, a poet does have a choice. There is the choice to remove him or herself from the minority. The poet minority is not a forced minority, and a poet rather, in most cases, is part of that minority by choice. Thus a poet does have choice, or rather, the removal of choice by allowing him or herself to be held by what is seen as a poet’s obligation to society is ultimately the result of a choice made by the poet. That choice is one that can be changed (although some follow the argument that poetry is essence, and that once a poet allows him or herself to become a poet - where we once again come to the question of what is a poet again - the effect of that is irreversible).
On the other hand, I appreciate your idea of oblivion, of how a poet seems to be defined by poetry and seemingly, a poet’s obligations, if I understand you correctly, which is reflected in the title ‘poet’/poetry. And likewise, how this same idea of oblivion is reflected in society.
Though, I’m afraid, I do not completely follow the link you make between society’s and ‘its failure to do so’. Perhaps if you would be more explicit? Failure to do…? Failure to think of itself as having other options? Failure to have no obligations towards the poet?
But thank you, very much, for commenting.
“What is a Poet?
A poet is somebody who feels, and who expresses
his feelings through words.
This may sound easy. It isn’t.
A lot of people think or believe or know they
feel — but that’s thinking or believing or
knowing; not feeling. and poetry is feeling –
not knowing or believing or thinking.
Almost anybody can learn to think or believe
or know, but not a single human being can be
taught to feel. Why? Because whenever you think
or you believe or you know, you’re a lot of other
people; but the moment you feel, you’re
NOBODY-BUT-YOURSELF.”
e.e. cummings