Poetry World http://thepoetryworld.com Poetry Definition, Types, Friendship, Valentine, Love, Dark, Personification, Birthday and Lots More About Poetry en-us Copyright 2007, Poetry World team. 240 Even Poetry Is Undergoing Cutbacks http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96628 Thu, 9 Sep 2010 07:51 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96628 It’s not clear what’s more unlikely — that for 43 years most of the nation’s best-known poets have come to the modest Katonah Library for a poetry series begun by a former Mad Men-era adman, or that in this high-dollar address the series is now struggling to scrape together $6,000 to keep going.

Still, there’s a small tale of the arts in the real world in the long life and shaky future of the Katonah Poetry Series, which began in 1967 and now has no director or money for anything beyond what could be its last reading on Oct. 3.

]]> Poetry: What Does It Accomplish? http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96478 Wed, 8 Sep 2010 07:04 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96478 Here are two well-known descriptions of what a poem is, and does, one by Wordsworth, one by Stevens:type a: Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings; it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility. type b: The poem must resist the intelligence / Almost successfully. These two assertions, though not opposed, place distinctly different emphases on the function of poetry. The first description, Wordsworth's, suggests that poetry is a means of gaining perspective on primary experience: powerful emotions can be gathered, then dynamically relived, translated, and digested in the controlled laboratory of the poem--by proxy, such a poem also constructs perspective for the reader.

In contrast, Stevens's description implies that the poem and the reader engage in a sort of muscular struggle with each other--that struggle is how they become intimate, how they really "know" each other. Stevens suggests that a good poem, as part of its process, resists, twists, and enmeshes the reader (and perhaps the poet as well), an engagement in which perspective is challenged, and by no means guaranteed.

]]> Poetry for the new season http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96343 Tue, 7 Sep 2010 06:33 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96343 Happy fall, Seattle. (At least now, the weather matches the season, right?) And fall is the perfect season for enjoying poetry ... see below for some wonderful events coming up soon. Tuesday, September 7, 7 p.m. -- LiTFUSE Launch Party, at Richard Hugo House. Featuring former and current LiTFUSE Faculty Susan Rich, Mimi Allin, Elizabeth Austen, Dan Peters, and Tara Hardy, come out for poetry, music, and merriment to celebrate the 2010 LiTFUSE Poets' Workshop upcoming in October. A $5 suggested donation will benefit Tieton Arts & Humanities.Saturday, September 11, 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. -- Hedgebrook  Open House and Reading. Hedgebrook's open house will include retreat and garden tours, refreshments, live music, and readings by Hedgebrook alumnae. Free.

]]> Online Poetry Communities: 10 Tips to Finding the Right One for you http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96202 Mon, 6 Sep 2010 04:57 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96202 Online poetry communities, in their simplest sense, are sites you join to share poems and to meet other poets who also share an interest in poetry . However, finding an exceptional poetry site, dedicated to its poets, is not quite that simple. With so many poetry sites out there, how do you choose which one is best for you?

1. Membership Fees: Some poetry communities say they are free, once you join, however, you have to “upgrade” for additional features. Other poetry sites rely on donations, and advertisements. Look for a site that is no more than $35.00 annually.

]]> Poetry Slams: Performance Plus Art http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96112 Sun, 5 Sep 2010 15:31 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=96112 Performance artists of all types enjoy the awe and the kudos coming their way from the general public. In return, any concert or performance turns livelier with audience participation. During the recent decades, more and more musicians--even those in the classical music field--have begun to encourage the audience to sing along or clap to the beat. This behavior has seeped out to other fields such as stand-up comedy and open-mic poetry readings.

With these facts in mind, I imagine, the slam poetry is succeeding because people are drawn into the magnetism of our clannish eras when everyone participated in the tribal dances, telling stories, and sing-along sessions. Truth is, I had not heard of "Slams" in regard to poetry, until--in the writing site I belong to--I started to participate in the slam poetry contests, hosted by two site members: one, a creative writing professor from Chicago and the other an English teacher/poet from Australia.$HOPME$

Later on, I found out that slam poetry was sometimes attacked by the academia with the idea that slams cheapen the true art of poetry. As an answer to this accusation, slam poets became more vocal and more organized to make themselves accepted as members of a serious performance media.

The first slam poetry started in 1984, in the Get Me High lounge, a Chicago jazz club, by a construction worker named Marc Smith. Two years later, Marc Smith offered a plan to another jazz club, the Green Mill. When the owner accepted Marc Smith's plan of hosting a poetry competition for performance poets every Saturday night, the slam poetry competition was introduced to the public arena.

Although the opposition to the poetry slams still exists, slams have performed an impressive function in promoting poetry to the general public. During the later years, more poetry books have been sold and an astonishing number of searches about poetry have been conducted on the internet search engines.

Poetry slams are here to stay because they have pushed poetry into the livelier world of performance, turning it into an intense experience for both the poet-participants and the audience. The art of poetry too, when faced with detachment or worse yet extinction, has welcomed the slams, as if returning to its earliest origin of spoken words made to be heard.

A serious poetry slam, as performance poetry, does not depend on the quality of the words, lines, and the poetic devices alone. It also involves oral skills such as eye contact with the audience, emphatic reading, voice control, and controlled body language. This is because poetry slams are performed primarily for the audience entertainment. A slam is not the same as an open-mic performance since an open-mic is there to encourage the poets while the audience fares second.

Sometime ago, I was among the audience in an informal poetry slam. True, it felt akin to a vaudeville show, but the audience participation and the poets' enjoyment were genuine. In an informal slam poetry contest, the judges are selected from among the audience and all forms of audience participation are encouraged, even booing the poets at the end or the middle of their poetry readings. If the audience is dissatisfied the poet leaves the stage; however, during the slam I watched nobody left the stage as the result of public booing. Probably, I was inside a quieter audience.

In the beginning, slam poetry used to be about specific subjects that involved public concerns like politics, baseball, social issues, etc. Afterwards, the themes and the subjects expanded in range immensely.

At present, poetry slams find worldwide fame due to the efforts of PSI or Poetry Slam Inc. and The National Poetry Slam or the annual slam championship tournament. During the first round of a serious slam competition, all entrants can read their poetry. The time period for each poem is three minutes. Poets are allowed to enter the succeeding rounds if they qualify. The judges' scores are numerical from zero to ten.

In the beginning, this competition was for poets singly. Nowadays, poets compete in four or five persons in a team in their home states and countries from North America and Europe. The winning teams travel to a city hosting the final competition. Since most local public radios broadcast the competition live to their listeners, the annual National Poetry Slam has become a popular event.

Besides the National Poetry Slam, any community may organize special slams such as: Dead Poet Slams that is reading from the works of deceased poets; Cover Slams where poets read other poets' works; Improv Slams where poets say whatever comes to their minds without previous preparation; Group-Poem Slams written by a group of poets instead of one; Haiku or Limerick Slams; and the very funny Bad Poem Slams or the Low-Ball Slams where the worst score wins.

Poetry slams are not a passing fad. Any form of entertainment that is grounded in imagination with its roots in art will surely endure excess showmanship or high-brow criticism. Poetry Slams and their organization Poetry Slam Inc. are here to stay in earnest.

]]> Hope and Change by Gita Saraydarian http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=95967 Sat, 4 Sep 2010 07:41 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=95967 I suppose these two words can mean a whole lot of things to different people. One thing for sure, what we are seeing is a huge wave of people saying something like: “We want to dare to hope; don’t tell us what we can hope for and what we cannot hope for; we want a different leader, a different philosophy, a different way of doing things.” And, people are making these decisions with their hands and feet and the ballot! What a concept!

There is both a practical and deeply esoteric meaning to hope. Take hope away, and we shrivel up and get depressed; we die internally if we think nothing changes. Or, we waste our time and our resources trying to forget that change is possible. It actually takes energy to try to bury hope. Hope is such an essential part of our being that the natural condition of human beings is to have hope, always.

]]> Near Nightfall http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=95749 Thu, 2 Sep 2010 07:14 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=95749 The phone ringing stops everything and the cold voice
draws a body in white chalk—
says your son has been at the precinct since last night.

Before you leave the house, you've smoked four cigarettes
and as you drive, smoke
drifts into your eyes.
The house lights were already on and his bedroom door

a sliver of light that crossed you
when
your foot pushed it open. His absence was a question:
the Newports left unopened in your purse for years. For a moment

you almost expected to find him,
his voice barely above a whisper. The television
hummed;
it made the door an invite—but he is gone,

and you see yesterday's clothes on the floor,
books, video games and sneakers
on the bed, under the bed. He is not on the bed,

phone to his ear as usual—the door is still open.
It's Sunday and there's
no reason for his absence. Against the shadows,
hints of your laughter:

his first word was "no,"
a picture with Orioles cap on big enough
for his father,
and his face etched with red tracings of Kool-Aid.

He needs to know
you expected him home, and why smoke from a Newport
leaves the taste of metal
in your mouth.

]]> How To Write Sad Love Poems To Get Your Ex Bac http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=95578 Wed, 1 Sep 2010 07:18 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=95578 How To Write Sad Love Poems To Get Your Ex Bac: Almost every woman is a hopeless romantic at heart and if you write the love letters and poems these will be kept in a special place and cherished for years. Books
on romance and love are chiefly purchased by women more than men and every woman that reads them wishes she could also have a fairytale love life and happy relationship with her knight in shining amour. Many relationship counselors will not tell you that if you have broken up a very effective way to get her back is to compose sad love poems. Now most men will not have a clue on how to write sad love poems; never mind to write sad poems to get your ex back. Even on the internet real guides on how to write sad poems to get your ex back are extremely hard to find. Sad Love poems have been written by famous people like Napoleon, Oscar Wilde, and Charles dickens. Love poems can truly melt anyone’s heart or make you think deeply about life.

]]> Poets laureate compare notes in Halifax http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=93341 Fri, 16 Jul 2010 10:05 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=93341 In Halifax this week, rhymers, rappers and writers of verse are attending the first national gathering of the country's poets laureate. There are 17 poets laureate in Canada, appointed by municipal, provincial and federal governments to promote literature and the arts.

The position dates back some 400 years, to the English court of King James the First. A poet laureate was hired to write poems for royal occasions. But Canada's current day bards bring a decidedly modern perspective to their work.

Roland Pemberton, Canada's youngest poet laureate at 24, is better known as hip-hop artist Cadence Weapon. Pemberton said his role as Edmonton poet laureate is to promote art in all its forms. "I've been doing some work with the train station in Edmonton, the LRT, putting some poems into the architectural design," he told CBC News.

]]> USC poet makes splash with latest book http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=93105 Wed, 14 Jul 2010 11:14 GMT http://thepoetryworld.com/article.asp?articleid=93105 Sometimes she blames her favorite doctor-Dr. Seuss, that is. When that Cat came with that crazy top hat, so did Andrea Perry's love of rhyme.

Hailing from Upper St. Clair, the author-poet is celebrating the release of her third picture book, "The Bickelbys' Birdbath," a whimsical, fun, summer romp that all starts with a mailman. There's a goose and a moose in this story that is built backwards in the "This is the House that Jack Built" tradition. Perry explained, "The idea for this story came first with the title.

I wanted something goofy sounding and something alliterative and for some reason I wanted to write about a birdbath. I made up the name Bickelby to go with my birdbath. Oh, and I knew the birdbath was cracked and the mailman was bringing a new one."

This story is different from her two previous books--"Here's What You Do When You Can't Find Your Shoe" followed by "The Snack Smasher." Both of those books are collections of wacky (and somewhat weird) silly, fun poems. All three books have been published by Atheneum.

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