From: sharon@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov (Sharon Hopkins)
Subject: Re: The Business of Poetry
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory (NASA)
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 22:46:07 GMT

In article <1992Apr13.115804.2349@hemlock.cray.com> n2412@cray.com (Joe Green) writes:
>In article <1992Apr11.045934.2059@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov> sharon@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov (Sharon Hopkins) writes:
>>In article <1992Apr10.131536.28619@hemlock.cray.com> n2412@cray.com (Joe Green) writes:
>>
>>The cry of the dull, doomed youth of the '10s, wanting war, action,
>>heroism, escape from the banality of bourgeois burgher life.  Getting
>>the Great Machine instead.  Trenches, stalemate, industry as war hero
>>and chief general.  Dead piled in heaps at the Somme, over ground
>>abandoned in a tightening of lines.  Half a million, my recollection
>>(too many books ago).  What is the alternative?  They envisioned one
>>escape, found none.
>
>Of course.  War is always staged as adventure and escape from banality.
>What is more banal than war?

Yes, the point I attempted to make.  (The discovery that was made then,
previous proofs having been ignored or rejected.) 

>The Great machine a consequence of
>capitalism and of the values of a military aristocracy -- the great
>machine transforming real bodies to metaphor.  This is the
>"transformation" r hardin claims he can find everywhere that is 
>therefore without consequence, interest, or meaning.  Is that what
>you mean, John Wesley? 

No:  I don't buy the "transformation".  The "great machine" transformed
real bodies into real fertilizer, and longs lists of names on church walls.
Also various social, economic, and demographic problems stemming from,
among other things, the useless death of almost unimaginable numbers of
young men.

The poets transformed the real bodies into metaphor -- it's easy, and
even hard to avoid ("longs lists" -- nice ring to it).  But they'd expected
glory  -- notice the changing tone of the poems over those few years.

That war was staged partly in an attempt (failed) to escape the
banality of capitalism, war as escape from commodification, from tedious
exchange.  If war doesn't work (so far no banana) what will?

> [Joe's arguments deleted in agreement, not rejection.]

>>But there is Thomas' answer:
>>
>>	"Not for the proud man apart
>>	 From the raging moon I write
>>	 On these spindrift pages
>>	 Nor for the towering dead
>>	 With their nightengales and psalms
>>	 But for the lovers, their arms
>>	 Round the griefs of the ages,
>>	 Who pay no praise or wages
>>	 Nor heed my craft or art."
>>
>>Yet what is that but perhaps the commodification of banality:  grief
>>paid-for but not owned, not shared?  The gift ignored, unwanted; but the
>>grief a gift (a theft); the dead, dead.  (But borrowed with nightengales
>>and moonlight, another theft, even a deceit -- it is for the dead, who care
>>no more than the lovers.  Less, being dead.)  What's the alternative, or
>>must we seek one?  The living live, grieve, love, join the dead:  even
>>the poets.  Gift, theft, or exchange.  Even we who are "seared with trade;
>>bleared, smeared with toil"?
>
>Thomas again typical.

Yes, why I selected that example.  (Hopkins perhaps less typical.)

>What does the "what's the alternative" question mean?

When I asked it first:  what's the alternative to war as an escape from
the banality of capitalism?  The second time:  what's the alternative, for
poets, to borrowing the dead to make nice poems?

>The alternative is to refuse bondage.  The alternative is political action --
>not a poetry corrupted by murders.

Are we not *all* corrupted by murders?  How can poetry that is not corrupted
still speak?  (Refuse bondage to what?)

Crud, I left the Millay book at home.  The last line of the
poem I'm wanting:  "this tall, oblivious gaoler eyed with stars."

I'll ditch (for now) the pretty language, and try to ask my question straight
(in gratitude for your straight answer, above).

When has political action achieved anything poetry has attempted?

(There is overlap, certainly.  I'm thinking of Cardenal, "In Cuba".  One of
the poets he quotes: "Don't forget it, poet:/in whatever place or time/you make
or endure history,/there will always be lying in wait/some dangerous poem.")

The self-reflexive, this-and-that sort of poetry may be free of blood,
but will it make anyone yelp to read it?  Will they read it again?  Clip
it and mail it to friends?

My poetry is sentimental, often overly-timid.  Pretty sometimes, usually
harmless.  It has little fire I have not borrowed, little life, less
death.  Even the pain I borrow -- I haven't had much, and most of that not
very interesting.  But sometimes, just sometimes, I know I've managed to
speak even to one or two people, make them say "Yes, that's how I felt,
but didn't have words for."  Or just produced a smile, or an "Ow!".  There
is the gift I would give, even if their pleasure is also repayment.

Not a large or particularly noble endeavor.  I don't always try even for
that, but just to meet the criteria I set for myself, to succeed in
an attempt and hope also that someone likes it, or is moved in some
direction they don't mind going.  Once in a while, to create thought:  to
cause pain that might be needed, to cause a less-wanted change in thinking.

Political action.  

I don't attempt it often, with poetry, unless to suggest that people live,
and love, and hope, and hurt, and eventually die (one way or another).
Even icky people.  A very conservative, measured, quiet sort of politics.  

("icky" chosen with care)

>>"Consider the lillies of the field, how they grow..."
>>
>>Is there, ought there to be, more than this?
>
>If the lily wants to avoid the mower, they're better be.

Heh.  Point to you.

--Sharon
Newsgroups: rec.arts.poems