The Pensacola journal., 1920-03-29
THE NEW POETS
BY CELIA MYROyER ROBINSON

IL be in good clothes. fashion In verse
fcrm than either the pursuits or the radicals wan'
to inflict upon new name Tor our PET iasn-
4 ion Here comes F. A varrelman. writing in The
Editor magazine of the craft. published at Ridge
wood. New Jersey and says: I'm The Editor OF
June 25 j. Brown Jewett in Prose Poetry and Line
Verse Acknowledges the poetic value of SO called
free verse or hetero-rhythmc as prefer to
call It, lin contradistnction to rhythmic verse)
but asks why the 'reactionary unpoetic form OF
verse;"
Il But is free verse unpoeticf
In the New Poetry Magazine. some months ago.
Harriet Monroe said: IF criticism is to have
| in vivid picture, Pa, h-steppin'.
H After all, Kipling never painted for us anything
more pungently humorous or more whimiscally
any value it must upon the obvious truth that
poetry existed before the English language began TO
form itself out of the debris Of other tongues, and
that it now exists In forms Of great beauty among
far away peoples who heard OF our special
rules"
Years ago The Observer. published at Charlotte.
N c.. was most generous to young poets. The COL
umns were open to genius at all times, and one Of
the most striking epics have ever read was writ
ten by feminine Tar Heelite. and began something
like this:
II II seen pa comm steppin' high,
II AS was of his walk the way"
Il There was more than column about pa, and his
adventures, which included the adventures of ma,
and incidentally daughter. who wrote the verses (?)
! and Daughter became famous, over night. The
only reason filthy lucre did not follow fame am
sure, was that she had never heard of the follow
up" theory. known to all good publicists.
never read more striking lines, and 1 have
ceased to find joy in them they bring before
| In all my reading of poets old and new have
original though possibly the fact Of his sophistca-
tion and of the mountain girls lack of that same
quality does make difference.
This is almost equaled by the famous San Fran
cisco earthquake poem the first verse of which
we quote:
Meny accidents has happened to big stiles
And meny people has been hurt and killed
With fires earthquakes floods and other things
Our school histries is filled
But one morning all San Francisco was sleeping
Except them who got up before five
The whole erth shook big bildngs fell
And many people was burned alive.
But laugh may at free verse. call it hetero-
rhythmic poly -rhythmic like suffrage. it is
with U.s. whether like it not. And since hon.
confession good for the SOUL we acknowledge
that we like it under any name-at least, OF it.
If you do not like ii. at least you must acknowl-
edge that 1t is descriptive. Here Is example from
HOOPS Dy Wlurld wilson GlDSon. IN which Cen
tleman John, one of the characters. describes a
camel (ths description ought to be popular at this
time especially with the prohibitionsts):
"And then consider cames: only think
OF camels long enough. and you'll go mad
With all their humps and Jumps; their knobby
knees
Spay feet and straddle legs; their sagging necks,
Flat flanks, and scraggy tails. and monstrous
teeth"
No one need go to circus to see a camel after
that.
Can it be- however. that Mr. wilfrld Wilson Glib
son caught his trick from Shakespeare. who in de-
scribing horse. says:
Round hoofed. short jointed, fetlocks shag and
long,
Broad breast. full eye. small head and nostrils |
wide:
High crest. short ears. straight legs and passing |
strong:
Thin name, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide" |
We have to admit that shakespeare's description
is more musical.
Mary Eleanor Roberts writing on Old Poets and
New Freedom, reminds that few years ago
the pleader for free accounted the DEVILS
Advocate traitor to tradition and the classics and
an arguer against the canonizaton Of the saints"
But since spoon River Anthology became best
seller. and the just fame which it brought to Mr..
Edgar Lee Masters, some of the reviewers have be- |
gun to read free verse before they write about it.
and some of them indeed. man. of them, COM
ing to see beauty where they caricature.
Listen to this. by the young Irish poet, Francis
Carlin:
"Shoon- "a -shoon,
sing psalm,
Although am
Out OF Davids