THESIS FOR COLUMBIA COLLEGE LITERARY JOURNAL

<u>A Few General Correctives to the Present State of American Poetry</u>

Think of the poem as an object, an apple that is red
and good to eat--or a plum that is blue and sour--or better
yet, a machine for making bolts.

Every poem has a function defined in its objective
character, thus the shape of a poem indicates its worth--and
those things to which it is related in the mind whether
complete or incomplete, old or new, living or dead.

All poems being purely of the five senses can be made
only of sensual elements by the objectivity of which the
poetic object as a whole is made up.

Language at a high pitch of intensity, by physical
law, takes on a rhythmic character, this is the basis upon
which poetry has its origin. Men recognizing this have
always employed this natural quality of motion to be rhythmic
when they wished to produce a certain kind of effect. Each
period and locality, using its own language in its own object-
ive environment has selected certain patterns of the basic
rhythms, such as suited their taste, and made their poetic
forms of them.

Each great period of literary history has invented
its own forms and by that invention has signalized its
greatness.

Each poetic form thus becomes an object with a
definite meaning specially related to the period of its
invention and, which is more important, limited by that

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period. Thus to borrow and use a specific form of a past
age to a certain extent stultifies the user of it as
incompetent in his own day.

He who invents the fully expressive form of his
own day implying the full intellectual and moral accomplish-
ments of his time is a major poet.

He who fills in the incomplete forms of another
day with all the implied intellectual and moral limitations
and limitations
of those times is a minor poet and as he becomes more
hidebound and entrenched in his position as such he becomes
the more a blackguard.

Men writing poetry in the United States do not
write in the English language but in their own. But in such
a country as no college in America teaches the American language every
young man must realize that in the academy he has learned
his literary trade, to call it such, in a foreign speech. The
results are fast becoming disastrous to us.

The disastrous results resulting from a divorce
between the native speech and a literature of instruction are
chiefly evidenced in the virtual disappearance of poetry in
a major form from our day and age. The common acceptance
phrases it: Poetry is becoming more like prose every day.

This is a healthy sign toward a poetic
disaster if it may be so
It indicates the break between
the moment to the conception of what poetry might become when properly
anchored in the regeneration that we have.
the poetry of instruction, that is English poetry out of the
linguistic environment which sea
excellent as it may be
and a natural spoken language of the day which is the
material out of which a new poetry must be built.

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What happens is that

Our common sense rejects a false poetry, or a false poetry with a major false note in it which we are instructed is the example for our following. So we use a natural speech but the difficulties are almost overwhelming since nothing is so hard as to lift the commonplace up to the level of the imagination, requires a major artist.

John Dewey has given us the lead, he says: We are beginning to discover that the local is the only universal. That is to say, we are to discover the universals of poetry in our own language and until we do, we shall not have a poetry of our own.

This is to be done, first, by observing the speech about us. It is the speech which we are to observe, as all men have observed the speech of their times when they wanted to write well. Dante stands with Rabelais and Shakespeare in this; they made use of the common speech to make their forms.

But the poet especially must observe the rhythmic forms of the common speech. And he must *discover* in them how his own speech falls into patterns when it is white hot and charged with passion of whatever sort. He must first discover, then select, then formulate so that he may invent a form comprehensive enough to include in his *form* the whole intellectual and moral concept of his day in which this day is an enlargement upon the forms of all other days.

But be sure that unless he, the poet, can invent this form his day is doomed, for no one else will invent it

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and without it men are worse than beasts who with it could
see a way to live in the world.

The poet is more important to an age than a moralist.

The poet is more important to an age than a
philosopher.

The poet is more important to an age than the greatest
genius of natural science that ever existed.

All this is true because the poet is the only one
who can create the sensible container, accessible to the
senses, to hands and mouth and eyes, which has ever in the
history of the world been able to contain those fluids.

So that if modern poetry is tending toward prose, it
is because of lack first of observation of the language. This
comes of bad teaching. Our hearing has been dulled by
habitual training in the habits of a foreign language (English
and its historical relics. We have through his largely lost
the power to hear our own speech. Only when we can begin
to possess it again and to detect in it the new and living
elements with which we must work will we be able to begin
to understand the problems much less solve them.

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He who fills in the incomplete forms of another
day with all the implied intellectual and moral limitations
of those times is a minor poet and as he becomes more
hidebound and entrenched in his position as such he becomes
the more a blackguard.

Men writing poetry in the United States do not
write in the English language but in their own. But inasmuch
as no college in America teaches the American language every
young man must realize that in the academy he has learned
his literary trade, to call it such, in a foreign speech. The
results are fast becoming disastrous.

This is the healthiest sign toward a poetic
regeneration that we have. It indicates the break between
the poetry of instruction, that is English poetry and of the
past, and a natural spoken language of the day which is the
material out of which a new poetry must be built.

3

Our common sense rejects a false poetry, or a
poetry with a major false note in it which we are instructed
is the example for our following. So we use a natural
speech but the difficulties are almost overwhelming since
nothing is so hard as to lift the commonplace up to the level
of the imagination.

John Dewey has given us the lead, he says: We are
beginning to discover that the local is the only universal.
That is to say, we are to discover the universals of poetry
in our own language and until we do we shall not have a
poetry of our own.

But the poet especially must observe the rhythmic
forms of the common speech. And he must discover in them how
his own speech falls into patterns when it is white hot and
charged with passion of whatever sort. He must first
discover, then select, then formulate so that he may invent
a form comprehensive enough to include in his form the whole
intellectual and moral concept of his day in which this day
is an enlargement upon the forms of all other days.

2.

He who invents the fully expressive form of his own day implying the full intellectual and moral accomplishments of his time is a major poet.

Men writing poetry in the United States do not write in the English language but in their own. But inasmuch as no college in America teaches the American language every young man must realize that in the academy he ~~will~~ learn his literary trade, to call it such, in a foreign speech. The results are fast becoming disastrous.

This is ~~the healthy~~ sign, ~~and a poetic regeneration~~ that we have. It indicates the break between the poetry of instruction, that is English poetry of the past, and a natural spoken language of the day which is the material out of which a new poetry must be built.

What happens is that our common sense rejects a false poetry, or a poetry with a major false note in it which we are instructed is the example for our following. So we use a natural speech but the difficulties are almost overwhelming since nothing is so hard as to lift the common-