Poetry - April 2010 Edition

I've just finished reading the wonderful new issue of Poetry, in which the journal takes the opportunity to query poets about their poems. I have been greatly enjoying Poetry - both its wonderful selection of poems and the way in which it engages the world of poetic thought - expanding the discourse in all kinds of fruitful ways. This issue's approach to poetry - querying the author concerning composition and intent - is intriguing, of course, and I find in many cases that I am enthralled by the poet's mind revealed in light of a poem I have just enjoyed. The issue gave rise in particular to two ruminations on my part, though, how we - or I - view the activity of poetic composition, and where the literary community stands in the continuum of authority between authorial intent and reader-reception.

I was at first flabbergasted to note that several poets when queried about the origin and/or meaning of a certain word, phrase, rhyme, or juxtaposition thereof, replied that they needed a rhyme or liked the sound of it. Of course, I quickly realized that my reaction revealed more about me and my outlook than the poets who were supposedly the focus of inquiry. For a teacher, it is easy to become wearied of rhyme in general. After reading numerous poems with strong rhythm, end-stopped lines, and internal and end-of-line rhymes, one does long for a bit of eccentricity even - gasp - an enjambment or unrhymed line. Certainly, we often see sense and meaning sublimated to the needs of the rhyme scheme. However, I was reminded by these discourses that the problem in these cases is not that words are chosen to serve the rhyme scheme, but rather that meaning is sacrificed. These conversations revealed that the search for rhyme or for a sound match could open poems, suggest new lines of thought, bring new and disparate ideas together. The key is the poetic mind evaluating the outcome with awareness and sensitivity.

The second set of ideas that this issue gave rise to centers on the idea of authority. Umberto Eco wrote compellingly on interpretation (this time of his novel, The Name of the Rose) and the author's loss of authority once a piece had been released into print. The questions posed by Poetry to the authors focussed on derivation of meaning, authorial intent, and compositional process and elicited fascinating material without implying that the author of a poem has final interpretive ownership of that piece of work. It supported my own hope that we will never resolve the question of authority but will instead remain balanced, sometimes uncomfortably so, between author and reader, text and context. I want to be able to read ancient poets as a reconstructed contemporary of the poet, as a tenuous Victorian, as an ideal contemporary reader, and as myself with all my experiences enriching the piece.

Of course, in my eagerness to read the journal, I have now consumed my own pleasure and must wait a full month before another edition. Fortunately, CV2 and Room should be out very soon ...