“I think we will always have the impulse towards visual poetry with us, and I wouldn't agree with Bly that it's a bad thing. It depends on the ability of the individual poet to do it well, and to make a shape which is interesting enough to hold your attention.” ThinkingWellsEnoughIndividualAbilityInterestingAttentionPoetDependsShapesAgreeImpulseVisualsBad Things Author:James Laughlin
“When you work in form, be it a sonnet or villanelle or whatever, the form is there and you have to fill it. And you have to find how to make that form say what you want to say. But what you find, always--I think any poet who's worked in form will agree with me--is that the form leads you to what you want to say.” ThinkingWantFormPoetAgreeWhat You WantSonnet Author:Ursula K. Le Guin
“With mimicry, with praises, with echoes, or with answers, the poets have all but outsung the bell. The inarticulate bell has found too much interpretation, too many rhymes professing to close with her inaccessible utterance, and to agree with her remote tongue. The bell, like the bird, is a musician pestered with literature.” FoundLiteratureAnswersToo MuchPoetMusicianBirdPraiseAgreeTongueInterpretationBellsEchoesRhymeUtteranceInaccessibleInarticulateMimicry Book:The Essential Alice Meynell Collection Source: The Essential Alice Meynell Collection
“There are those who say that poets should use her and his art to change the world. I'd agree with that, but I think everybody should do that. I think the chef and the baker and the candlestick maker - I think everybody should be hoping to make it a better world.” ThinkingWorldShouldArtUsePoetAgreeChanging The WorldMakersChefBakers Author:Maya Angelou
“I agree that comedy does a good job - and is often about - stepping over the line - Lenny Bruce, etc. - and that this is important for a lot of poets too. I guess I feel like there has to be depth.” FeelsDoeImportantJobsLinesComedyPoetAgreeDepthEtcGood Job Author:Rachel Zucker
“The only thing we all agree on, virtually every poet in this country, is that this Administration is really frightening, and we want something done about it.” WantCountryDonePoetAgreeAdministrationFrighteningWant Something Author:Sam Hamill
“The real question should be: what makes a good political poem? The possible answers to that question are both obvious and yet still a little too subjective for anyone to ever fully agree on. What do I most wish to see in a political poet? Sublimated rebellion.” ShouldLittlesStillsRealPoliticalWishAnswersPoetAgreeObviousRebellionSubjectiveReal QuestionsGood Political Author:Andre Naffis-Sahely
“I think the whole emphasis in England, in universities, on practical criticism (but not that so much as on historical criticism, knowing what period a line comes from) this is almost paralysing. In America, in University, we read - what? - T. S. Eliot, Dylan Thomas, Yeats, that is where we began. Shakespeare flaunted in the background. I'm not sure I agree with this, but I think that' for the young poet, the writing poet, it is not quite so frightening to go to university in America as it is in England, for these reasons.” ThinkingWritingReasonWholeAmericaYoungLinesKnowingPoetPeriodsCriticismEnglandAgreeHistoricalUniversityPracticalsBackgroundsNot SureFrighteningEmphasisDylanEliotYeats Author:Sylvia Plath