Re: Resurrecting Poetry

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There are many people who have no value for poetry, even some who see it
as pathological. Someone wrote on the Internet that poetry is not a
cure-all for low self-esteem. In my case it has nothing to do with my
self-esteem at all. I started writing poetry when I was 10 and was
recognized for it. And I did this in Russia, where poetry was a big
thing.
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There are many who claim that poetry is useless or impractical. I see
three very useful and highly practical applications for poetry.
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One is that it can allow people to express what they feel or think about
someone they care about, and as such can help to improve families,
relationships and friendships.
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Another is that it can allow people to articulate and work through their
feelings and their thoughts.
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And probably the most important one is that it can communicate one's
understanding and realizations to other people and thus help all sorts
of people in all sorts of ways.
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Finally, in case of a good poem, you have produced something beautiful –
something as such that adds to the civilization and the world.
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In my life poetry has been far from useless. In my life poetry has been
the saving grace. It is the reason that I was admitted on a full
scholarship to an elite private school in Virginia. It is the reason I
have most of my friends. It is the reason I've been with women who were
extremely attractive both physically and personally when I am neither.
There have been any number of people who have attacked me, frequently
very viciously; but there are any number of others who love my poetry
and my translations.
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Another common slander against poetry is that it is reflection of mental
illness. Of this there are two claims: Either that it comes from
personality disorders (such as “sociopathic” or “narcissistic”) and that
it comes from chemical disorders such as bipolar or schizophrenia.
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The first is not hard at all to refute. In many places such as France,
Russia and Italy, poetry is widely read and highly regarded by normal
people, which would not be the case if it was limited to people with
personality disorders. Poetry was highly respected in World War II
generation, which unlike baby boomers has never been accused of any
disorders at all. If someone is a sociopath and does not have emotions,
he would not be attracted to a pursuit that extols feelings; he would be
much more likely to become a businessman or a lawyer. As for
narcissistic disorder, it would pathologize everyone from Gates and
Rockefeller in business to Trump and Clinton in politics.. There may be
narcissists in poetry; but I do not see why there would be more
narcissists in poetry than in business, politics, media, academia or
law.
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In case of disorders such as epilepsy, bipolar and schizophrenia, poetry
may actually be a way to make something good out of a bad situation. In
epilepsy there is heightened contact between right brain and left brain,
which makes available for verbal expression intuitive understanding.
That can be very useful for creative pursuits, and Dostoyevsky, who was
an epileptic, produced some of the greatest literature in history,
writing his greatest work during his epileptic fits. In bipolar and
schizophrenia, there are available for conscious use the parts of the
brain that are not normally accessed.. This can likewise be very useful
for creativity; and people with these disorders can achieve naturally
the kinds of states that people in 1960s attempted to achieve with LSD.
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Another claim that I've heard – this time from an editor in DC – is that
the reason that poetry has become big in Russia is long winters. I have
news for this person. Poetry is big in place like Lebanon and Greece
that do not have long winters. There have been excellent poets coming
from warm zones such as Iran, Mexico and Chile. Many of the better poets
in America are black.
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Then there is the claim that poetry is unrealistic. The response to that
is that human world is what people make it, and something becomes
realistic when people make it so. If there is greater demand for poetry
and for arts in general, then more people who are willing to supply such
things will be able to make ends meet. The solution is to stimulate the
demand by getting more people to value these things. There is nothing
unrealistic about this; it has taken place in the past even in the
American history, and there is no reason why it cannot happen now.
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I want poetry to become as big a thing in the English-speaking world as
it is in Russia. There have been any number of excellent
English-speaking poets in the past. Probably the biggest problem has
been that poetry self-destructed. It was turned into cold cynical
abominations called post-modernism and avant-garde. When I took a
magnificent visual artist named Julia to attend an avant-garde poetry
reading in DC, she said, “This is not poetry.” On the Internet group
rec.arts.poems, I found the least poetic mentality of anywhere I have
been. These people not only produced absolute rubbish, but they were
absolutely vicious toward people whose poetry actually was poetry.
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The best way to make poetry a big thing in the English-speaking world is
to produce real poetry. Poetry that aims for – and achieves – things
such as beauty and passion. It is to leave in the dust the post-modern
and avant-garde gibberish and to produce something beautiful. People in
Russia read poetry that is being produced in Russia. Using similar
styles to produce poetry in English should create poetry in English that
people actually want to read.
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I can do the contemporary styles as well. For the most part, I choose
not to. Julia told me also after the reading, “I hope you never write
this way.” She was able to do excellent abstract art, but she preferred
for her work to reflect classical sensibilities. I took the themes in
her art and turned it into poetry. The result was a book
(https://www.amazon.com/Poems-Julia-Mr-Ilya-Shambat/dp/150234369X) that
made me – and her – the talk of DC poetry scene.
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I want to resurrect poetry. And that means clearing away both the
misconceptions about poetry and the post-modern and avant-garde nonsense
and producing poetry that aims for – and achieves – beauty and passion..
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Things that poetry is meant to be about, and things that have been
present in poetry that people actually want to read.