[Suzerain of Sheol]

Woooo! English nerd discussion! Yeah!

Okay, first of all, I'll mention that there seem to be two "schools" of poetry, as it were, in our age, though there could of course be more that I'm overlooking. (This is probably, actually, a gross simplification). But, regardless, you have the collegiate poet, learned and studied, writing in a "scene", part of the literary machine that keeps poetry even remotely relevant as an art form. I would classify my professor and her fellow poets she invited to our classes under this heading. My problem with this group, like every other literary in-group, is that they're writing mostly for each other, almost speaking a different poetic language (or have evolved poetic language into something we lesser sentients can no longer apprehend) and it largely comes off (to me) seeming like artistic fiddling and self-indulgence, as though their poetry is just an exercise to engage the creative parts of their mind.

On the other hand, we have the, I suppose, more classical paradigm of poetry that I'm fairly certain all the poets around here fall into, the poetry of emotion and thematics (and, it must be said, still recognizably a "poem" in the classic sense, as opposed to the rather bizarre productions of the above group). The problem with this group is that, a.) it has been so thoroughly explored as an art form over the centuries, it's gotten to the point where advancement really is next to impossible, and b.) it can end up being even more self-indulgent than our erstwhile artistes, becoming an exercise in gazing inward, and expecting the world to care about our personal states of mind. This sort of poetry struggles for relevance, and can in many cases end up impossible to empathize with to any great degree. It often comes down mere words on a page, representing -- to the poet -- their mind-state at the time of writing, but of negligible value as a written work to be read.

This is, of course, only my opinion on the matter, and I invite cogent disagreement. :)