When is Poetry not Poetry?

Hi, I've a question title today and that's because I'm writing about stuff I learned in class today, stuff which I'm against, but feel it's important to share with everyone. So, I've been doing some intense work in poetry these last few Fridays and we've been looking at poets who's poems are out of the circle of 'normal poetry.' Poets like; Lyn Hejinian and her prose poem My Life, Ron Silliman, Tom Raworth and today Tom Phillips, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Amiri Baraka and Kenneth Goldsmith. (I've posted some links below for these poets, which you can go and visit. I didn't want to post up any of their poems in case I get in trouble, so please go and check them out, 'cause then you'll see what I'm trying to show you.)

So, most of these poets sort of fall under the area of poetry for the ear, eye and mind, which means they make great use of sound and often the poets perform them so that the full benefit can be reached. The eye or visual poem often involves a sort of collage, mashed up style of words, letters and images, sometimes the poets may use other people's writers and make something out of them. There is also the idea of conceptual poetry- take Goldsmith and his poem which is in fact a newspaper typed up and turned into 900 pages worth of words. Lastly there is the experiment writing and the very Modernist view of producing something that is so fresh it has never been seen before by anyone else.

That sort of gives you a rough idea of the stuff I looked at today and the links will give you even more. It sort of is like the extreme side of poetry really or like mixing music or art with poetry, unfortunately I disagree with it, for me this is not poetry, its something caught in-between these areas and in a strange place of it's own that sort of is like marmite- you either love it or hate. Though, hate is a strong word and I don't hate the poems or poets, I just don't agree with them over this. I guess to achieve these things you must see the world and language in a different light and I guess- though I hate to use this, (irony there!) being dyslexic might be the issue here! I'm not setting it all down to that, but more of my own idea about what poetry should be and should not be!

I wanted to add another image to show you some visual poety, but scared of copyright iusses, I thought I'd try one of my own, so here's one like really quick, no editing poem, that I did about trains;

I think everyone should be able to make their mind up though, so please let me know what you think.

http://www.tomraworth.com/
http://www.tomphillips.co.uk/
http://www.geoffreyyoung.com/thefigures/day.html
http://www.ianhamiltonfinlay.com/
http://www.amiribaraka.com/
http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/
http://mylifebylynhejinian.blogspot.com/

Here's someone who's put up their Modernism Visual poems on flicker. I think they are good.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/virtue_fern/3112597938/

Lastly, my friend asked me to post a link to his blog. He's a comic book writer in the making:
http://voicesofa-distantstar.blogspot.com/

here's one of his drawings that I like!

Oh and here's my personal twitter, in case you want to follow me there;
http://twitter.com/#!/ironmaidenfan9

Rainny days

Hi, this is my 80th blog post! Well so it says on the dashboard and I think that's been the most interesting thing of my day. I've not been doing a lot because of this;

Rain. It's been like this all day and for most of the last two days as well, though we've not had gale force winds today yet. I did brave the weather and go to Ormskirk for pop tarts and cake, but then I've spent the rest of the day in bed. I've been making notes in Wuthering Heights- getting it ready for my Vic Lit projected in March and watching TV movies; first the Corpse Bride and now Jane Eyre a black and white version, but as I'm soon about to be studying the novel- I read it over summer- I thought having it on in the background couldn't help. I still have Brent Weeks' The Way of Shadows to finish- 6 chapters left now. I've been busy doing other things though.
My uncle died on the 26th Jan and it was really sudden, so I've not had the will or the mind to be doing much. Luckily, I've had little work to do though, its about to change. I've an essay to write for Lit Modernism- 2,000 words on Kathrine Mansfield's short stories and her Modernism symbolism.

Guess watching the Corpse Bride has made me lit these. I like candles though, but the only tea light candle holders I have are Halloween ones. Still it doesn't matter, I like Halloween too much. Anyway, the candles are for my uncle tonight.
I've been baking cakes too. This is my latest design; a full moon with bats, misty clouds and stars. I don't think it was cooked in the middle but my housemates still ate it!

So I've not been doing anything else lately, though I've been thinking about giving Bob the cactus his own twitter account, though I've two of my own on the go right now, but it would be easier then his blog! He's doing okay, growing fast, though he still hurts when he gets you, but it seems he likes watching the world go by and everyone hurrying to and throw and missing the simple things as they pass.

So lastly for today, I've been trying to get my TV sorted, by upgrading the channels. It took me awhile to find the channel scanner button though, because this TV is a bit funny. So I found the button and scanned and then the TV lost all the BBC channels. It really loves doing that, so I had to watch the start of Star Wars 4, till I could rescan it again-not that I didn't mind, it's an okay one-and then it did it again! So had to go for the 3rd time luckily step and now I've all the right channels and I'm still watching Jane Eyre!