I've seen worse poems win prizes - this one at least displays *some* intelligence and skill - but it is so verbose and gassy and careless that by the time I reached the final stanza, I couldn't forgive the last line. la plus ca change...
Indeed intelligence and skill are "displayed." If the poet had something in addition to intelligence and skill, he wouldn't have to put those things on display.
At first I wondered why you were wasting words on such a bad poem, but I see that it is really just the impetus for a more general discussion. The poem does have some value though, as we learn from bad examples what not to do. The poem has less to do with "the divine afflatus" than with simple terrestrial afflatus. I became actually a bit angry while reading it -- I don't want anyone to write like this, but even more, I don't want anyone to like it. It is understandable that the writer may have a blind spot about his own work, but when others praise it, it feels to me like collusion, like complementing the emperor on his wardrobe.
I agree that contests can be useful for the promotion of poetry, but not when the representative offered to the public is a poem like this one; in this case I suspect it would be rather counterproductive to present this as a poem which might pique the interest of a potential audience. Contests also suffer from a severe case of de gustibus non est disputandum, and I seldom agree well enough with the judges' taste to bother entering anything.
I too do not like this poem but it seems that nobody - not least the judges by the sound of their comments - knows that 'Gods tiny cows' are ladybirds (ladybugs for Americans) .. the poet is looking at an infestation of ladybirds on the ceiling in the first stanza. Once you have this settled then more of the imagery makes sense.
I had no idea, but that does make the image of the honey water click. Although then I wonder how it works with the blank ceiling, though, cause white cows with black spots work better than ladybugs to make that image work
I agree. The bit about the robes shining 'incarnadine' and the bit about them missing their dust and grass once they've come indoors through the window pane solidify the ladybug reading for me!
". . . a record herd of god's tiny cows . . ." I'd rather step in a fresh cow patty than feed on a diet of gasbaggy poems like this. Hey, haters of poetry, you ain't hating it enough if this prize-winner is the best of it. Self-consciously earnest, stridently topical, precious, convoluted--all of this would be tolerable if the language had some zing. But the worst part--ultimately the only thing that matters--is the dulness of the syntax. Drinking game if you want to pass out: Take a shot every time our Prize-Winning Poet uses a preposition. Note to Partridge (!) Boswell: You've used up your lifetime allotment of "of."
When a poet speaks of “the churches of our cars,” and it isn’t quite clear that he has a grasp on the meaning of “decimate,” you can be fairly sure that all of the surrounding matter will be no more than the effluvia of exhausted engine expending its energies on getting nowhere.
Why bother? Who talks like that - juxtaposing half-ideas that scream look at me I’m smarter than you - made ya stop & think and you can still barely get half my drift.
Having (ostensible) meaning doesn’t make convoluted language anything other than convoluted language. Honest talent doesn’t do that because they don’t have to. So why bother?
This post reminds me why I freed myself of contests. The times I won a prize I either tailored my writing specifically to what I thought the NFSPS state judges would reward or wrote what I knew to be a total lark
Terrible poem aside - if you have no idea what "collaboration between the poet’s intent and their acquiescence to that which remains uncontrollable" means, perhaps you should make an effort to figure it out, instead of reacting as if your ignorance is actually superior knowledge. You're writing about poetry and the concept of negative capability is too far out for you?
Even if it were the case that's what she meant, which it wasn't, it was still needless jargon. Why not just say negative capability? And doesnt negative capability involve ridding oneself of self consciousness? This poem is nothing but self-consciousness.
Ms. Dickey, rep for Poetry Incorporated, was talking bullshit when she said "acquiescence to that which remains uncontrollable." She's a judge handing out money. She has to say something. Perhaps you should make an effort to figure it out.
Apparently Mr. Charboneau was talking bullshit when he claimed not to know what it means, because now he does, but maybe you're not. Which part didn't you understand?
It's the gestal. I'm sure you know that you can't parse individual words or lines in a poem without losing something of the whole. It's the whole thing. The whole sentence is jargony. You're ignoring the point I'm making about the purple-prose-ness of it.
And don't use foul language in my comments section.
The "analytical philosopher" comment below is on track, I think, but I have a somewhat more charitable reading of the post author's commentary. The phrase from the contest judge is one of those whose meaning is clear if you take a step back and allow yourself to react to the whole of it, but is hard to parse word-by-word. It's rather like a pointillist painting, where the picture can't be found in the dots of color. I suspect that the author came to read the judge's remark after reading the prize winner. Since the prize-winning poem is actually a very bad poem (I think most will agree), it frustrates both styles of reading. No picture emerges from the dots, but neither does a picture emerge when you take a step back and consider the whole.
My reaction when I can't interpret a text holistically is to try the opposite and zoom in on the words to see if I can make sense of things that way. After reading the winning poem, I got stuck in this mode myself and got into a "pissy-parsing" mood of uncharitable close reading. That's the effect it had on me, and I initially reacted to the judge's quote in the same way as the post's author did. But I'm not writing an article about it, so there was time for me to recover my balance and catch on that I was in an uncharitable frame of mind. Things like that are why I don't trust myself to write hot takes. I may just be projecting here of course, but I think I understand why he read that quote the way he did, since I'm subject to the same fault at times.
Why bother? Having some kind of meaning doesn’t make shitty convoluted language anything other than shitty convoluted language, which returns me to why bother
The theme of language's limits is like catnip to bad poets. It's obviously an excuse for their badness. Ironically, with a true command of language, the theme becomes endlessly productive. Think of Dante at the end of the Paradiso, who expresses the inexpressible while pointing to something more that cannot be expressed. Or more prosaically, Whitman reserving the inexpressible to himself and limiting us: You should have been with us that day round the chowder-kettle. "You had to be there" is not effective poetry, except in the hands of master, who makes us imagine the chowder.
I've seen worse poems win prizes - this one at least displays *some* intelligence and skill - but it is so verbose and gassy and careless that by the time I reached the final stanza, I couldn't forgive the last line. la plus ca change...
Yeah, certainly worse out there. I dunno why this one got such a response out of me. Maybe it had just been building up.
Indeed intelligence and skill are "displayed." If the poet had something in addition to intelligence and skill, he wouldn't have to put those things on display.
That last line really got me too.
Both the poem and the article are a cloud of 1/f noise that silences victims.
Agree with you about Larkin’s poem.
Larkin cuts right to it always.
Yes – nothing wasted!
At first I wondered why you were wasting words on such a bad poem, but I see that it is really just the impetus for a more general discussion. The poem does have some value though, as we learn from bad examples what not to do. The poem has less to do with "the divine afflatus" than with simple terrestrial afflatus. I became actually a bit angry while reading it -- I don't want anyone to write like this, but even more, I don't want anyone to like it. It is understandable that the writer may have a blind spot about his own work, but when others praise it, it feels to me like collusion, like complementing the emperor on his wardrobe.
I agree that contests can be useful for the promotion of poetry, but not when the representative offered to the public is a poem like this one; in this case I suspect it would be rather counterproductive to present this as a poem which might pique the interest of a potential audience. Contests also suffer from a severe case of de gustibus non est disputandum, and I seldom agree well enough with the judges' taste to bother entering anything.
It's worth talking about, although there's no shortage of mediocre poetry being elevated by contests.
I only enter my poems where I think there might possibly be a receptive mind on the other end. In the present milieu, I seldom bother.
Me too.
Well said.
Thank you Stourley
I too do not like this poem but it seems that nobody - not least the judges by the sound of their comments - knows that 'Gods tiny cows' are ladybirds (ladybugs for Americans) .. the poet is looking at an infestation of ladybirds on the ceiling in the first stanza. Once you have this settled then more of the imagery makes sense.
I had no idea, but that does make the image of the honey water click. Although then I wonder how it works with the blank ceiling, though, cause white cows with black spots work better than ladybugs to make that image work
I agree. The bit about the robes shining 'incarnadine' and the bit about them missing their dust and grass once they've come indoors through the window pane solidify the ladybug reading for me!
That does make a lot more sense. It's still overwrought, but much more parseable with that key to unlock the meaning.
". . . a record herd of god's tiny cows . . ." I'd rather step in a fresh cow patty than feed on a diet of gasbaggy poems like this. Hey, haters of poetry, you ain't hating it enough if this prize-winner is the best of it. Self-consciously earnest, stridently topical, precious, convoluted--all of this would be tolerable if the language had some zing. But the worst part--ultimately the only thing that matters--is the dulness of the syntax. Drinking game if you want to pass out: Take a shot every time our Prize-Winning Poet uses a preposition. Note to Partridge (!) Boswell: You've used up your lifetime allotment of "of."
When a poet speaks of “the churches of our cars,” and it isn’t quite clear that he has a grasp on the meaning of “decimate,” you can be fairly sure that all of the surrounding matter will be no more than the effluvia of exhausted engine expending its energies on getting nowhere.
The Larkin poem is lovely.
“The Gathering” is a bad poem, chosen, we’re told, from “more than 21,250 entries.”
Bad poetry aside, the contest is ridiculous. Even the fine poems would drown in the flood of entries.
The judges spent too long in the candle section and accidentally ended up picking the worst scent
Why bother? Who talks like that - juxtaposing half-ideas that scream look at me I’m smarter than you - made ya stop & think and you can still barely get half my drift.
Having (ostensible) meaning doesn’t make convoluted language anything other than convoluted language. Honest talent doesn’t do that because they don’t have to. So why bother?
This post reminds me why I freed myself of contests. The times I won a prize I either tailored my writing specifically to what I thought the NFSPS state judges would reward or wrote what I knew to be a total lark
So are you telling me…the emperor…has no clothes?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
No empire either. Just a career of contests.
Excellent.
Terrible poem aside - if you have no idea what "collaboration between the poet’s intent and their acquiescence to that which remains uncontrollable" means, perhaps you should make an effort to figure it out, instead of reacting as if your ignorance is actually superior knowledge. You're writing about poetry and the concept of negative capability is too far out for you?
Even if it were the case that's what she meant, which it wasn't, it was still needless jargon. Why not just say negative capability? And doesnt negative capability involve ridding oneself of self consciousness? This poem is nothing but self-consciousness.
So you do know what she meant? And it's entirely non-jargon. Just normal words anyone should be able to understand.
You must work in academia
Which word gave you trouble? Acquiescence?
You score high on negativity capability.
Ms. Dickey, rep for Poetry Incorporated, was talking bullshit when she said "acquiescence to that which remains uncontrollable." She's a judge handing out money. She has to say something. Perhaps you should make an effort to figure it out.
Apparently Mr. Charboneau was talking bullshit when he claimed not to know what it means, because now he does, but maybe you're not. Which part didn't you understand?
It's the gestal. I'm sure you know that you can't parse individual words or lines in a poem without losing something of the whole. It's the whole thing. The whole sentence is jargony. You're ignoring the point I'm making about the purple-prose-ness of it.
And don't use foul language in my comments section.
I would seriously hope someone who teaches English would not find that sentence difficult to understand. I'll leave it at that.
The "analytical philosopher" comment below is on track, I think, but I have a somewhat more charitable reading of the post author's commentary. The phrase from the contest judge is one of those whose meaning is clear if you take a step back and allow yourself to react to the whole of it, but is hard to parse word-by-word. It's rather like a pointillist painting, where the picture can't be found in the dots of color. I suspect that the author came to read the judge's remark after reading the prize winner. Since the prize-winning poem is actually a very bad poem (I think most will agree), it frustrates both styles of reading. No picture emerges from the dots, but neither does a picture emerge when you take a step back and consider the whole.
My reaction when I can't interpret a text holistically is to try the opposite and zoom in on the words to see if I can make sense of things that way. After reading the winning poem, I got stuck in this mode myself and got into a "pissy-parsing" mood of uncharitable close reading. That's the effect it had on me, and I initially reacted to the judge's quote in the same way as the post's author did. But I'm not writing an article about it, so there was time for me to recover my balance and catch on that I was in an uncharitable frame of mind. Things like that are why I don't trust myself to write hot takes. I may just be projecting here of course, but I think I understand why he read that quote the way he did, since I'm subject to the same fault at times.
Why bother? Having some kind of meaning doesn’t make shitty convoluted language anything other than shitty convoluted language, which returns me to why bother
An excellent demonstration of the lack of negative capability. Thank you.
that bit felt very ‘analytic philosopher disingenuously attempts to read the continentals’
Did you just trick me into reading a poem I would never read past the 3rd line? Did you make me eat my peas one at a time? I think you did.
The theme of language's limits is like catnip to bad poets. It's obviously an excuse for their badness. Ironically, with a true command of language, the theme becomes endlessly productive. Think of Dante at the end of the Paradiso, who expresses the inexpressible while pointing to something more that cannot be expressed. Or more prosaically, Whitman reserving the inexpressible to himself and limiting us: You should have been with us that day round the chowder-kettle. "You had to be there" is not effective poetry, except in the hands of master, who makes us imagine the chowder.
Thank you for introducing me to Larkin’s poem. What an awesome piece.