Religion and Poetry

[JS]

I've been writing, publishing, and teaching poetry for almost thirty years now, so you'd think I could be more articulate about this good question than I'll probably manage to be. I don't know that I think that a religious belief or experience is either a sufficient or necessary condition for a good poem, but my experience is that writing or reading a good poem produces the state of mind that I think I was supposed to feel in church, but never did. It has something to do with the sense that words can take you so far, and then they have to become a means for going farther, without actually saying what they mean. (See what I mean about being inarticulate on this subject?)

There was a recent column in American Poetry Review that argued that spirutality and poetry needed a divorce. It really irritated me, which was, I guess, a way of discovering how close I think the connection can be.

[Dale]

I don't read much poetry because I just can't understand it. ....

That's a thing I'm really interested in. There is no doubt in my mind that the inaccessibility of poetry drives most readers away. Even as someone who write, edits, and publishes the stuff, I encounter plenty of poetry that is really incomprehensible to me. However, the incomprehensible stuff comes to me in two basic categories: Poetry that uses language so obscure and odd that it feels kind of like a verbal Rubik's Cube...like the reader is supposed to slowly and carefully "solve it." I HATE that. The other category is poetry that uses language that is beautiful in and of itself and really isn't necessariliy meant to serve up any particular meaning. I just think of it as something like music. I love a lot of music which doesn't necessarily mean anything.

On the other hand, I don't think poetry is really poetry when is so flat and transparent (to mix metaphors?) that there's no mystery to it all. A lot of the ability to really appreciate poetry exists in people who embrace, or a least tolerate, a lot of ambiguity and mystery in life, which is not unrelated to the original question about poetry and religion.

A poem, to me, is a bit like a joke. If the point of the joke is easy and obvious, it's not funny. If it takes too long and too much effort to "get" the joke, it's not funny. The sweet spot in between is when it takes the mind just the right amount of "search time" to get it.



Dale

[Dale]

Poetry => boring drivel
Religion => boring infantile superstitious drivel



djm

What an annoying post.

[SteveShaw]

I keep thinking that poetry, a bit like Mozart's operas and Bach's cantatas, is something that may serve me well when I get a bit older. When I try to read poetry of any substance (er, longer poems) I nearly always find it hard work but very occasionally an idea will be expressed in a beautiful way that I could never have imagined - gets to "the heart of things" - and that pulls me up in my tracks. I think my brain needs "refining" into poetry before I'll be able to appreciate it fully. That probably means reading it a lot more than I do and having an open mind. I'm not at all religious to say the least, but I would be annoyed if it were suggested that this stunted my ability to have a spiritual side to my nature. I love to visit old churches and cathedrals, see religious works of art and listen to sacred medieval music and the great masses and other religious choral works of Bach, Mozart and Beethoven.

Steve

[I.D.10-t]

I don't read much poetry because I just can't understand it. ....

That's a thing I'm really interested in. There is no doubt in my mind that the inaccessibility of poetry drives most readers away from it. Even as someone who write, edits, and publishes the stuff, I encounter plenty of poetry that is really incomprehensible to me. However, the incomprehensible stuff comes to me in two basic categories: Poetry that uses language so obscure and odd that it feels kind of like a verbal Rubik's Cube...like the reader is supposed to slowly and carefully "solve it." I HATE that. The other category is poetry that uses language that is beautiful in and of itself and really isn't necessariliy meant to serve up any particular meaning. I just think of it as something like music. I love a lot of music which doesn't necessarily mean anything.

On the other hand, I don't think poetry is really poetry when is so flat and transparent (to mix metaphors?) that there's no mystery to it all. A lot of the ability to really appreciate poetry exists in people who embrace, or a least tolerate, a lot of ambiguity and mystery in life, which is not unrelated to the original question about poetry and religion.

A poem, to me, is a bit like a joke. If the point of the joke is easy and obvious, it's not funny. If it takes too long and too much effort to "get" the joke, it's not funny. The sweet spot in between is when it takes the mind just the right amount of "search time" to get it.



Dale

I was going to say what’s not to get and give the example of
i sing of Olaf glad and big and then reread it and can see that it hits right in the middle of Dale's joke analogy (for me). Not Ralph Waldo Emerson and not Dr. Seuss, right in the middle.

[missy]

I don't mind poetry that has some type of "scheme" to it - some type of meter, some type of rhyming convention, etc.
What I don't get is the "free verse" style of poetry. There's a person that comes to our Ceilidhs (I know I spelled that incorrectly!) that reads this type of poetry when her turn comes around. I just don't "get" it as poetry - I can't see how it's any different then just writing.

I'm not into snapping my fingers in appreciation, either!

[Lorenzo]

I use to draw inspiration from both religious verse and secular poetry. I can see a similarity. Maybe it's the use of parallels between God, Nature, and the human being that offers insight into the meaning of life that we search for. I'll admit that some of my favorite poets are probably non-belivers, from what I can tell, and I've often wondered about that. And I've noticed that even a great poem from an agnostic can pull on the heart strings as well as any religious verse...at least for me.

I still don't know how anyone can read a poem like The Tuft of Flowers without feeling something that transforms the heart.

[fearfaoin]

I approach both poetry and religion from a logical standpoint. Both, to
me, contain puzzles that can be solved with some serious thinking.
In both cases, I may come to different conclusions at different times.
Also, with both, it has to hold my interest for me to bother trying to
solve it.

I've recently become more attuned to the poetry in song lyrics.
Sometimes lyrics, like bad poems, are infantile, or annoying
(Michael Cretu's lyrics on any of the later Enigma CDs are
rediculous), and sometimes they are fascinating. Some lyrisists,
such as Beck, Lisa Loeb, and occasionally even Eminem, do not
worry much about content, but are trying to paint an abstract
picture that fits a rhythmic pattern, like the late poet Gertrude Stein
(I know, there's a lot of cultural backlash against a certain rapper,
but somtimes you have to discuss things dispassionately).
Some songwriters use imagery that's worthy of the greats. Dylan
springs to mind, but even Aerosmith can occasionally turn a phrase
into a puzzle of poesy:

• I majored in Love
  But in all minor keys
  'Cause falling in love is hard on the knees.

Likewise, you can find a lot of fascinating puzzles in religious study
that are interesting even (maybe especially) if you have no personal
stake in the beliefs.

[susnfx]

Where's "not religious, likes poetry except modern"??

At the risk of getting myself at least temporarily tossed into C&F Outer Darkness or something, I don't care at all for the type of poetry in the Right Hand Pointing stuff. It reminds me of the 60s when to say anything totally off the wall was frequently met with a slow stare and a long drawn-out "Wwwwoooowww. That was so groovy, man." *taps on bongos*

I love poetry but if I have to work too hard at understanding what in the h*ll the author is talking about, I'll skip it in frustration.

"Dude," she said as she walked into the yellow storm,
"You're turning into the brownness I feel around me."
The walls became filmy and we rode the fathomless waves
Into yesterday's thoughts and tomorrow's nothingness.

*taps on bongos*

Susan

[jsluder]

I had to vote "other". I used to be quite religious (during my high school and college years), but I'm not so much any more. I like some poetry, but I rarely read it.

[JS]

Sheesh, you'd think fans/practitioners of one marginal art form would be a tad more tolerant of another, eh? How many folks dismiss trad music with "it all sounds alike" or by coming up with some stereotype about its roots or performers, or by complaining that they miss in it what's already familiar to them or that it requires a little patience and knowledge to get it? Contemporary poetry is a tremendously varied piece of turf, including formalists as well as excellent free verse poets, visionaries, confessional types, and rationalists. You might want to give it a fair shot before you shoot.

[brewerpaul]

I get the feeling that a lot of poetry is more for the poet than the audience. This is not a bad thing-- the act of setting down one's feelings about a particular subject is a very focussing thing. However, it doesn't always transfer over to other people.

[susnfx]

You might want to give it a fair shot before you shoot.

I have. I've read tons of it. Same conclusion--for me personally, you know.

Susan

[Cynth]

I don't read much poetry because I just can't understand it. ....

That's a thing I'm really interested in.

I find this problem interesting too. I feel as though I can understand why or, at least, that people would love poetry even though I don't seem to be able to become involved with it.

However, the incomprehensible stuff comes to me in two basic categories: Poetry that uses language so obscure and odd that it feels kind of like a verbal Rubik's Cube...like the reader is supposed to slowly and carefully "solve it." I HATE that. The other category is poetry that uses language that is beautiful in and of itself and really isn't necessariliy meant to serve up any particular meaning. I just think of it as something like music. I love a lot of music which doesn't necessarily mean anything.

My reaction to the presence of words has always been that they should be meaning something. I don't seem to be very sensitive to the sounds of words. I have read things about prose writing that make me realize I also miss out on that aspect of prose. So even though I read a great deal, and sometimes I do read things that are very well written, my mind seems to be unaware of the sounds the words would make. It is connected only to the ideas---and I know the sounds could have something to do with the ideas, so I consider it a problem. I might enjoy the puzzle sort of poem, but I have never understood one (I haven't read that many really) well enough to know where to start or if it is a puzzle.

When I listen to music, I do not seem to have the same problem. I don't have to discern some sort of story in the music or attach a particular emotion to it, although one might sometimes. The sounds alone can be enough to make my hair stand on end. Although I have noticed that I am very attached to the Western European (I think) idea of music's going someplace, of having a landing place, of sounding as though it is on the way to something, if this makes sense. I have difficulty with music that doesn't have this quality.

I didn't think I had this problem (needing a "meaning") when I looked at paintings and pictures, something I very much enjoy, but I think I do because completely abstract images rarely move me. I can't just look at colors or forms and be moved although I think I can appreciate that aspect of a powerful image as part of what makes it so striking. I used to be very interested in Amish quilts. They are geometric designs made of the most astounding color choices. I would spend hours looking at pictures of them. There are actually abstract paintings which are very similar. I do not respond to the paintings at all. They seem meaningless and uninteresting to me. This is one of the great mysteries of my life.

On the other hand, I don't think poetry is really poetry when is so flat and transparent (to mix metaphors?) that there's no mystery to it all. A lot of the ability to really appreciate poetry exists in people who embrace, or a least tolerate, a lot of ambiguity and mystery in life, which is not unrelated to the original question about poetry and religion.
Dale

I had not thought about this idea of "ambiguity". It is interesting. I am troubled by ambiguity---uncertainty about how to interpret something or how to feel about something. I don't mean that I think everything can be explained, that would be silly. But, for example, if a story ends on an ambiguous note, I am actually quite upset.

From the point of view of one who does not read poetry, it seems to require a certain patience---I think it would not seem that way to those who really love to read poetry just as there are things I like to do that other people can't imagine having the patience for. I'm not sure the type of patience one has can be changed. On the other hand, sometimes disciplining one's self to do something can lead to great rewards. So I think that there is an intellectual laziness involved there too.

The teaching of literature and poetry in school can affect people I think. I came out of high school thinking that if you read a great book once, you either got it or you didn't. The teacher would ask what the mast on the ship symbolized without going through the thought process that might lead to an answer, and if you didn't know it meant you were hopeless (I thought then). I came out of college thinking the same thing about poetry. The teacher would ask what the drop of dew on the leaf symbolized, again without going through the process of how to think about what one has read, and it was all downhill from there. I know better now. One can read for different reasons. You can read a work of literature once simply for the enjoyment of it. Or you can study and think about it, which is work, for an even greater enjoyment. I think the same must be true of poetry---although I do seem to get stuck at the reading it once for enjoyment part. And here I am back where I started.

[JS]

Worth noting that we've shifted, if not quite hijacked the topic here from the original question about poetry and religion. My fault, partly.

Here's a bit of John Clellon Holmes describing what he sensed in Jack Kerouac's stories, that they "seemed to be describing a new sort of stance toward reality, behind which a new sort of consciousness lay." The charm of that sort of expression--the charisma--is something that seems to me common to poetry, to religious movements, to music when these are taken seriously as a means of changing or affirming or understanding life, not as entertainment or habit. You can debate whether a particular artist or genre or revelation does it for you, but that isn't really the point--it's an either-you-get-it-or-you-don't phenomenon.

The Holmes quote is from Ann Charters' intro to "The Portable Beat Reader."