"On Poetry" by Ai Weiwei

AI Weiwei's "On Poetry" can be found here [link]
 

on the transportive quality of poetry

 

The Chinese artist Ai Weiwei's short statement on poetry found in an issue of Poetry Magazine from a couple of years back was recently brought to my attention. As statements on poetry go I don't think much of it: it's disjointed and a bit pell-mell, and mostly empty rhetoric. But at a couple of places, if we take Ai's words at face value, accept them as they are written, there may be something interesting to be found.

Beginning with the statement in the second paragraph.

Reading Walt Whitman, Pablo Neruda, Federico García Lorca, and Vladimir Mayakovsky at a young age, I discovered that all poetry has the same quality. It transports us to another place, away from the moment, away from our circumstances.

That is a very often seen claim for poetry, that it "transports us to another place." Unfortunately, it's also a very common claim for prose fiction, which right off the top should make the claim suspect as to its value as regards poetry.

And then we also can consider this:

One gloomy January day in 1863, Jean-Louis-Ernest Meissonier, the world's wealthiest and most celebrated painter, dressed himself in the costume of Napoleon Bonaparte and, despite the snowrall, climbed onto the rooftop balcony of his mansion in Poissy.

That's the opening sentence to Ross King's The Judgment of Paris, a book about the rise of Impressionism in painting. It is presenting historical, verifiable fact. And yet, it also can be said to "transport us to another place," making the claim not only trivial about poetry, but one that can't even be limited to literature.

"The Circus Animals' Desertion" by W.B. Yeats

W.B. Yeats’s “The Circus Animals’ Desertion” can be found here [link]
 

the contextual nature of meter in English

 

Trigger warning: this post is about scansion and meter. Results may vary.

 

I want to take a look at one line of verse – at one syllable within the context of one line of verse. It offers what is to me a curious moment within meter in English. The conclusion I will draw from this little excursion is so fundamental it is barely worth being a conclusion. Still, it is a conclusion important enough that it merits being made every now and then. And I do come upon arguments about meter or prosody that fails to hold to this rather fundamental idea. Besides: in the least, everyone needs to see it a first time.

That line of verse is found in the opening stanza of Yeats's "The Circus Animals' Desertion."

I sought a theme and sought for it in vain, I sought it daily for six weeks or so. Maybe at last being but a broken man I must be satisfied with my heart, although Winter and summer till old age began My circus animals were all on show,

Iambic pentameter, the rhyme irrelevant to the discussion. So that we are all on the same page with the scansion, which is not irregular by any means, let me set it out.

i SOUGHT / a THEME / and SOUGHT / for IT / in VAIN, i SOUGHT / it DAI / ly FOR / six WEEKS / or SO. may BE / at LAST / being BUT / a BROK /en MAN i MUST / be SAT / isfied WITH / my HEART, / al THOUGH WIN ter /and SUM /mer TILL /old AGE / be GAN my CIR / cus AN / i MALS / were ALL / on SHOW,

I believe all would agree to this reading. The only real variables are the "maybe" of line 3 (which can be: MAY be / at LAST) and perhaps the "satisfied with" on line 4 (reading it: be SAT / is FIED / with my HEART), though I tend to consider the latter a less satisfactory reading. Both speak in their own way to where I want to go, but I want to focus on another word.