Life in the Cereal Aisle

the poetic line

 

I want to posit a question. Or posit an idea that in itself presents a question. Perhaps many questions. It depends on how seriously you take the idea of the poetic ear.

Take this phrase that I have been playing around with (unfortunately to little fruition):

time well spent in the cereal aisle

Except, that's not the phrase I'm playing with. This is:

time spent well in the cereal aisle

There is a world of difference between those two phrases, entirely because of how they work on the ear. The latter has an aural resonance that is wholly lacking in the former. Why? What am I talking about? Break it down:

time spent well in the cereal aisle spent well ------- cereal aisle speh / ell ---------- see / ayl seh / ell ----------- see / ayl

So that you can read it without going back up, and hear what is going on:

time well spent in the cereal aisle

vs.

time spent well in the cereal aisle

Do you hear the aural construction that is created by reversing the order of "well spent"?

"Eviction Notice" by Dan Gerber -- Verse Daily, 2/8/13

from Sailing Through Cassiopeia (Copper Canyon Press)
poem found here
 

first lines:
The spider from the rug suddenly
Wondered where he was
 

line breaks

-- edited 5/23/13
-- reformatted 12/10/2013
 

There's a couple of moments in this poem worth exploring, commenting on, critiquing: the "suddenly" in the first line (rhythm and semantics); whether line three needs desperately to be deleted as cheap gimmick; whether the "on" in "on which" is incorrect; possible syntax problems. But I will limit myself to line breaks, considering the post on today's Poetry Daily offering, below. The two poems create a great compare/contrast, worth the reader's exploration.

This poem has very strong, very punched line breaks, and pretty much on every line. It has the effect of making every line distinct (especially in that every line is a single, simple phrase), and it is difficult for me not to put near-emphatic pauses between the lines. A very different effect that goes to amping up a touch the humor of the last lines. Is it wholly successful? I don't think it wholly successful: the lines are too punchy to me. But, perhaps, that is more a result of the other clumsinesses in the poem. (I can't quite decide as of yet.)

Nonetheless, the poem makes for interesting exploration set beside "Nostalgia™," on Poetry Daily (subject of my post previous). Totally different approach to line endings: subtle manipulation there versus hammer-like pounding here. Not saying one is better than the other: that would be absurd, as the question of success of either approach lies wholly within the poem at issue. But interesting contrast nonetheless, worth contemplating.

"Nostalgia™" by Robert Hershon -- Poetry Daily, 2/8/13

from Goldfish and Rose (Hanging Loose Press)
poem found here
 

first lines:
At Uncle Li's
Golden Lotus New
 

the poetic ear (and line breaks)

— edited 5/23/13
— reformatted, minor edits 12/10/2013
— This post has been added to the "Best of the PDC" page on my Hatter's Cabinet site.
 

Good fortune that this poem follows behind "Geckos in Obscure Light," two days ago, and my comment about punchline poems, which I can now amend: there is nothing wrong with punchlines in a poem, if you are telling a joke.

Nothing to complain about with this little poem. The rhythm of the last three lines of the first stanza feels a little off to me with the present line endings -- I've spent a few minutes now exploring alternatives. But that's for discussion about rhythms and sound and line endings, a discussion that usually comes to a positive net result (and inevitable between poets with sensitive ears). Love the break up of the opening lines and continue to all the way up to those last three.

And then there is that line break after the "to" in the middle of the second stanza. Which wholly works, because the break is to a purpose that is natural to and an inherent extension of the poem: something nice to see what with my having seen so many poets justify their ending a line with a preposition with pedantic mantras taught them at their workshops and MFAs, yet who are utterly oblivious to a fundamental critique: it sounds terrible. That is, unless that awkwardness of sound is, as here, being put to a purpose.

Let's propose a couple natural laws, to wit, of poetic sound:

• There is no excuse for not developing your poetic ear (which includes not just sound but rhythm).
• There is no substitute for developing your poetic ear.
• The poetic ear is essential to poetic sophistication (insofar as there is any aural aspect to the poet's work).
• The sophisticated, developed poetic ear always trumps a poetic technique or rule (which means realizing workshop/MFA taught technique is ersatz poetics and little more -- read Gombrich's Art and Illusion, especially as concerns schema).
• Line breaks are unavoidably part of the aural experience of a poem. When they are not, it is with poems that are little more than paragraphs with close margins, left justified. And such poems may technically be poems, but they are nearly invariably not that terribly much of a poem, and are, thus, mostly disposable. (If not ignorable.)
• Ergo, a poet must pay attention to the aural aspects of line breaks.

Yes, Virginia, there is talent necessary to poetic sophistication, just as with everything else in the world. And if A.E. Housman says your line break is clumsy, shove your workshop wisdom deep in your pocket and read and read and more importantly study and study (perhaps I should say sing and sing?) until you can hear that clumsiness too. There's a lot to learn about line endings in comparing this poem with less successful (or flat bad) poems. I recommend the effort.

 
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I could also talk about the ideation, and want to. This little joke-poem (I mean that in the good sense) would make for a great class discussion about literary ideation (and how not to screw it up). But enough for one post, except to say I laughed. Out loud.