In my ongoing search for justification, vindication, or to put it blunt: permission to write, I just stumbled across some very wise words by Gregory Orr:
As a poet, I’ve always hated that poetry often intimidates people. May people I know feel that poetry is a test they can only pass if they are smart enough or sensitive enough and most fear they will fail. Many refuse the test altogether – never read poetry – for fear of failure.
Somehow something has gone wrong with poetry in our culture. We have lost touch with its purpose and value, and in doing so, we have lost contact with essential aspects of our own emotional and spiritual lives.
There is something special about poetry (…), but it is not what most people think. It’s not that poetry is written by very intelligent people or very sensitive people and is appreciated only by others of equal intelligence and sensitivity. What’s special is quite the opposite of this elitist notion of poetry. What’s special is that poetry is written down or composed in every culture on the planet at this moment – …
Gregory Orr, Poetry As Survival
sub rosa 
Great quote, and I couldn’t agree more! I hate when people dismiss poetry as stuffy or boring…what do they think music is made of?
Great quote, and I couldn’t agree more! I hate when people dismiss poetry as stuffy or boring…what do they think music is made of?
I think the link to music is very obvious, but still very often forgotten –
Sigrun,
Poetry seems like a form of telepathic communication. Transmission of thoughts absent anything superfluous.
Thank you,
Jerry
YES!
I love Orr’s work, have been following his poetry for many decades. Good prose writer and excellent teacher.
“poetry is written down or composed in every culture on the planet at this moment”…the “at this moment” part is what’s so sweet.
Your high score on Goodreads was one of the reason I started reading this book
🙂
I’m not disappointed!
I’m glad!
I absolutely love this. This notion of elitism, perpetuated in, for example, the all-too-often unbearable poetry published in, say, The New Yorker, is the pits. Here’s to a revolution in the perception of poetry! Not just for the myopic flower-sniffers anymore! (That said, I am very much a myopic flower-sniffer.)
🙂
…no matter what the route. Agreed!