"Poetry? I just don't get it..."

It is difficult

 to get the news from poems, 

                   yet men die miserably every day 

                                  for lack 

of what is found there.

                            William Carlos Williams

  

Poetry? For most, it comes from a galaxy far, far away; written by people long, long ago. And yet there are thousands of poetry books, chapbooks, and broadsides that keep sliding down the chute. And thousands more literary journals and online magazines, all publishing poems, all hosting competitions.

Thousands write poems…but who actually reads or listens to it? Not many. Pretty much the only audience out there for poetry is other poets. It is a very insular world, one that seems to purposefully exclude the non-poet. I think this is mostly because most contemporary poetry is incomprehensible to the non-poet. But with a just a bit of explanation from the poet, many poems become more accessible. It doesn't mean they aren't still a little strange and 'hard'. Here's what the great American bard William Carlos Williams once said about this:
 
I wanted to write a poem
that you would understand.
For what good is it to me 
if you can't understand it? 
But you got to try hard –

                            from” January Morning”

                            

Indeed. But you don’t need to attend an MFA program in poetry for two years in order to gain admission into the dark, rapturous, goofy, and strange theme park of Poetry Land. Below are links from the infrequently appearing section I call: “Poetry? I Just Don't Get It.” They each contain one poem, along with an explanation by the poet.

Michaela Kahn: If I ring my body like a bell of coins...

Erling Friis-Baastad: Andalusian Poems

Gretchen Primack: The dogs and I walked our woods...

Miriam Sagan: Diamond Tsunami

Mark Pawlak: Among the Colleagues

Alejandro Escudé: A Bird, A Prowler

Andres Rojas: From the Lost Letters to Matias Perez, Aeronaut

Lissa Kiernan: Poems from Glass Needles & Goose Quills  

Paul B. Roth: Deafening Music

Bill Cushing: Two Stairways

Donna Fleischer: insert poetry everywhere anywhere here