Well, poeisis may be what I'm after,. but if you want to call my poems
prose, then I guess I can't stop you. I would argue that most are in a
form of 'verse' which is the base distinction, since there is poetic
prose, indeed there are prose poems. But my forms of 'verse' tend to
ignore meter, or to play with it to such an extent that only a term
like 'free verse' will do. On the other hand, I agree with Pound that
No verse is free for the person who knows that s/he is doing.
And I certainly would argue for rhythm rather than meter, but I might
agree that poetry tends to have 'measure' which is not necessarily
meter as you seem to be defining it. Again, wcwwilliams is one figure
to point to here.
Doug
On 3-Aug-05, at 9:24 AM, Marcus Bales wrote:
>> On 2-Aug-05, at 10:27 AM, Marcus Bales wrote:
>
> On 3 Aug 2005 at 8:47, Douglas Barbour wrote:
>> I'd simply say here, Marcus, that you are making a distinction, but
>> it's between 'verse' & 'prose':
>
> No, I'm aware of the attempts to make that distinction, but to make
> that
> distinctions just enshrines more brightly the word "poetry" as an
> honorific. My purpose here is to distinguish poetry from prose as we
> distinguish carpentry from masonry -- not to disparage one or elevate
> the other, but rather, instead, only to distinguish them.
>
> If you hold that we need not distinguish them, then, of course, you
> won't
> mind if I call your work "prose" in the least because in your lexicon
> there's no difference -- right?
Douglas Barbour
11655 - 72 Avenue NW
Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9
(780) 436 3320
We both know the reason why you called
So stop wastin’ time tryin’ to soften up my fall
I know you wanna sweeten up the taste
But if you don’t mind I’ll just take my sorrow straight
Iris DeMent
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