The poetic is more than the shape? The shape is merely an extension of the
main trope in the poem, it signals, and that trope is connected with the
spiritual message. But I suppose this goes back to that old, old discussion
about form and content --a dualism that has its critics...
Otherwise you reduce the poem to a word puzzle or shape --which Herbert
would have disapproved of. And certainly in an oral based society like
Herbert's the poem would have been read out. Perhaps you might consider that
point --and the one mentioned before, Andrews is an effective reader of his
one column poems --in the latter is it his reading that compensates the
reader/listener?
My twin brother who is an Anglican vicar --would certainly argue likewise
regarding the spiritual element and its connection with the poetic. But I
suppose religion has nothing to do with a poem like Easter Wings. . .
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