Comments on: What is poetry? And does it pay?

What is poetry? And does it pay?

oldleada — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:14:15 -0800

Are bad dreams good? Is "Bad Dreams Are Good" good? Is Joni Mitchell a poet?

By: The World Famous

The World Famous — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:16:08 -0800

She wrote it in the future, so she's not only a poet, she's a time traveler. But doesn't this question belong in AskMe?

By: dismas

dismas — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:18:05 -0800

there ain't no money in poetry that's what makes the poet free but I've had all the freedom I can stand...

By: nasreddin

nasreddin — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:28:15 -0800

No.

By: dersins

dersins — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:31:50 -0800

"Bad Kale is Good" Little leaf all green and ruffled, garnishing my plate; You made my meal look nice and pretty, Even (dare I?) great. You sat atop the peas and carrots (Or, under you, they hid). I hope I never try to eat you... Oh my gosh-- I did!

By: Kinbote

Kinbote — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:32:50 -0800

No, but W.S. Merwin didn't shag himself 3/4's of the way through CSNY.

By: Iridic

Iridic — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:37:41 -0800

I think I prefer "Both Sides Now."

By: RokkitNite

RokkitNite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:48:00 -0800

Stripped of musical accompaniment, most successful lyrics become, at best, doggerel. The skills needed for being a good lyricist are not the same as those needed for being a good poet (although there's some crossover, obviously). I mean, as a poem, this really, really sucks. As song lyrics - I guess they might work.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:49:58 -0800

Joni Mitchell commands, I believe, a certain amount of respect for writing a good number of very lovely songs over the years. For taking unexpected artistic chances throughout her career that, even when they didn't necessarily work so well, were always brave and forward-looking. But she also was one of the key, original perpetrators of a certain type of navel gazing me-me-me-and-my-feelings-feelings-feelings sort of songwriting that was only made tolerable due to the high level of musical expression and craftsmanship she possessed, and of course her crystalline voice, which, before tobacco had taken its slow and steady toll, had an amazing range and clarity. But in recent years she's become one cranky old lady indeed. Seems like every interview of hers is full of bitter musings and contemptuous remarks on today's crop of singers and whatnot. I guess unsurprisingly, for someone who wrote that many self-referential songs about their love and their love and their needs and their love, ad nauseum, she comes off as egotistical in the extreme and more than a little judgemental of others. And this latest poem linked here, jeebus, it reads like something a high school student would've written, doesn't it? Embarrassing. I prefer to remember her here, with The Band, doing Coyote.

By: motty

motty — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:54:44 -0800

No it doesn't pay. Yes Joni Mitchell is a poet. Also a better guitarist than most. And singer. Hence the more lyrical nature of her poetry (assuming you are not one that wishes to reduce poetry to some skeletal dry as dust thing that moves nothing and no-one and ends up being successfully parodied by an accidental drunken typo). I'm trying to figure out what that crack about CSNY has to do with the price of eggs and it's hard to come up with anything that makes sense.

By: The World Famous

The World Famous — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:57:37 -0800

Let's compare it to real poetry: Blue Jean. I just met me a girl named Blue Jean. Blue Jean. She got a camouflaged face and no money. Remember: They always let you down when you need 'em. Oh, Blue Jean. Is heaven any sweeter than Blue Jean? She got a police bike. She got a turned up nose.

By: Banky_Edwards

Banky_Edwards — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:06:48 -0800

The cell-phone zombies babble Through the shopping malls While condors fall from Indian skies Whales beach and die in sand Please, please, please tell me this is some kind of meta-parody of what unbelievably trite poetry looks like. Oh, how I wish I had never clicked that link. It's like finding out that the goatse guy is actually Elvis Costello.

By: Kattullus

Kattullus — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:19:12 -0800

I never thought I'd live to see this day, bad poetry in The New Yorker.

By: bukharin

bukharin — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:23:23 -0800

No, she isn't a poet here. The poem lacks compression, is curiously far from rhythm. Goes to show you how poor the general conception of poetry is when a brilliant lyricist and musician cannot conceive of poetics as anything but soft prose with a hint of rhyme. Poetry should never be far from music. Meter and form provide the container that pressurizes and shapes the liquid thought. Here the words spill out and evaporate in the sun. Well, nice try anyway. I still like her.

By: bukharin

bukharin — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:23:59 -0800

I never thought I'd live to see this day, bad poetry in The New Yorker. Where have you been?

By: Banky_Edwards

Banky_Edwards — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:30:55 -0800

Bukharin - I suspect Kattullus has been attending Sarcasm 101. There may still be time to enroll, get on down!

By: Grod

Grod — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:31:02 -0800

Please read the The Ode Less Travelled by Stephen Fry if you are interested in what makes a poem a poem but also want to stay awake and be entertained.

By: Benny Andajetz

Benny Andajetz — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:33:35 -0800

dismas: Guy Clark. I'm impressed - you must be the other person who listens to him.

By: bukharin

bukharin — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:34:52 -0800

I see, Banky. Sounds grrrreaaat....

By: celerystick

celerystick — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:36:49 -0800

I thought it semi badass in Yeats ian way until the Mighty Mouse part. and I didnt notice it was Joni. Oh Well.

By: caddis

caddis — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:47:35 -0800

They are better, cheaper and safer than bad trips.

By: vronsky

vronsky — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:48:08 -0800

Someone needs to put them in my hand ripe and ready, sun-warmed, to be Laurie Anderson's boyfriend. No googling involved - subscription to the erect toothbrush, like an egg of fire against the cliff behind the whale at speeds of up to this fat old bald guy. My friends in 1830 would have a saying, certain shades of red or gold will always throw things at a laundromat Thanks for having a "phantom" third arm Come up, Kinch! Come up, you fearful jesuit!

By: jfuller

jfuller — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:49:33 -0800

omg, I know they'll never give us William Shawn back but have they dredged up Tina Brown and made her editor again? Joni, when you're good you're very very good; and when you're bad you're horrid. Sigh. Ang here my other fave female popular writer, namely Ursula Le Guin, also broke into the New Yorker and turned in the cleverest NYer-style coming-to-understand story of them all. (Called "Two Stops on the Northern Line" in the magazine, and republished as "Two Delays..." in the collection called The Compass Rose--which just shows she got a good New Yorker editor. Luckier, evidently than Joni.

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:52:41 -0800

vronsky, you little scamp, have you been into the mushroom jar again?

By: vronsky

vronsky — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:55:22 -0800

re your first "Nantucket sleighride" – your whaleboat is dragged behind the whale at speeds of up to 100 words and ideas, often expressed in a bowl of lather on which a mirror and then covered the bowl aloft and intoned: --INTROIBO AD ALTARE DEI.

By: flarbuse

flarbuse — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:58:38 -0800

Are bad dreams good? The answer to this question lies, in a large part, in how bad is defined. If bad here is being used as it is in phrases like "that's one bad motherfucker," then it is clear that bad actually means "good." If bad means "good," then bad dreams must -- by their very definition -- be good. Therefore, using this definition, bad dreams are clearly good. But what if that is not the definition oldleada intended in phrasing this perplexing riddle? What if bad is actually meant to mean "bad." Well, as bad is the opposite of good, then it would seem obvious that bad dreams cannot possibly be good. It would be a contradiction. So now we are looking at two conclusions, and they are the exact opposite of each other. If bad means "good," then bad dreams must be good. If bad means "bad," then bad dreams cannot be good. Or can they? Therein lies the ultimate conundrum presented to us by oldleada. Cannot some things which are bad actually result in something overall being good? If we were to say, "The detonator in the bomb at the orphanage was bad," then wouldn't we really be saying that is a good thing? Very few people think that it is a good thing to blow up an orphanage. As such, a bad detonator turns out to be a very good thing. Can this third ingeniously simple and deceptive use of bad be applied to dreams? Let us see. What makes a dream bad? Usually, we would say that a dream that involves the death of hundreds of people would be a "bad" dream. But what if that dream was really a vision and the dreamer was able to recognize it as such and then prevent the death of hundreds of people? Would that "bad" dream then be considered to be good? oldleada has clearly played us all for fools here. What seemed at first glance to be a pun-like throwaway question may, in fact, be the sort of unsolvable riddle that will lead the greatest of minds to seek solitude in the depths of mind-altering substances. Which will, in turn, cause them to have bad dreams of their own.

By: fingers_of_fire

fingers_of_fire — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 18:14:45 -0800

(For my money, Joni's best lyrics - I'm thinking of "Hejira", "A Strange Boy", and "Refuge of the Road" in particular - are as good as they get, and who cares what you call it? It certainly says something to me about things, in an artistic and rhythmic way. I also think that it is ingeniously coupled with the music. If that qualifies as poetry, then so be it. I actually think it's cooler than poetry. Multi-dimensional.)

By: Iridic

Iridic — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 18:32:29 -0800

have you been into the mushroom jar again? Nope - he's been in the Markov jar. I suppose I was going to need a little explication. Take a poem (preferably a good poem; they have more uses than simple defense— foraging, cooling, courtship, etc). It could be programmed for the U.S. to hit.

By: notsnot

notsnot — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 19:25:29 -0800

Benny andajetz - nope, there's any number of us here. Guy rules.

By: kingfisher, his musclebound cat

kingfisher, his musclebound cat — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 20:13:03 -0800

It's like finding out that the goatse guy is actually Elvis Costello. Please tell me you mean "It would be like finding out that goatse guy is actually Elvis Costello" -- or at least that it was taken "Spike" era.

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 20:25:37 -0800

i'm pretty certain these are song lyrics i'm also pretty certain that none of you have gotten published in the new yorker

By: flapjax at midnite

flapjax at midnite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 20:35:38 -0800

i'm pretty certain these are song lyrics I think you're probably right. But whether it's a song or a poem, it strikes me as pretty awful, either way around. i'm also pretty certain that none of you have gotten published in the new yorker I'm betting this wouldn't have been published in The New Yorker, either, had the author been unknown. I've got songs that are better than this. That's right, even though she's a hugely famous, successful songwriter, I'm going to come right out and say it: a lot better than this. But I wouldn't imagine they'd get published in the New Yorker if I faxed 10 of 'em a day to their offices for the next 10 years. Just saying.

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 21:05:17 -0800

I'm betting this wouldn't have been published in The New Yorker, either, had the author been unknown. just how many unknown authors get into the new yorker? oh, it happens, i'm sure, but not often I've got songs that are better than this. well - we haven't heard the music - i was going to be a smart ass but from what i've heard of your music, i'll admit that you may well have songs that are better she's been very inconsistent since herija and even when she's decent - well, it's not as good as she used to be neither is poetry these days

By: Burhanistan

Burhanistan — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 21:29:08 -0800

Most dreams are your brain an undifferentiated mass. Maybe a little extra for the pounding action on its own self-referential and recursive source. Normal laws of physics are out the bonus/extra services ads sparingly compared to what happened here. Just be interested in things and if your area gets hot or cold, especially if you can usually find a bottle or two about what it seems.

By: stavrosthewonderchicken

stavrosthewonderchicken — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 21:29:36 -0800

Is ketchup a vegetable?

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 21:43:09 -0800

no, it's a fruit

By: hortense

hortense — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 22:15:28 -0800

vintage Joni

By: mecran01

mecran01 — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 22:40:12 -0800

And this latest poem linked here, jeebus, it reads like something a high school student would've written, doesn't it? Embarrassing. I prefer to remember her here, with The Band, doing Coyote. posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:49 PM on September 11 Is nothing sacred in this blue hole of hellishness? You sir are the Martin Amis of music criticism!

By: Kinbote

Kinbote — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 23:22:11 -0800

By: tommyD

tommyD — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 03:12:07 -0800

Anybody here know of any poets anywhere who can write a melody as good as Joni Mitchell's worst song? Joni's problem is that, by the time you realize Hejira is as good as it is, she's already moved on to something else, and you are bummed because it isn't Hejira. So folks get snarky because 'whales beach and die in sand' isn't the coolest, hippest most poetically trendy thing to say. The new album is out in a couple weeks.

By: the sobsister

the sobsister — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 08:08:39 -0800

yeah... I'm a big fan of her recordings--some of them, at any rate--but this poem? lyric? napkin scrawl? just blows. and not in a well-that's-just-your-view kind of way either. it blows in quantifiable, empirically-verifiable ways. why she or The New Yorker wouldn't/couldn't have seen that this just doesn't read well at all, I can't say. It's one thing to want to flog your new album for your target demo, it's quite another to humiliate yourself out of vanity or misplaced pride. ugh.

By: spock

spock — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 08:31:49 -0800

Are bad girls good?

By: Reggie Digest

Reggie Digest — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 09:06:11 -0800

Washed up old hippies Bet they're going to vote for Hillary Clinton

By: Reggie Digest

Reggie Digest — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 09:10:32 -0800

Anyway. Yeah, it's not the best poem in the world, but if she put it to music it might not be half as bad. Her descent into poetical inadequacy isn't nearly as unfortunate as, say, Neil Young's.

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 09:28:30 -0800

except that neil, to my knowledge, hasn't claimed he's writing poetry

By: blucevalo

blucevalo — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 12:35:01 -0800

She's curmudgeonly, she's self-important, she's not released a hgood album in close to 30 years, and I'd love to know what William Shawn would have thought of the New Yorker publishing free verse from the Proud Poetess of Fort Macleod. But I'd still take bad poetry from Joni Mitchell over most of the other content of the New Yorker -- and most other stuff that passes these days for poetry and/or lyrics -- any day of the week. She's right: the cell-phone zombies do babble through the shopping malls.

By: rikschell

rikschell — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 13:22:15 -0800

For reference, here's the other poem in this week's New Yorker: FAME We were at dinner in SoHo and the couple at the next table rose to go. The woman paused to say to me, I just wanted you to know I have got all your cookbooks and I swear by them! I managed to answer her, Ma'am, they've done you nothing but good! which was perhaps immodest of whoever I am. --Les Murray Now that's what I call poetry!

By: pyramid termite

pyramid termite — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 22:29:45 -0800

that's not poetry - it's prose with funny line breaks

By: bukharin

bukharin — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 08:55:55 -0800

that's not poetry - it's prose with funny line breaks thank you, pyramid. you're exactly right.

By: The World Famous

The World Famous — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 10:14:03 -0800

Anybody here know of any poets anywhere who can write a melody as good as Joni Mitchell's worst song? Bob Dylan can. Gord Downie, too.