[New-Poetry] RE: Re: Substitution of Terms

[Crisman Cooley]

Paying attention to the pleasure one feels during sensual experiences  
(that is, while experiencing sense images) is very close to the  
meaning of the sanskrit word "kama".  Practicing kama may seem facile  
in contemporary art because of its close association with "beauty"  
and the denigration of the beautiful in almost all art of 20C (few  
cursory examples that come to mind: criticism by various people of  
work of Mapplethorpe and Morton Feldman for being "too beautiful",  
Picasso through de Kooning's slaughter of the female form, etc.), but  
I would argue that it is essential to recent poetry (example:  
Creeley's praise of Olson) and future non-Eliotian poetries.  All  
"negative numbers" (which I spose would mean images that cause pain)  
that Kafka mentions could be represented in comedy.  (At least if,  
like me, you're bored by the belief of some Buddhists, Puritans and  
confessional poets that "life is suffering".)  Representing the  
entire universe of sense images as beautiful and hilarious, I think,  
will be made by contrary trends in 20C poetry (as well as performing  
and visual arts) to appear quite new.

> Date: Tue, 19 Jun 2007 13:14:41 -0500
> From: "Skip Fox" <skip at louisiana.edu>
> Subject: RE: [New-Poetry] Re: Substitution of Terms
> To: "'NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &amp;	Views'"
> 	<new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu>
> Message-ID: <000001c7b29d$baab0c10$f4954682 at win.louisiana.edu>
> Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="us-ascii"
>
> Just by way of standard definition, imagery is limited to  
> "representation
> through language of sense experience" (Perrine freshman text). It  
> goes on:
>
> <snip>
>
> The word _image_ perhaps most often suggests a mental picture--and  
> _visual_
> imagery is the kind of imagery that occurs most frequently in  
> poetry. But an
> image may also represent a sound (_auditory imagery_); a taste  
> (_gustatory
> imagery_); touch, such as hardness, softness, wetness, or heat and  
> cold
> (_tactile imagery_); an internal sensation, such as hunger, thirst,  
> fatigue,
> or nausea (_organic imagery_); or movement or tension in the  
> muscles or
> joints (_kinesthetic imagery_).
>
> <snip>
>
> Perrine (or Arp) then goes on to allow for the possibility of more  
> than
> "five or even six senses," which certain psychologists allow for.
>