[New-Poetry] When poems leave you speechless

[Bob Grumman]

I think you've shown us this once before, Hal.  Anyway, it IS 
interesting.  What strikes me is that there's no mention of beauty or 
aesthetics.  There's "philosophy," which may be thought to have to do 
with "truth."  Strangely, from someone supposedly representing the wilds 
of contemporary poetry, it's almost entirely verbal.  He lists "visual 
shape," but nothing else having to do with the visual potential of a 
poem, and--unless I missed it--nothing about the direct use of science 
in poetry (or even of science as subject matter, which is entirely 
different).  The computer doesn't exist so far as this list is 
concerned.  He leaves out the many specific pluraethetic devises I'd 
have on such a list, like intra-syllable flow-break (to mention a minor 
one).  In summation, I'd say (going by this list) he's probably a good 
twenty years ahead of Kirsch and the NY Times, but a generation behind 
what the most innovative poets are doing nowadays.

I know he knows more than this list shows,  but the list suggests an 
incomplete severance from poetic conventionality--verbocentricity, to be 
precise.  Lots of good current poetry is all words, but not as much of 
half the best current poetry is (if you believe the best poetry ought to 
do more than repeat the subjects and handling of some previous 
generation's poetry).

--Bob G.