Science or Art, IP, abab Options

[jgdittier]

Is poetry a science or an art,
its form an inmate's solitary state,
enchained by prose's flavor, naught but tart,
encased in walls of brick or solid slate?

When wisdom rules as commeth forth from mind;
if crystal hard, a mold, no choice allows.
Behold, we've verse of scientific kind,
less choice for guffaws, nor for laughs and howls.

If verse is art, the poet then is free
to entertain us any way his muse
can choose, like Charlie on "Berg's" knee,
and none of Milton's methods man may lose.

May bards e'er be the forces to elate,
humanity's approach to verse, sublime
and pray our minds we vow to never sate
and lose these joys we nurse with beat and rhyme.

note "Berg's" =Edgar Bergin, ventriloquist/humorist,
Charlie McCarthy was his dummy

[Guest_Jox_*]

Hi Ron,

Thanks for your reply.

Sorry, Googling for "goldenquills" doesn't work. It brings just two sites up - one not even in English. I tried entering it as two words and a myriad of sites was then returned and I couldn't see a likely site. You don't have a URL?

I shall have to go to fine your reply to Sylvia.

I don’t think you can draw any conclusion from your mailing to colleges. Teaches receive vast piles of bumph daily and most of it is binned without looking - we simply don’t have time to read-though - or even to bother opening the envelopes. I’m very sorry but I fear that fate probably hit your chapbooks. It is far more likely than they opened them and carefully read through them. I suggest you don’t adopt that technique with educational institutions - they really are bombarded. If you want to get involved, it is likely some would welcome that (if it fits into their programmes) but just drop a line first - you’ll save a fortune!

I think your description of haiku might be a tad off. It is an ancient verse-dorm - though, yes only relatively recently has it been adopted in “The West.” And, though I am out of my depth here, are haikus not R&R - they have set numbers of syllables which (if not written by me) will tend to produce a certain rhythm, will they not?

You talk of “old world devices,” What do you mean please? (I have still to read your reply to Sylvia, so it may be there?)

Cleo has set the parameters for SQs already... but I was only using the SQ as an example, anyway.

Ok, I’ll go hunt down your prose-pose to Sylvia. See you later.

James.