Maybe We Shouldn't Read Poetry

I think we may be approaching this poetry thing all wrong.

Way back in the day, poetry was some blind dude telling you stories (Homer). These days, we think of it as a column of words in a book you read. I'm not talking about content. I couldn't care less whether poets are talking about sunsets, wheelbarrows, people in jail, or whatever else is on their minds.

When Homer was around, people absorbed poetry. It was a primary form of entertainment and history, something that brought people to their feet, cheering (or so I imagine, anyway. I wasn't there). These days, you kind of nod to yourself and turn the page. If you're that girl in a poetry class I took, you make a copy of it and hang it on your wall. I once took someone's magnet words, found on their refrigerator, and rearranged some into the sentence, "My memory walks upon sunsets in wonder." Poetic, no? Some people would argue it doesn't mean anything. I would argue it's pretty.

A poetic sentence on a refrigerator is as useful as the cherry blossom trees on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. I've heard they look beautiful when they bloom, and they are all over the place. They probably make some people stop, take a picture, post it to their Facebook.

But it's only refrigerator poetry.

Those cherry blossom trees don't provide cherries. And they also don't smell. They look pretty, but they don't embrace their potential as cherry trees (I'm ignoring biology, stay with me here). A line of poetry on your refrigerator doesn't change your life. A column of text in a book can, but it's unlikely. That's because you shouldn't read poetry.

Poetry should be listened to.

It should be absorbed through the skin and the ears, you should want to repeat the words to taste them on your mouth. If you go to YouTube, you can see poetry while you hear it, watch images swell beneath the words spoken aloud. I highly recommend this use of YouTube.

Poetry is part music. It is what gave birth to lyrics, and it is a sibling of written prose. We should be able to hear that music--the stressed syllables, the sounds of the letters, the pauses and tempo switches--while we soak in the meaning of the words. That's when you're doing poetry right. If you aren't listening to it, you are getting only half the poem. You're getting a cherry blossom tree instead of a full cherry tree.

I realized this only just the other day, after being told it by nearly all my English professors in college. This video is what brought it to me. Think how weak this poem would be, in comparison, if it were read silently. Perhaps if we were taught in school to listen to poetry, instead of taught to read it, we would enjoy it more. Perhaps things would be just a little bit different.