tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post7288366792200348252..comments2023-12-16T02:44:20.427-06:00Comments on Reginald Shepherd's Blog: Short Thoughts on the Long PoemReginald Shepherdhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11965170916626482963noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-47206190130930115522014-12-05T00:24:59.697-06:002014-12-05T00:24:59.697-06:00Yes I always believed that there is a story behind...Yes I always believed that there is a story behind every poem. Even those of the But I am fond of reading of <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/best-short-poems-to-memorize/ranker-books" rel="nofollow">easy poems</a> as they get into head quite easily and you don’t have to use your brains.daisegomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15936584138825779392noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-90412635764066452322007-09-11T09:04:00.000-06:002007-09-11T09:04:00.000-06:00oh, wonderful essay."The Ball Poem" is my favorite...oh, wonderful essay.<BR/><BR/>"The Ball Poem" is my favorite Berryman as well, tied with "Homage to Mistress Bradstreet." I have the book of that title, which contains both.<BR/><BR/>What about Anne Carson's work--obviously Autobiography of Red, but also her longer poems in Glass, Irony and God, or the poetic sequences in Plainwater?Eireannhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05210936853920525091noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-3923713605780681902007-03-03T07:12:00.000-06:002007-03-03T07:12:00.000-06:00I have found that I create short poems over and ov...I have found that I create short poems over and over. I do not know if they should be categorized as drops in the ocean, snapshots or whatever else but if they are I would hope they would be drops with BIG SPLASHES or Snapshots that are in an Art Gallery. I sometimes feel with long poetry you can get lost. I found this blog by trying to find out what is preferred long or short poetry. I am currently in the process of working on my first book and I find myself pondering on the idea of whether people will embrace the shorter version of me or if they would rather stretch me out or BIGGIE SIZE ME!! At any rate I have looked at poets like Maya Angelou and Gwendolyn Brooks and they too had shorter versions of themselves extended out and were considered good poets. SO DOES SIZE REALLY MATTER???Cocoa Butter Girlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03623076862536984678noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-41696312765088216032007-02-26T08:07:00.000-06:002007-02-26T08:07:00.000-06:00I always seem to write longer poems by accident wh...I always seem to write longer poems by accident when I am telling a story and it takes on a life of its own and I stumble along with the verse lines trying to keep up with the vision like trying to steer a wagon pulled by galloping horses in a storm. Since I am a busy man with children and graduate school classes in geographic information science, I find the serial approach works since I forget what I was writing the day before. So I try to keep each story-poem encased in its own mood, style and action. Then I post them all under a collective name, Angeliad of Surazeus. Lucky for me I know database methods so I keep them all in a database which makes for easier presentation on a web site. <BR/><BR/>Simon Seamount<BR/>http://worldchronicle.netSurazeushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09789098306361445130noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-72798619823043385802007-01-30T10:08:00.000-06:002007-01-30T10:08:00.000-06:00Dear Rocco, Thanks very much for pointing me towar...Dear Rocco, Thanks very much for pointing me toward this book, of which I'd heard but which I've not read. I've ordered a copy online, and I'm confident that it will be useful to revisions of this piece. This is a topic over which I will be mulling for some time.<br /><br />And thank you, Henry, for pointing me toward your essay on the long poem, which I found quite interesting. Your thoughts on the long poem being defined as much by content as by form have been quite useful.<br /><br />ReginaldReginald Shepherdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11965170916626482963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-40435238131581941192007-01-27T02:48:00.000-06:002007-01-27T02:48:00.000-06:00"I am an adherent of Keats’s directive that the po..."I am an adherent of Keats’s directive that the poet load every rift with ore, but it’s impossible for the extended lode of the long poem, at least of a through-composed long poem, to be all gold." Christian Wiman had similar things to say about Glyn Maxwell's "The Sugar Mile":<br /><br />http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/09/05/news/bookmar.php<br /><br />Wiman clearly does not believe that "a long poem may gain by the widest possible variations of intensity."Andrew Shieldshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02804655739574694901noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-58780084628897024962007-01-26T16:14:00.000-06:002007-01-26T16:14:00.000-06:00Reginald, I've posted a brief essay, which is not ...Reginald, I've posted a brief essay, which is not exactly a response to yours, but most definitely was "spurred" by it : <br /><br />http://hgessrev.blogspot.com<br /><br />best, HenryHenry Gouldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06763188178644726622noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-48500107361981734902007-01-25T22:03:00.000-06:002007-01-25T22:03:00.000-06:00Let me offer some scattered thoughts athwart this ...Let me offer some scattered thoughts athwart this discussion: taking the Duncan/Spicer/Blaser take on the serial poem, it’s about the poetic impulse overflowing any particular poem, not allowing the individual, integral poem to cut-off the poetic flow. It’s a negotiation through the tension between a principle of poetry not embodied in any poem & individual poems. & what’s nice, it’s not a critical practice, which is where poetry as a principle most often appears. It is poetry that attempts to enact certain ideas rather than talk about them. Such enactment is quite rare.<br /><br />I sympathize w/the practice & the idea behind the practice a great deal, but it’s not as if the principle of poetry is more important than individual poems. This is not a chicken-or-egg story. The poems come first, and ideas of a principle of poetry come after, attempting to make sense of, understand the full import of the poems.<br /><br />Given the various descriptions offered in the post & the comments, it seems that the long poem tends to point away from itself, away from the poem’s poem-ness, toward ideas. So maybe an emphasis on the long poem is actually an evasion of poetry. Perhaps only a writer of great short poems could be a great poet.Lawrence LaRiviere Whitehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00060484548455926167noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-11265779848928177292007-01-25T08:49:00.000-06:002007-01-25T08:49:00.000-06:00I like all the wide-ranging references in this pie...I like all the wide-ranging references in this piece. Elegant writing for blogworld.<br /><br />As an inveterate long-poem addict, I would hesitate to give so much weight to the motive of ambition or machismo, though ambition plays a part, of course ("Fame is the spur", wrote long-poemist Milton).<br /><br />The application of Longenbach's syntax distinctions ('because/and/or') is neat, & maybe helps explain some stylistic differences. But I think the logic of subject-matter or theme is a more important factor in shaping long poems.<br /><br />In other words, I think the long poem is a consequence of a "big idea". Virgil & Milton, in particular, make their defining "arguments" explicit. Just as scientists and philosophers seek elegant explanatory generalizations, the long-poem writer desires, more than anything else, TO TELL US SOMETHING. The long-poem writer has something to say which is so important (to her or him) that it "totalizes" reality : draws all kinds of particulars into its orbit. It's as much a habit of mind as of ambition : a desire to unite the Many and the One. &, as you are at pains to point out, there are risks involved : it's called the "harder they fall" syndrome.Henry Gouldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06763188178644726622noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4014415529871703586.post-65922286242263039812007-01-24T22:58:00.000-06:002007-01-24T22:58:00.000-06:00At least you can aspire to the "long blog post." ...At least you can aspire to the "long blog post." Your post has as many words as some "long poems" do. <br /><br />Which goes to show a long poem is a relative concept, as Conte argues. Often the difference between long and short is a difference of "packaging," in that you could take titles off a series of short poems, put some numbers on them, and voilà, a long poem, divided into numbered sections, is born. Not any more ambitious than the collection of short lyric poems.Jonathanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09371893596402673898noreply@blogger.com