This article won’t get many shares on Facebook. I see the articles that get lots of shares: articles written by concerned and knowledgeable millenials ranging from topics about political and social issues to articles spelling out lessons we can all learn from "Finding Nemo." Needless to say, this article won’t be one of them. I’d be lying if I told you I don’t care about shares – I do, but not enough to change what I write about to tell people the things they want to hear. Instead, I’m going to write about what I want to write about: poetry – a dying art in today’s fast-paced, nigh-illiterate society. That is why this article won’t get many shares … and I’m OK with that.
Poetry is an ancient art; it comes from the melodies we perceive in others, the world around us or ourselves. The poet transcribes this melody and, in doing so, turns cacophony to symphony, thereby giving us a focused picture of the melodies of the world, set to rhyme and meter. Why, then, is it unpopular in today’s world? A combination of things puts a wall around poetry and makes it inaccessible to all but a few…
First, the fact that many people have had bad experiences in high school or college with poetry makes it seem less appealing later on in life. All students learn to associate the things taught in a class with the person who taught them. So if a high school English teacher was bad, then so too is the poetry he or she taught. Such a reason is easily seen as illogical upon consideration and should therefore become a nonissue.
Second, the language used in the famous poems of old use a slightly different type of English than we are accustomed to today. This is an easy issue to fix: simply substitute words like “thy” or “wilt” with the modern synonyms of “your” and “will.” Before too long, your brain will learn to read it all as the same thing.
Third, there is a stigma surrounding poetry that whispers to the possible reader that poetry is boring and irrelevant. A rather comical reason with a rather simple solution: read it. If you read and, more importantly, understand a poem that is almost universally hailed as interesting and still think it’s boring, then perhaps your brain just doesn’t mesh well with this particular style of art. I understand that phenomenon completely. For example, of all the different types of art, I understand dancing the least. I don’t get why people are into it, I’m not good at it and I don’t feel emotionally moved when I watch other people do it (unless somebody is grinding dirty to some Tyga or something … I can feel that sometimes). Even though I don’t understand dancing, I still respect it as an art form. I’m not writing to convince everyone to read poetry for two hours each day – I’m writing to encourage people who have never tried it to try it.
Finally, there are just people who don’t like to read. This is perhaps the greatest inhibitor of all – after all, why should I read poetry if I don’t even like to read novels? The greatest way to overcome this is by looking at a poem; most of them are shorter than a page. People don’t like reading because it’s boring and takes time. Fortunately, most poetry is short enough that it won’t bore you and doesn’t take enough time to make an impact on your day.
I hope that you, whoever you are (probably just my mom), have been convinced to at least try to read poetry. And here is a link if you need a source to find good poetry.
