Poetry and "Poetry"

Yeah, I've missed half of National Poetry Month. Going to miss the other half, too, I'm afraid. But if participating in our month in the public eye means being lumped in with the likes of Snooki and Dr. Oz, I'd just as soon spend the time on my taxes.

There's a new anthology out, edited by Kathryn and Ross Petras, called "The Anthology of Really Important Modern Poetry: Timeless Poems by Snooki, John Boehner, Kanye West, and Other Well-Versed Celebrities", in which the Petras extract some found poems from the utterings of people normally hunted by paparazzi more than poets. From what was quoted in my local paper I'm sure it's quite funny, and it certainly seems to poke fun at folks who deserved to be so poked. But....

The April 9 headline in the Today section of our Newark Star-Ledger was "Celebs go Shakespeare". Ugh. Even if I accept these artsed-up celeblurbs as poems, this headline is way off the mark. First, it's not like the celebrities set out to be poets, and more importantly, this ain't the bard telling us about "the depth and breadth and height/My soul can reach", this is Carmen Electra saying "I had nice b--bs before --."

Under the headline is the tag "Poetry anthology finds beauty in ridiculousness." Beauty? Really? One of the editors explains "We're like stupidity experts. I am one of the only people who can say I proudly make my living from stupid." I think that's great! If stupid were string beans, MTV could solve world hunger all by itself. And I'm glad someone smart is harvesting that stupidity for some personal gain. But is it beauty? Is breaking Kate Moss's insightful "I just started wearing bras. It's a miracle." into


I just started wearing
bras.
It's a miracle.

creating something beautiful?

I should say that I enjoyed reading NJ journalist Amy Kuperinsky's article - it's funny and smart, the way I expect the Petras intend this anthology to be taken. But just like Kuperinsky's good journalism isn't poetry, neither (IMHO) are the creations the Petras have collected likely to rise to the level of poetry. Why do I think this? Well, Wikipedia defines poetry as "a form of literary art which uses the aesthetic qualities of language to evoke meanings in addition to, or in place of, the prosaic ostensible meaning." as the definition of poetry. Can repurposed celebrity quotes rise to that? I'm skeptical.

Now I hear you saying: Is this really that big a deal? What is it about this book that gives me an itch I can't scratch? Well, the things is that it's being celebrated as part of National Poetry Month. To be fair, when 2012 Dodge tickets went on sale, that was featured with equal prominence (if not quite equal length or equivalent imagery) in the Star-Ledger. My worry is that, just like my friends in places other than New Jersey seemed to believe at there just must be at least some in The Sopranos, people will believe the finds in this book must be real modern poetry.

And is it? Well, I promise to take a stroll through the book when it arrives in my library system, and if I find anything that sways me toward accepting these as poems I'll tweet my approval. Until then, I'll stick with Poetry Daily, AAP, and Your Daily Poem for my NatPoMo headlines.