Most interesting perspective on being an author of poetry and some generalisations which can be disputed. Perhaps I should highlight them...hajrafradi wrote:A Hungarian novelist, Dezso Kosztolanyi, put it this way (roughly translated by me now, ad-hoc): "Poets make a garbage heap out of their lives only so that they will produce a colourful mushroom to grow on it." I can't remember if he used the word "mushroom" or "flower".marjoram_blues wrote: Does your 'Pushthrough' poetry help in a 'counselling' kinda way?
Kierkegaard asks: ' What is a poet? An unhappy man who hides deep anguish in his heart, but whose lips are so formed that when the sigh and cry pass through them, it sounds like lovely music.' ( p43 Either/Or - a fragment of life )
I think he got it wrong. Poets start with their life being a heap of garbage but they don't create it themselves, and don't even like it having their life that way arranged. Their inner sense and yearning for beauty then creates the colourful vegetation. I mean, poets are reactive, not pro-active. They deal with their lives like those who are given lemons. Do the best with what they are handed.
But to a non-poet, who looks at him or her from the outside, the process is indistinguishable from the way Kosztolanyi saw it. Because having your life resemble a garbage heap is also a self-generating process: you spiral downward, by force of your lifestyle you amplify your lifestyle. Onlookers may not notice that this is not necessarily your choice, they attribute the beginning as your own design, because they see you go from bad to worse, so they figure at one point you went ON YOUR OWN ACCORD from good to bad. But that first step is never the poet's wish or desire or even doing.
In other words, you have to be one to know how it exactly feels.
That's A. B. is that sometimes (an awful lot of times) the colourful vegetation seems only beautiful to the author of the poetry him- or herself. At that point, loneliness multiplies in intensity, but a sense of specialness and a sense of consolation has already been obtained. And those poets won't be damaged by the criticism of their poetry. Thank goodness.
Does poetry have any psychotherapeutic value for me? It feels good to push out a poem. A good poem. Like pushing out a good story. I feel relieved, and more at peace immediately after putting it out. Although it also galvanizes me a bit. Very comparable to inhaling the scent of the body of a woman (female pheromones) for a man (or the other way around for a woman, I guess): it both invigorates and calms the inhaling person. A little bit also like when you unburden yourself in the washroom. You feel lighter, more nimble, and energetic, while more relaxed and more at ease with yourself and with the world.
So the value of creating poetry, at least for me, may be more of a physiological relief, which brings about a gentle and mild sense of euphoria.
Wow wee. I did answer you, didn't I.
I don't agree with either Kierkegaard, Dezso Kosztolanyi, or yourself on the seeming need for any kind of garbage life, or deep angst, to produce wonderful poetry.
'You have to be one, to know exactly how it feels' - well, this seems obvious that an individual would need to be a poet/carpenter/pilot to know how it feels. But this can't be generalised into how others feel. Nor does it say anything about how any criticism might affect them. Exactly, or otherwise.
Thanks for explaining the therapeutic value of creating poetry - as it pertains to yourself, and probably some would say that it like 'giving birth'.
I am interested in what potential therapeutic value your 'Pushthrough' might have for readers. Do you have an example to offer ?