Volume 2, Issue 2

Spring, 2005

POETRY TO THE EARS

One if the main problems that confront the teacher of literature in the middle/high school classroom is the challenge of communicating not only message and theme, but also the rhythm and tone of a poem.  There is a genre of poetry that relies on the visual - lines, colors and proportions for apt communication of its message.  It is known as "concrete" or "visual poetry." See the poem " Ping Pong" by Eugene Gomringer for example:

                                                                  ping pong
                                              ping pong ping
                                              pong ping pong
                                                       ping pong

Paul Kloppenborg, author of the article "Concrete to Computer:  The Future of Visual Poetry,"  comments that the visual and semantic elements constituting the form as well as the content of a poem define its structure so that the poem cam be a "reality in itself and not a poem about something or other."  While visual language is achieved through an awareness of graphic space, the concrete poem uses word arrangement, sounds, syllables and words as a means of presentation  (2-3).

Some poems, however, cannot rely on textual representation alone to transmit an experience. Basil Bunting, critical writer and Modernist, makes the following comment in his essay, "The Poet's Point of View":

 A skilled reader can try to hear, mentally, what his eyes see in print:  but nothing will satisfy him till his ears hear it as real sound in the air.  Poetry must be read aloud ... Without the sound, the reader looks at the lines as he looks at prose, seeking a meaning. Prose exists to convey meaning, and no meaning such as prose conveys can be expressed as well in poetry.  That is not poetry's business. Poetry is seeking to make not meaning, but beauty.  (80 - 1)

Contrary to Bunting's closing statement however, poetry can be both meaningful and beautiful.  The written word captivates, inspires, and enlightens; its value is immeasurable.  Prose, on the other hand, sometimes fails to capture the condensed passion that can be expressed in the spoken language of poetry but each form of literature serves its purpose.  The beauty about which Bunting speaks is communicated through listening.  Students should be given the opportunity to extract meaning from spoken literature.

Tasked with making literature and poetry a beneficial experience for students, instructors are responsible for exposing them to techniques that will make the edification process more enjoyable.  One such technique that may help to accomplish this daunting task is the use of electronic media.  Due to the evolving shift in literary culture, modern poetry can be enjoyed by using Web sites, audio files, CD's, etc.

Having recently been introduced to the Paul Laurence Dunbar Web Site  which houses readings of the poet's standard English and Black dialect poems, I can personally attest to the fact that one does not really know a poem until he or she has heard it read aloud.  University of Dayton professor of English, Herbert Woodward Martin, provides an exemplary re-creation of the author's sentiments as he delights Dunbar enthusiasts with lively renditions.  My simple readings of "The Party," "When Malindy Sings," and "When Dey 'Listed Colored Soldiers" had not begun to scratch the emotions that I experienced during Martin's excellent performance.  This listening experience, therefore, has value to me. I was a silent partner, yet I was engaged as an active participant.  The use of black dialect was authentic and believable; one could literally feel the rhythm and hear the music in poetic verse.  As a student, I gained from this oral reading and have marked the site to use for future classroom instruction as a teacher.

Dana Gioia, celebrated poet and author of Disappearing Ink:  Poetry at the End of Print Culture, maintains that literary poetry  has separated into four distinct groups:  performance poetry, oral poetry, audiovisual, and visual poetry.  "The aesthetic of each form is different," she says,"and under the pressure of electronic culture, artists are pushing the forms farther apart as the emergence of new forms like Spoken Word and slam poetry demonstrates" (24).  Enthusiasts may prefer one form over the other and with the continued development of the digital age; computational processes will involve more interaction and creativity.

Hear with your Eyes                    

 ... In a society with too many books and too little time for reading, especially serious literary  reading, a book of poems, no matter how superb, can no longer be sure of attracting an audience  by means of print alone.  The poetry reading - despite its high-art aura - fulfills  the prerequisites of  the new orality:  like radio, television, film, and recordings, it takes language off the printed page  ... it links the spoken word to the physical presence of the speaker. (21-2)

"Poetry reading" describes a performance (from a published text, of course) before a well-behaved, often academic audience.  'Spoken-word poetry' - so redundant from a historical perspective -  identifies voiced verbal art, verse that is lifted off the page and into the world of presence and experience. (30)

Across the spans of human societies, oral poetic traditions encode what we call history, anthropology, folklore, mythology, law, philosophy, medicine, and numerous other disciplines ... we are in the habit of understanding poetry as a species of written poetry, not the other way around ... when viewed fairly, verbal art turns out to be much more extensive, more diverse, and more fascinating than  we customarily presume, and our practice of "reading oral poetry" must respond to that challenging diversity. (28-9)