(January 16, 2021 at 11:19 am)RozzerusUnrelentus Wrote: It seems to be an abrogation of the art to neglect form, construction, framing, rhyme, rhythm, metre, sense et. al.
One good thing about art is that it's a really big category. It includes just about anything anyone wants to put there. And if someone declares that a thing isn't art, you can be pretty sure that someone will come along and make it art, because artists tend to be ornery that way.
So I don't think it's useful to declare that any kind of art has to be a certain way. Poetry can be just about anything.
At the same time, I think we can make strong arguments for a thing being good art or bad art. And to do that, we need to look at qualities that we consider good or bad.
So for example, in something that claims to be a poem, we could work on whether it is a cliche, or whether it is telling me something not usually known, or whether it's intelligent or not. Because originality, telling me something I didn't know, and intelligence are good things in themselves. I can't prove scientifically that being original and intelligent are good things, but I can argue whether or not a particular poem has those things.
But of course this isn't something that can be fully settled for everyone, or quantified. It's not like chemistry, where definitive answers are possible.
Quote:Chuck out a stream of incoherent and disjointed consciousness or a bad wet dream and call it poetry. And get the plaudits.
Most poetry is bad. Like most painting, or most novels, etc. And plaudits almost always come for something other than quality. The best way to get plaudits is to flatter the audience with something that looks intelligent but isn't. (So somebody like Banksy gets rich.)
In the example you gave, my first impression is that it's trying hard to look artsy, but won't repay close study. But I may be wrong.
