Today I led a poetry workshop for a small group of Australian youth. I had picked out a few of my favorite poems, some Yehuda Amichai, Michael and Matthew Dickman and Samuel Menashe. Poetry and songs is not the same thing, I started out confidently. Hold up, said Biff. He was from Sydney and had not wanted to take my poetry workshop. In fact, he informed me it was his 6th or 7th choice. I had upset Biff by declaring that songwriters i.e. Bob Dylan, Neil Young are not poets but musicians/songwriters. They may write poetically but their songs are not poems they are songs. Biff told me I was closed minded. After the workshop I went home and while cleaning my house I thought a lot about the forms of artistic expression. And also if Biff was right, am I being closed minded? Recently I read an interview with poet Kevin Young in the magazine failbetter where he eloquently said, that for him to love and admire Dylan’s songs did not have to mean that he thinks of Dylan as a poet. This got me thinking on what is a poet. It does seem that the term or form is given out very loosely. Someone who photographs is not called a painter. Would you call a cellist a pianist or a singer? Then again is a singer considered a musician or an artist or a poet if he or she composes their own music? If everyone is a poet or an artist then does that mean less to be a poet or an artist? I have always innocently thought that poets are people who write poetry. My sister has always considered herself an artist, now she considers herself a photographer. She considers herself these things before she considers herself a Jew. I consider myself a Jew and a poet. Do I bring poetry to being a Jew or Jewishness to poetry? If we are all humans than can’t we all be poets? And why would a musician/songwriter who is infinitely cooler than a poet want to be a poet? And are we poets a bit guarded with our title? Because as Biff points out it may be 6th or 7th place on most people’s list.
Link to Kevin Young interview http://www.failbetter.com/33/YoungInterview.php?sxnSrc=rcint
I believe if we are human than we are artists (or have the capacity to be). Whether the heading of the “artist” is labeled as a painter, poet, photographer, singer song writer, guitarist, new media, performance artist, or whichever, our objectives are essentially the same. Does it not seem disparaging to label one form of art to be superior than another? Does it not seem to be counter intuitive to pin one discipline against another?
i think that there are people, musicians, painters whatever they may be that you look up to and wish you could do what they do. or do what you do but the way they do what they do. i wish to write poetry the way Charlie Parker plays sax. or the way Godard makes movies. i dont think admiring one form of art over another is a bad thing. i know i am drawn to all forms of art but i think if i could pick i would have picked to be a singer or a painter. my question is why is it so simple to be a banker. or a grocer. they aren’t calling themselves doctors or carpenters. why when it comes to art and specifically poetry is it up for grabs anyone anywhere can do it. or maybe that is the nature of artistic form. tho i would never say i am a painter because i can pick up a brush and paint. and do we de-legitimize the work by saying anyone can do it.
Its funny the way we think we would like to prosper in one art other than that in which we feel gifted. Somehow there seems to be a gap between ability and desire. There always will be. We can’t all be architects and doctors at the same time. In the same way (though some are capable) we can’t all be photographers and poets. (thought: though as a profession/hobby/practice art forms are unique because they are every day becoming more and more available to the masses, though it seems we can always be writers, what makes someone a ‘writer’? An ape can scribble on a page. )(No offense to apes)
In my idealistic view, I see art as self expression, and a way to connect with the mystery of life around us. Humans have an innate desire to create. Would you tell a 5 year old that his mothers day poem is not true poetry? Is it? Does that make him a poet? Somehow I like to believe that creativity from the soul is not allowed to be discluded from the definition of ‘art’. Because that really is what we are talking about here, Poet Painter CreativeWriter Photographer. If Bob Dylan calls himself a poet, so be it. I think it all comes down to personal perception in the end. This could be debated endlessly by comparing a bad poet to an accidental good poet, or a bad painter to an accidental good one. Which is more real?
i think people who write poetry are poets. Naomi Shihab Nye has great poems that her son wrote when he was a kid. more like he said all this poetry and she wrote them down. She also said that everyone is a poet till they grow up. I think you can be mutiple arts. but that means that you are doing them. you are actively making art. in any of its forms. the difference between songs and poems are probably alot smaller than the similarities but they do exist. song lyrics accompany music. they stand in front of the music, or ride the music. poems have the music in them. whether it be in the internal rhyme of the poem or the rhythm. and you hear this most when you go to a poetry reading. i can’t think of any poems i know that could become songs. and people always tell me when i say i am a poet, oh you should write music. im like i wish! i am happy to be a poet. and i do feel like art is open to me. mainly thru collaboration with other artist doing whatever art form they are doing. i do agree with Kevin Young in that it is possible to love songwriters for being songwriters, because that is an amzingly amazing part of art and they do it so well.
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