From: "RSM" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: Is Joni a poet? Nay.
First, a caveat: I am not a poet and don't play one on TV. I don't even read much poetry. But, regarding whether Joni's lyrics are poetry or not, I think that the suggestion that they are not poetry because they are not "condensed" or "stripped down" overlooks the majority of what we call poetry. Certainly there is poetry, particularly modern poetry, that is very spare in use of words. However, just because it is not a haiku does not make it less than poetry. The moment I pressed 'send' on my post, I knew someone would reply from this train of thought. When I speak of Poetry being condense, I do not mean Haiku, or brevity of words. Certainly poetry can be free form as well as long. The compression I mean is one of language and thought. The essence of poetry is verbal and conceptual density. The many ways to that are quite complex and exhilarating. For example, using non-poetry mind you as my example: Waiting for Godot is a deeply complex, conceptual work and yet the written line is matter of fact, plain speak bordering on gibberish. And yet, in spite of simplicty of dialogue, there is a complexity of thought the average joe could not begin to wrap their brains around. Poetry is like that. There is a density and condensation of thought and word play. Joni Mitchell's lyrics are certainly poetic and beautiful. Beautiful enough to warrant contemplation and reading. But they are not poetry. The Complete Poems and Lyrics does not work as a stand alone book of poetry, in spite of the artful cover and title. It is an unsatifying read as a book of poetry. Perhaps a professor of English could speak at length to the whys better than I can. I'm reading Shadows and Light right now and as lovely as it is, it is too straight forward a piece of writing to work as Poetry. "Every picture has it's shadows and it has some source of light." is too declarative a thought -as is the entire song- to be poetry. A poem wouldn't tell you every picture has it's shadows. It would simply BE the thing. (Not sure if I'm making sense...) The condensation of thought would strip away the declarative and the reader would discover, by discription, or words alone that the shadows mentioned in the piece are in fact the shadows of a painting. That would turn the writing into Poetry. Not by mere compression of word, but compression of thought, a poem, through condesation, says a lot more than what is literally written, however long the passage: eg. From the Poem 'About Opera' by William Meredith: What dancing is to the slightly spastic way Most of us teeter through our bodily life Are these measured cries to the clumsy things we say, In the heart's duresses, on the heart's befalf. -The thoughts being expressed in that stanza would fill a digest in common spoken language. I am partnered with a Poet. (He just handed me that passage, btw...) With over 200,000 books in the house (!!!), I can't move from room to room without tripping over Poetry in one form or another. From the early Greeks to the most contemporary writers, he's read it all. I know exactly what HE would say if I asked him if Joni were a poet. I would get that same look I get when he wanders by the tv set when I'm watching Star Trek, and they characters are speaking space speak: "Captain, the triambic radiation is interfering with the targetting scanners..." Actually, he didn't effort a grunt when I posed the question to him. I would trust his informed judgement. I'm not sure why we would want to cast Joni's lyrics in such an unflattering light as to put them in the realm of Poetry. Especially on the heels of her brilliant triumph T'log. These lyrics are among the most brilliant song lyrics in the history of mankind. As poetry, Wiliam Meredith or Donald Justice is running nuclear rings around this stuff. Why pale her work by such comparison? Which brings up a bit of irony I'm afraid to mention, but thought of when I opened the T'log package: I find it curious that Joni devotes so much of her worth to a medium that she is a minor player in, when as a writer/singer/composer she is unparalleled in the history of mankind. That's like Einstein devoting himself to carving wildlife... Shakespear idling his time in the joys of baking bread... I mean, really. Certainly, her painting is lovely and I wouldn't have her put her brushes down for a moment. Some of her pieces are downright magnificent... As a singer/composer she is not only one of the top 20 human beings among the billions living, but billions in the entire history of the planet as well. As a painter, the peers her equal or better, just in the southern Cal area alone would popuate a small city. (Not to cast dispersions on her art. Just a statement of how many good artists there are out there doing good stuff.) Why would I want to cast her painting in an unflattering light by holding them up to High Art? Or her music to Poetry? I would rather contempate her work for what it is: Popular song raised to it's highest zeinith. She is the queen of musical beauty.
