Can
Poetry matter?
Gioia’s essay sums up
that poetry is thriving more than ever before, but only in a subculture.
It seems to me that our culture is used to this idea of instant
gratification; Instead of spending ages scanning through textbooks trying to
find answers to our everyday questions, we simply use a Google search. If we
feel like watching a specific type of movie, we can be seated and watching it
on Netflix in less than 5 minutes. A poem has to be dwelled upon to retrieve
what lies within, which takes time. The length of poems can diminish the
average Joe’s desire to read it. If we’re Google searching for something, we
tend to read the answers that are short and sweet; to the point.
There could be an number of reasons why poetry is dying for popular culture, but I could name a few that I thinkt to be contributors. Reading used to be a prized skill. Long ago it wasn’t
uncommon that someone in America couldn’t read, but now days it is. Being able
to recite a famous poem made you seem intelligent, in today’s time it’s still impressive
but, to me, it’s not what it used to be. When Russia launched Sputnik, America was in shock. Our
government then decided to increase the math and science credits required to
graduate, in order to give our space program a boost. This could of got in the
way of the importance of other subjects like English.
People may think poetry is dead amongst popular culture,
but I disagree. It is, however, different from the poetry we think of. The
poetry I think of, at least, has a certain structure. The modern stuff that I
see day to day, that I consider being poetry, are in TV shows, movies, videogames,
social media sites, music, and nursery rhymes. A very popular TV show, madmen,
recited Frank O’Hara in an episode; but this is the “old structure” I’m referring
to. As I watched my cousin play his videogames, I noticed every time he died, a
quote would appear while it was loading. I see Facebook pages with quotes on
them all the time. I consider these “short and sweet” words of intense emotion
and intelligence to be a form of poetry. poems were recited at funeral and
weddings in the movies we discussed in class, and they were words of intense
emotion. I can see how some people consider the lyrics of Rap music to be a
form of poetry too. With all this said, I argue that poetry is a huge part of
our everyday lives, and it does matter. It’s still a way to express emotions
and make things sound better than the everyday sentences we’re used to.
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