Poetry

cheers

I hope it doesn't cause too many fights. This is just a chance to name your favourite poet and why. If you can be bothered. I can understand if you can't. And if this has been discussed before, then I really CAN understand why you can't. But when everyone feels up for it, why not? You won't get any prejudice from me, I think all poetry is beautiful in its own way.

Ican tell you what my two fave poems are

Stop All the Clocks, Cut off the Telephone
The Owl and the Pussycat

cheers

Alright, Illuvatar, I have given this subject some thought, and have discovered that I don't have one favorite poet; however, there are several poets that I have respect for and have influenced me over time. For instance, "Hiawatha" by Longfellow was the first poem I remember hearing growing up. Frost's "The Road Not Taken" deserves a mention, and so does W.C. Bryant's "Thanatopsis", and, of course, Poe wrote several 'romantic' poems that I quite liked while in high school. Later on, I studied the British laureates, including Tennyson. He was quite good, as you say. As a 'Victorian', he naturally was a bit 'Ivory Towerish', but I shared his fascination for the Odyssey (Ulysses), so it was cool. I've always had a soft spot for Percy Bysshe Shelley, maybe because he died so young, but "Adonis" also comes to mind. So much for happy poems, eh? I guess I tend to lean towards the 'romantics', but some of the realists and victorians are quite good.

Oops...forgot to mention Chaucer.

Shelley, Byron, Poe, Sydney Sheldon, Dr. Suess

Chaucer is wicked!

jsut thought you might like to know that

cheers

I completely forgot about Shelly, he would be up there in my list too. Also Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem 'Kubla Khan' would also be a favourite poem. He used to smoke a lot of opium, and it's not hard to figure that out when you read that poem. I'm going to show my ignorance and say I don't know all those poets you mentioned Brick Lowrider: Longfellow, Frost and Byrant are not known to me, but I'll be sure to check out there work.

I also like Frost. "The Road Not Taken" is a good poem but my personal favourite would be "Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening" (I THINK that's the name, haven't read much poetry for a few years). Very nice poem and a theme that I really connect with.

I'm also a bit of a fan of the romantics, but I would sway towards Wordsworth rather than the latter more air fairy romantics.

I should really read some more...it's not something I've been inclined to do when no longer forced to at school or university.

Dr Suess - clever as paint and wickedly funny. The title escapes me, but his book about 'sleep' would have to be the 'Tomorrow Never Knows' of children's literature - trippy, and especially so when read aloud and quickly.

Chaucer is a piece of cake campared to Milton. It takes awhile to get the hang of the Middle English Language Chaucer uses, but what is really wicked is the Old English Language. Learning chinese calculus would probably be easier. [Is that what you meant, or did you mean something else?] Once you get the hang of the dialect (I would have to re-learn it) most of his stories/poems are funny. Nothing funny about Milton, btw.

I love William Blake too! But my favorite poet is Pablo Neruda, though I respect that he introduced the genre of mystery I believe that Poe is a greatly overrated writer and poet.

You would, wouldn't you?

Here is that opium induced poem 'Kubla Khan' By Coleridge

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were the gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-burning tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:
And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through woods and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!
The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and cave.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw:
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singinfg of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight 'twould win me,
That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

I don't really have a favourite poet- it tends to change depending on what mood I'm in. At the moment my favourite would probably be John Keats. Some other favourites of mine include Christina Rossetti, William Wordsworth, Lord Byron and Ted Hughes. One poet I really dislike, however, is William Shakespeare. Everyone always says how wonderful he is, but the only piece of Shakespeare's work that I've read and actually enjoyed is "Romeo and Juliet".

I'm not the best fan of poetry but I do like Dorothy Parker.