As we have moved through the poetics of individual poets and schools of poets, I found myself particularly focused on the goals laid out for their work. The Beats poets wanted a poetry that rode a beat, pointed out political grievances, and embodied a lifestyle; the Black Arts Movement wanted to explore voice, oppression, and […]
Author Archive | Tony Ferrese
A Reflection and “Cruising on Highway 61”
This week, we read about African American poets before and after the BAM (Black Arts Movement) poets. I was moved by much of their work, and I again found myself with a dilemma: how do I respond to these poets and their work. I am fully aware that I cannot, nor should I, attempt to […]
Language Poetry and “We Walked When We Couldn’t Speak”
It is somewhat difficult to discern precisely what the Language poets were all about. On one hand, they seem to have been focused on the notion that language itself represents some form of oppression, whereby writing perpetuates capitalist agendas, conformity, colonialism, social immobility, and even stands in the way of free thinking. The act of […]
Formalism and “Assimilation”
In the spirit of the formalist poets of the twentieth century, I sought out to attempt to make form a valuable trait in the poem I wrote for this week’s blog post. The formalists argued that by moving entirely away from form, so much so that most of the top poets of the era were […]
Anti-Semitism within the Black Arts Movement
Although the import of this passage can be minimized as rhetoric directed against Jewish businessmen in black communities, the fact is that anti-Semitism was a frequent feature of Black Arts poetry. Virtually every participating poet wrote at least one anti-Semitic poem, and some wrote more, though the level of virulence varied considerably. For Baraka it […]
A Representation of Psychology: A Close Reading of W.D. Snodgrass’s “Mementos, 1”
In, “Leaping into the Unknown: The Poetics of Robert Bly’s Deep Image,” Kevin Bushnell explores the use of an image in Bly’s poems. Bushnell demonstrates how Bly used images as a way into the speaker’s psychological state, the speaker’s unconscious mind, and how this, for Bly and others of the “Confessional” school of poets, became […]
A Reflection on the New York School Poetry and “Cuban Cigars”
At face value, the New York School poets can be difficult to define. They all appear unique in their own ways, while somehow maintaining a similar (sort of) style, a tendency toward abstraction, as if they have an answer they refuse to share, an image they leave intentionally unresolved, an underlying philosophy they only hint […]
Levertov’s Outline and “Space Travelers”
In reading poetry from the Black Mountain poets, I came to the realization that it would be difficult to effectively discuss their poems, aside from the use of white space, the syllables, the construction of lines, etc. For me, such a discussion somewhat fails to get at the heart of their work. Olson highlighted the […]
My Inner Beat Poet and “America Still”
Poems typically take time to polish. I am an MFA student at College of Charleston, a fiction writer, and I would not dare call myself a poet. I have, however, written many poems, starting back in middle school many years ago. Until college, though, I sat and wrote a poem, felt […]