Felix Dennis and the rhyming poem

[butters]

i have a book, complete with spoken word cd and complimentary dvd... (Lone Wolf)

i'll not listen to/watch them till i've taken my time reading him, as i want to first establish in my own head how they sound to me. a lot of i's and me's in there, granted. but it's not my voice i want to hear, it's the poems'. then, i'll hope not to be disappointed when i listen to dennis' renditions of his writes.

but that's not what this thread is about: it's about there being room for all sorts of poetry, including rhyming. yes, it fell out of favour (and for many good reasons), but i'm finding myself enjoying his writing not only despite the rhyming, but frequently because of it! i read the first few, dipping here and there into the pages ... if it was meant to be read in order, that'll have to wait till i'm ready to do just that; right now i'm in 'sampling' mode ... and while they don't feel like "high art", or "hugely worthy" or "illustrious", they are, quite simply, enjoyable. some of them are written with a simplicity that belies the messages underneath.

i wouldn't say he's 'the best writer i've ever read', not at all, but to have an entire collection, and so far i've liked each i've read, makes this guy someone worth reading and, possibly, emulating with a tinker or three.

here's a taster of his writing:

Winter Sunset

All day the snow had lain between the trees,
The barren, hump-backed hills bereft of life.
A sky bruised black, the sleet flung slant to freeze
The bones of man or beast. And then... a knife!

A white-gold knife to blind the sullen gaze
Of Old Man Winter louring in the West;
Three crimson wounds to set the clouds ablaze,
And guide my weary feet to home and rest.



Business

What poet writes of Business?
We stick to what we know,
We write of dross, of love or loss,
Of roses in the snow.

We turn our backs on Business,
On traders in the pit,
On callous brutes in charcoal siuts
With neither style nor wit.

We mine our inner feelings,
Refining hidden seams,
We tear apart our hearts for art,
And sift among our dreams.

Yet businessmen are dreamers;
If poets scale the heights,
Suits sieve the earth of all its worth
To stake the mineral rights!

Should poets sneer at Business?
I fear it must be so:
If not from spite, I fear they write
Of only what they know.

 

[twelveoone]

Yet businessmen are dreamers;
If poets scale the heights,
Suits sieve the earth of all its worth <
To stake the mineral rights! <

Should poets sneer at Business?
I fear it must be so:
If not from spite, I fear they write <
Of only what they know. <

comment?
all end stopped, except enjamb and ! and enjamb and dramatic conclusion. How does he read it?

It is a shame thomas hardy doesn't have spoken word
although I prefer Oliver

 

[UnderYourSpell]

When I first came here I was rhyming everything because it was all I knew, I still have a fondness for the rhyming forms and thoroughly enjoyed (for the most part!) trying them out in Survivor. It's a pity Tzara has left our shores because he taught me a lot about the rhyming forms, he has a whole thread somewhere teaching how

 

[butters]

Yet businessmen are dreamers;
If poets scale the heights,
Suits sieve the earth of all its worth <
To stake the mineral rights! <

Should poets sneer at Business?
I fear it must be so:
If not from spite, I fear they write <
Of only what they know. <

comment?
all end stopped, except enjamb and ! and enjamb and dramatic conclusion. How does he read it?

It is a shame thomas hardy doesn't have spoken word
although I prefer Oliver

the thing is, he seems to do this well enough that the end stops and end-rhymes don't get in the way of the write.

i don't know yet, as i'm not going to listen to him till after i've read them all. if i listen first, and don't like his voice, i'm going to have a hard time reading his poems in an unbiased fashion as his voice would bleed through and distract me.

thomas hardy has some of the best poetic phrases in his prose i have ever read... particularly his descriptions of weather, nature, landscapes. they made his works worth reading for me, even when i didn't much like stuff he did with his writes.

oliver hardy... bwahahaha.

 

[butters]

When I first came here I was rhyming everything because it was all I knew, I still have a fondness for the rhyming forms and thoroughly enjoyed (for the most part!) trying them out in Survivor. It's a pity Tzara has left our shores because he taught me a lot about the rhyming forms, he has a whole thread somewhere teaching how

hiya, annie

i understand why they fall out of favour, as so much bad poetry was force-fed us in rhyming schemes. but this guy goes to show (imo) how end-rhymes do not need to get in the way, and can even enhance, what a poem has to say.

it's making me feel like attempting a tinker with end-rhymes, even though i always preferred internal/slants. i think it will be hard to make something good and not for it to come across forced or trite.

 

[twelveoone]

When I first came here I was rhyming everything because it was all I knew, I still have a fondness for the rhyming forms and thoroughly enjoyed (for the most part!) trying them out in Survivor. It's a pity Tzara has left our shores because he taught me a lot about the rhyming forms, he has a whole thread somewhere teaching how

A rhyme in time
is so sublime
I have one in my drink
It deadens the sound
of the shaken glass
Deadens the ice's clink

Cheers
and I don't care
what the anons think

PS you can buy Turco's Book of Forms. Or a host of others.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Is this guy an American or English or other? I ask because it does make a difference when listening to the spoken word. I've listened to Americans reading their poetry and I understand but half of it , rather like listening to an accent your not familiar with. We all drop letters in our own language that would baffle an outsider and an American speaking different words in English can sound very amusing. When we were on a cruise the guide would insist on calling Canterbury thus ..... Canterrrrrrbry. When I pointed out what it should be she looked at me as if I was nuts and just carried on with her original interpretation. So there are now several Americans that are sure they have vsited Canterrrbry Cathedral

 

[butters]

Is this guy an American or English or other? I ask because it does make a difference when listening to the spoken word. I've listened to Americans reading their poetry and I understand but half of it , rather like listening to an accent your not familiar with. We all drop letters in our own language that would baffle an outsider and an American speaking different words in English can sound very amusing. When we were on a cruise the guide would insist on calling Canterbury thus ..... Canterrrrrrbry. When I pointed out what it should be she looked at me as if I was nuts and just carried on with her original interpretation. So there are now several Americans that are sure they have vsited Canterrrbry Cathedral

he's a brit - 65th wealthiest man in britain according to the news blurbs back then. but whilst he divides his time between london, stratford-on-avon, mustique, new york and and conneticut, his writing has all the english flavours you'll recognise, annie

 

[greenmountaineer]

hiya, annie

i understand why they fall out of favour, as so much bad poetry was force-fed us in rhyming schemes. but this guy goes to show (imo) how end-rhymes do not need to get in the way, and can even enhance, what a poem has to say.

it's making me feel like attempting a tinker with end-rhymes, even though i always preferred internal/slants. i think it will be hard to make something good and not for it to come across forced or trite.

I too like to play with internal and slant rhymes. I find end-rhymes can work with the proper mix of enjambment and end stops, but also variation in masculine and feminine endings at the end of a line and beginning at the next, if that makes any sense.

I also think the number of syllables in the words that end one line and begin the next as well as the sound of the consonants and vowels in those words can make a big difference.

Of course, the images and narrative have to measure up too. A recent submission, In Nocte, I think is a good example of effective use of rhyme(as well as repetition), but the last line of the poem left me utterly confused. If anyone can enlighten me, I'd appreciate it because I thought it was a nicely written poem otherwise.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

not sure but it could be 'what does this madness mean'

 

[butters]

if i were to hazard a guess, it would be along the lines of 'i'm in the dark/i do not understand/i am benighted' so in a dark place of confusion, perhaps? or 'my night'? but again i'd imagine this referring to that emotional darkness of confusion.

since i don't speak latin, and the online translators are pretty rubbish, i recommend you pm Byron in Exile. he has latin bones