@blockurator,

First off, you are an excellent writer. And thanks for making the effort to edit your comments before hitting the "Post" button. The quality of the craft is noted.

You're right, of course ... Whitman is in his own category which, I suppose, deserves a tip of the hat for originality. I don't really dislike Free Verse as much as I let on, it's just that so many poets go to it because it's easy and learn nothing about the science and art that underlie poetry composition. As nothing is right then nothing is wrong. In the anything goes ethos of post-modernism, Art gets to be anything that anyone says is Art ... no filters or quality-control. The result: Modern-day poetry.

Do you honestly think anyone will be quoting modern-day poets in 400 years like we presently quote Shakespeare? No one quotes them now.

In any event, I've taken it upon myself to fight an undoubtedly losing battle: The resurrection of "verse"... which now, rather ironically, is referred to as "New Formalism." Despite the long litany of literary giants that preceded them, all of whom wrote verse, the Free Verse folks are asserting "default status" ... verse has become some "exceptional."

I used to regularly volunteer at my daughter's Elementary School. In kindergarten and Grade 1, the kids loved poetry and I used to read them mine and others' works. In Grade 2, the teachers introduced them to Free Verse. And that was the precise moment that they started hating poetry.

I'm in advertising and I've done several studies on people's reaction to poetry. It's not that the general public think free verse is bad poetry per se ... it's that they don't consider it poetry at all. There's nothing mysterious about the reason why. I've explained the neuroscience behind the effect of verse in several of my posts if you're interested. Few poets are. Philosophically, most poets consider themselves "thought leaders" (we're an arrogant bunch) but as I've pointed out, if no one is following you ... you're not a leader of anyone or anything.

In reality, modern-day poetry has become post-structuralism on steroids and a venting mechanism for post-modern (Marxist) political and philosophical ideology. As a soldier, I spent 5 years in Africa at the end of the Cold War. If people only new what Marxism actually looks like in its implementation ... the difference between the theory and the reality. It's a
bloody nasty business.

Quill