Change of book: Change of Person
Mantra Rain attempts to restate the central problems of modern poetry. It builds upon my first presentation in Greatest Living Poet. I no longer need the mask of the "Greatest Living Poet" to make my points clear. Mantra Rain presents a very clear and healing answer to how we write modern poetry - and shows how each poem represents a break with the past. The poetry of the last 50 years sought to solve the problem of poetic language in the modern world by resorting to newspaper prose. Mantra Rain defines the method of poetic composition as near to the craft of "incantation", allowing the power of the perfect magical expression to coexist seamlessly with colloquial speech.
I said in my first book that the origin of all poetry came from incantation, and this phenomenon can be easily investigated in many original sources and ancient cultures, such as The Book of the Dead, the Bible or the Dead Sea Scrolls. I have suggested in many forums that there is currently a very small public market for contemporary "prose as poetry". And rather than make the deduction that the genre of poetry no longer is relevant in our culture - I show that it has merely been poorly written.
I believe the statement the market has made is correct. Poetry as it is written today in the West is actually a form of prose, wearing the costume of poetry. And people do not respond to this unless they have an agenda of politics, serve a particular interest group, or need to fill an academic resume. Poetry is a social phenomenon, but the lack of market participation has created a poetics alienated from vital social dynamics. I believe that by 2001 there was little social consensus about poetry's core competency, which persons may be considered poets, and what constitutes memorable speech in the modern world.
If specific and achievable distinctions cannot be made under these criteria, then we must follow the market and no longer recognize poetry as separate and honored genre. The good news (if you have studied this book) is that poetry is still a nation's greatest cultural prize. Our age, like all human ages, will be represented to future generations in one or two lines, or if the future is generous, it may give us ten lines to explain ourselves. We have the choice to be represented by politicians, self-indulgent rock stars, or poets. I hope the question remains rhetorical.
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