Sylvia Plath, Rumi, there's a lot of spoken word poets who do a really incredible job putting their spoken work into page poetry - that's what I strive to do.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Spoken word poetry is the art of performance poetry. I tell people it involves creating poetry that doesn't just want to sit on paper, that something about it demands it be heard out loud or witnessed in person.
And some poets are far better read off the page because they're very bad speakers. I'm thinking of one in particular whom I won't name, a good poet, and he reads in such a dry, boring way, your eyes start drooping.
Poetry is a vocal art for me - but not necessarily a performative one. It might be reading to oneself or recalling some lines by memory.
We all write poems; it is simply that poets are the ones who write in words.
I consider myself kind of a reporter - one who uses words that are more like music and that have a choreography. I never think of myself as a poet; I just get up and write.
Poets are seen as the caretakers of language, so working with words no matter what the form is what we do.
On a practical level, poetry isn't something anybody has really made a great living at. I might sell some books and, once in a while, someone might pay to hear me read.
A poet is a professional maker of verbal objects.
Poets go through a very tough apprenticeship in the use of words.
I don't try to call myself a poet. But I know that my stuff is pretty literal, in that the themes are pretty simple and on the surface.