End of Parenthetical Poetics

Aye, carumba! And then you have a poem like the one I just read on a national online publication (this blog is trying to be nice and not actually name names). Maybe the first poet on the blogosphere is right after all. And the scourge of mediocrity, where are you when we need you.

Maybe the formalists and the avant garde have more in common than we think: most mainstream poetry just isn't that good. At least formalists have a sincere interest in craft. And postmodernists at least won't bore you with incredibly inept syntax with dull metaphors or sentimental and inane confidences.

I think the problem here, beyond the fact that something like this is considered exceptional enough to be published in such a singular space, is the fact that the poet appears to have labored long on such hackneyed and pedestrian fare, as if under the impression the poem being written was actually good.

Or maybe I'm just thinking of my own writing. We are the last ones to know after all.