Preface - Electronic Poetry Center

At its best, Language poetry never valorized language "for its own sake" as the
editors claim. Nor is it the case that theirs is the only or hegemonic way of
writing. But if language poetry is to be attacked–and don’t we have enough
attacks from the dominant poetic discourses already?– it had better be attacked
in a more responsible way than it is here. That means informing oneself about
what’s really going on around the globe and not just throwing out phrases like
"Reagan-Bush" or "triumph of capital"? If there’s a blueprint for a new
economic program let’s hear what it is. In specifics. But surely, in the heyday
of Newt Gingrich it’s rather ineffectual to drop phrases like "triumph of
capital".
A final question: who is to read the new revolutionary poetry (what it will be
like remains to be seen) the editors advocate? Is poetry going to "deliver
victims from the daily miseries inflicted by the politicians and the
bourgeoisie?" How is this to happen? Certainly not via ignorance,as in the
statement (page 7) about "wars of the West against Islam and in Asia." In Asia:
Does China have no responsibility for ‘wars in Asia"? Japan? and Islam:are the
Islamic countries really just innocent victims of "the West"?
I would think "revolution," poetic or otherwise, would require a little more
analytic rigor than what we see here.