WRWA Newsletter.pub - Wisconsin Writers Association

Some Reflections on the WRWA Jade Ring Contest, 2006 – Poetry Category
by LaMoine MacLaughlin, First Poet Laureate of Amery, Wisconsin – 2006 Poetry Judge
Page 33
The Poetry Category of the 2006 Jade Ring Contest included
135 entries by 52 writers. I was delighted to be able to
judge this category and, after review of the material, I would
like to offer several recommendations. Specific comments on
each winning entry are included at the end.
First, I would suggest that in the future a separate category
be considered for humorous verse. Judging humorous verse
along with more serious poetry is really weighing apples
against oranges (or perhaps watermelons against cherries).
The humorous verse will usually be judged second best. Humorous
verse possesses its own unique set of standards and
should be appreciated for those special qualities and characteristics
contained within its special genre. I mention this because
there was some very good humorous verse among the
poems I read and judged, but they don’t show up on the final
screen. Humorous verse deserves its own separate category. I
believe that WRWA should separate humorous verse from the
rest of poetry for the same reasons that it separates prose into
various categories.
Second, and I suppose this is one curse of living in the age
of Harry Potter, so much of what tries to pass as poetry in our
time gives evidence that contemporary writers trying to write
poetry do not read very much poetry—at least their poetry
reflects that they have given up reading the great past masters.
Our manic preoccupation with development of an individual
style does not give us the right to suspend the principles of
good writing, which have always involved clarity of expression,
considerate communication with our audience, and careful
crafting of our material. I remember one of my teachers
reminding us that the more we try to be different, the more we
look like everyone else. There is no place for purposeless misspelling,
and improper usage is grammatically incorrect in
poetry as well as in prose. The basic principles of good writing
apply equally to prose and to poetry. We don’t have
enough time to read everything, so I would urge writers to
develop their models by reading the best. Read Blake, and
Keats, and Whitman, and Dickinson, and Yeats, and Frost,
and Roethke, and Wright. And when you finish them, reread
them.
Third, and I suppose this is another curse of our early 21 st
century, so much of what tries to pass as poetry in our time
gives evidence that it is written totally as individual expression
with little or no care for writing as communication designed
to reach another human being as audience. An audience
presumes a concern for community and for communication,
and many writers have written of the disintegration of the
concept of community during the last half of the 20 th century.
The danger, of course, is that the concept of community will
eventually drop from our vocabulary and it will altogether
vanish from our consciousness. Moreover recent disasters
have shown the extreme fragility of the fabric of community
in urban areas. As human beings we all need community, real
community, and it is far too important a concept to be allowed
to disappear.
Sometimes, as contemporary poets, we seem to have lost
our sense of audience and believe that if a reader doesn’t un-
derstand our poetry, that is not our problem; we have done our
part. Sometimes it seems as if aspiring poets believe that writing
poetry frees them from the need to communicate.
Writing poetry is serious work and does not free anyone to
be a bad writer. As writers, we all need community, real community,
to keep us honest and to keep us truly communicating
with other human beings. Sometimes we refer to virtual
(almost, but not quite) reality and at times we seem unable to
distinguish it from genuine reality. As writers, and perhaps
especially as poets, we need to reclaim our local communities
as the source of our audience and our touchstone for authentic
communication. Without a real audience, so much that tries to
pass as poetry degenerates into cutesy-pie word-play or incoherent,
meaningless babble. How about considering the following:
Talk with your Mayor about establishing the position of Poet
Laureate in your village or city. Shamelessly proselytize for
poetry. Become your town’s wild poetry prophet.
Visit your local schools and help teachers spread poetry
throughout their classes.
Run for school board or city council. I might even accept
church council. You might not win, but try it anyhow. Do
something to enter deeply into the life of your local community.
Read Vachel Lindsay’s “The Gospel of Beauty.”
Get a group of friends together and share one of your poems
with them. Ask them to respond to the poem. Or perhaps
read it aloud in a local park or coffee shop for people you
don’t know. Ask them to respond.
And let us never forget William Faulkner’s 1949 Nobel
Prize Acceptance Speech in which he eloquently states the
reasons why poetry is so important:
I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail.
He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures
has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a
soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and
endurance. The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is to write about
these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by
lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and
honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and
sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The
poet’s voice need not merely be the record of man, it can
be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and
prevail.
Finally, having said all this, I must commend those poets I
have selected as my top three choices and honorable mention
recipients. Their poetry ranges from traditional forms to free
verse, but all of it is thoughtfully developed and carefully
crafted. I have reread all of these poems dozens of times and
they remain new and fresh with each reading—a hallmark, I
believe, of good writing. Bravo! And thank you.
Winning Entry Poems:
First Place: “The Ascent of Icarus” (Jade Ring Winner)
This very carefully crafted sonnet of rhyming couplets
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