What Is Poetry

What is Poetry?

Poetry is language on a spree.
John Hegley
Poetry is a hotline to the emotions.
Andrew Motion
Poetry, like music is to be heard.
Basil Bunting
Poetry is language in orbit.
Seamus Heaney
Poetry is words with a tune.
Jon Stallworthy
Poetry begins in delight and ends in wisdom.
Robert Frost
Prose: Words in their best order.
Poetry: The best words in the best order.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Poetry is naked words dancing together.
Adrian Mitchell
Poetry’s like a huge multi-coloured marquee that has room for all kinds of forms and voices.
Vicki Feaver
Every poem is an island. To get to a poem requires sailing out from the mainland of routine language.
Robert Crawford

*Discuss each quote with your group. What is each of these quotes trying to say about poetry? Be prepared to share your ideas with the class.

*Choose the three quotes that you most relate to or find interesting and write down your own explanation of what is being said.

·  Write your own “Poetry is...” statement on the graffiti chart.

How to eat a poem

Don't be polite.

Bite in.

Pick it up with your fingers and lick the juice that

May run down your chin.

It is ready and ripe now, whenever you are.

You do not need a knife or fork or spoon

Or plate or napkin or tablecloth.

For there is no core

Or stem

Or rind

Or pit

Or seed

Or skin

To throw away.

Eve Merriam