From the Empirical Archives: I Hate Poetry by Benedict C. Schurwanz

I Hate Poetry

Benedict C. Schurwanz

PHOTO: E. Sabrina Lee

Originally published in the September 2012 issue of Empirical

I don’t write poems.

I haven’t written any in so many years.

I stopped because I got

Annoyed

With what I don’t have better words for than

“Beat Poetry,”

“Slam Poetry,”

Ridiculous lines that

Hang

Off the edge

Of a person’s mouth,

Words that are careful to

Hold on

To the tone on the edge of a

Question,

Hesitating to jump

From the edge of a pair of lips

For fear of falling

So far to the ground.

I don’t write poetry now.

So many years ago

I wanted to tell stories

That would be so much

Bigger

Than the little world upon which I felt myself to live.

I wanted to touch the sky,

To reach into it and

Touch

The clouds, roll over and over

Through the cotton fog and have it

Stick to my skin

In tiny little flecks that could hold me

And carry me over the trees

That I longed so dearly

To look down on from above,

See those shaking leaves

From the other side, be

Above them.

I wanted to be above those stupid

Canned poets that

Slam

Their words

Into the ears

And the faces

Of the poor canned people who sit,

Hearing without listening.

When I hear poetry

Read

In a slow

Stretched

Pace

It’s the reader trying to put a gravity into the words that isn’t necessarily there.

Or maybe it is there, but we wouldn’t know it because we aren’t listening.

We aren’t listening because we’ve decided how we want to feel

Before we started reading,

Or writing.

Even the word, Poetry,

Is stupid,

The word Poem,

Is so small for what people

Want it to mean.

We’ve inherited it along with a language

That shapes our thoughts and gives us

The only tools we know how to use.

The words out of the mouths of so many poets seem to

Draw themselves out as if to

Force their rhythms to become

Your rhythms,

My rhythms.

I think we read this way,

Write this way,

Listen this way

because we’ve learned to.

We’ve been taught to.

By people who’ve been taught to.

By people who forgot how to do it any other way.

I don’t like poetry.

I don’t really want to sound like anyone else.

I don’t want fall into a

Trap

Of trying to imitate anyone

Or everyone else.

I don’t want to write words that sound good to other people if they don’t

Sound good to me.

I want to scream at everyone I ever see,

Tell them leave me alone!

And then,

Listen to me.

I want Poetry

To be naked music in the form of words.

I want to tell people what is true,

And I don’t really know what is true,

And tell them that I don’t know.

I want my words to have

No rhythm

Unless it isn’t fake,

Isn’t applied out of imitation.

Then it isn’t true.

I want a poem that doesn’t

Push its rhythm onto you

But peels back the layers of the world to show you the truth that is waiting

there for you to touch it,

Waiting inside your heart to be touched.

I want to write a poem

So I can lend you my eyes for a moment

And you can put them on and see what I see

Until the poem is done.

If we read in our own naked voice,

We might find the music that is

Waiting patiently behind the words,

Giving itself over to us,

Rolling at our feet in the ecstasy of

Finally being heard.

Remember.

Remember what’s already been inside you,

What never left,

What is waiting still for you to meet it again.

Remember.

Please.

Remember.

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