In my youth I looked down upon formal poetry, considering it the wussie’s means of striking back against the established “norm” while lacking actual testicles. Now I see the subtle build of linguistic architecture and how time builds upon and backs up the message of those talented. I’m starting to appreciate opera too. May have to turn in my Man Card soon. Kill me before I host a Drag Queen library hour (LOL).
LOL - You’ll be fine. Poetry’s wonderful and Auden’s one of the best.
LOL! The sad thing was that this stuff started getting known as “gay”or effeminate, and it really wasn’t. It was just the usual that happens with leftist academics taking over a field,...in this case, all of literature and all of music...and interrpreting and controlling it according to their ideological guidelines.
That drove a lot of people away from poetry, which actually had been a popular art form. When I was growing up in NYC, there were a lot of bookstores and whenever a new volume of poetry was published by some well-known poet, such as Robert Lowell or Elizabeth Bishop, the window would be filled with the display of the poet’s books. The shops actually had to limit how many people could come into the store on the first day (bookshops were generally small then).
When I went to PS 165 on the Upper West Side, they taught us poetry. All of us, English speakers, non-English speakers, black, white or whatever. We also had to write poetry, even modestly, and then in what was called Junior High School (grades 7-9) they introduced us to formal rhyme scheme.
Most poets had been essentially song-writes of their time, and were popular with everybody. It was the leftist academy after WWII that destroyed this.
awesome post, and rest assured, no loss of manliness is seen here! There are lots of us here at FR who love it all: opera house, ballet, poetry; as well as gun range, barbecue pit and MMA ring.
Keep pressing forward in ALL areas of culture!