by Christina Anne Taylor

Created on: October 24, 2010   Last Updated: October 25, 2010

Free verse would more accurately fall under the category of “prosetry” or line-break prose as opposed to poetry.  Poetry commands skill; it commands a musical ear and an understanding of the role of mathematics within the music of poetry.

Who is so bold as to strip away the demonstrated skill, the gift of weaving art with science, creativity with logic, and to apply the word “poetry” to the commoner’s effortless expressions?  Most people are not gifted poets, and yet there are hundreds of thousands, possibly millions this very day who claim the title – but the title does command a certain level of innate competence: an understanding of meter and the ability to shape thoughts into strict forms that display skill while being pleasing to the ear.  The ballade is particularly challenging; the sonnet, villanelle, sestina, less so but impressive, nonetheless, and I would challenge all free-versers to craft a few of these.  Of those who cannot rise to the challenge, I have concluded that such free-versers are essentially like “artists” who splatter paint haphazardly onto a canvas and say, “Move over, Rembrandt!  Behold modern art!”  Free verse, in my opinion, is merely an attempt to lower the bar, so to speak, so everyone can participate – but poetry is above that.

I am a poetess – first and foremost, a formalist.  It is when I am lacking the mental capacity or focus in a given moment that I resort to free verse to deliver what I then consider an inferior end result – but I must say that free verse does have its place.  It often delivers more meaning than what is found in formal poetry, which oftentimes focuses most intensely on sound-quality and on working within strict parameters.

Free-versers wish to be poets; I completely understand.  If they can demonstrate poetic skills such as assonance, personification and metaphor in their expression, that is wonderful, and it lands them a place on the highest plateau of prosetry.  If not, free-versers might find a niche in short stories, essays (the best prose has poetic qualities, of course!), and inner-city poetry slams where everyone wears black to feel more arteestic.

There IS a line between free verse and poetry, or more accurately, there is a box – a box that is most often measured in beats of four.  The rest reads like prose.

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