Speech & Poetry

We know my unshrouded contempt for the claim that 2d art is poetry.

But why?

Here might be an analogue to help:

A painter paints, but then realizes that people, when they are not looking at his paintings, are talking about his paintings.

He says to himself "ah, it is not my painting that people love, it is the experience of my painting they love -- especially the talking about it."

So in order to help people talk about his paintings, he begins to incorporate words on his canvasses. He also starts to include larger and larger explanation placards to give his audience talking points.

One day, he doesn't produce a painting at all, but a large 4x3 white canvas with 16-point type describing a painting that isn't there. Eureka! He has given his fans what they truly want!

Not the painting, not the looking at the painting -- but the shared experience of having thought about looking at the painting -- the water-cooler chat, as it were.

"But," some child says, "you haven't painted anything. You aren't a painter anymore -- this isn't a painting."

"Oh, the ignorance of youth" thinks the painter. "Of course I am a painter, I have just found the essence of painting and given it to my audience."

In all of this,
the "painter" thinks he knows best.
In all of this,
the "painter" ignores the nature of his art.

Painting is eye-candy. As long as colors and shapes are on a canvas, we will look at them. We may talk about them to our friends -- to those who can't see the colors in front of them, but the experience, the purpose of a painting is to see it. No description can do a painting justice.

In the same way,
poetry is ear-candy. We will listen if it sounds good. When we are unable to listen, we may "listen in our heads" by reading the poem -- but the experience of the poem is aural, not visual. When we move away from the aural, we move away from poetry.