Marcella,
The way people talk about ecopoetry baffles me entirely. As does the poetry that ends up being in this category.

Very worrying indeed. Thanks for your post, which does get at some of the possibilities.

First, the poem is a creative endeavor—an exploration, a live entity that unfolds as it’s written and read. If everything within the poem is known before it’s even begun, then what’s the point of writing or reading it? Poems are not factual reports, intended to convey knowledge in the most transparent, most denotative language possible. Instead, a poem may use (hopefully) unexpected language or surprising juxtapositions that may not even make any immediate sense. A poem ostensibly about bees and colony collapse disorder could end up with tractor-trailers or issues of immigration in it, or veer toward an abstract translation of what flower markings might “say” to bees. I believe it is for this quality that poetry may be quite valuable in exploring ideas of ecology, in that it is able to make those surprising jumps—to hypothesize about the unknown, to be the fools who venture in, to explore inappropriate subjects, images, or language—to make those connections that most wouldn’t dare approach, for fear of being “inaccurate.”

I know the disciplines of science and poetry are vastly different in their methodology, and it can be difficult for one to appreciate the other. And I’m not arguing that poets be deliberately ignorant of the facts. But, I also think it’s essential to preserve a freedom to construct a poem that is not necessarily a delivery system for those facts; instead, an ecopoet may enter writing a poem to discover what may happen if, for instance, the language of a corporate memo is used to describe a field of genetically engineered corn. Another example is how the poet Tina Darragh explores the language of the animal rights movement, and how it can be broken apart and reconstructed within a poem. Anyway, I guess the gist of this is that I wouldn’t recommend reading a poem for your most up-to-date and accurate information on colony collapse disorder, but I would recommend reading it if you wanted a jolt to your innards and a fresh perspective on the subject!

Of course, as soon as I post THIS one it will show up and then I’ll look COMPLETELY insane.

(and in two different versions, no less.)

Thanks.

Thanks.

Ain’t life fun (and weird)?

.
Mockingbird

.
I see God’s hand in amber clouds
with golden rays above blue seas,
in black stripes on orange fur.
I see His plan in flowering tree,
in hummingbirds and honeybees,
in every desperate cur.

Call me crazy…well, they do,
but I see His thoughts in cobras, too.
I see His will in crocodiles,
in spider webs with morning dew.

They see God in human beings
and Satan in the wild,
but I see the Devil in you and me
and in every human child.
The roots of Poison Ivy
always grow new vines.

I see that mockingbird on the fence over there
just winked his eye at me.

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Copyright 2008 – SOFTWOOD-Seventy-eight poems, Gary B. Fitzgerald

Humanity is
the start of the race, I say
humanity is the mold to break away from, the crust to
break through, the coal to break into fire,
The atom to be split.

Terreson

Thanks for the added clarification. In the end I do agree with you that “eco-poets” should know their stuff. Forrest Gander teaches a course on eco-poetry at Brown and there’s some discussion in his posts (archived here at Harriet) on the subject.

I don’t entirely agree with you that poets need to know everything about any subject about which they might chose to write. I think it depends on the subject and what our idea of “knowledge” is. But I do agree with you that certain subjects call for a more exacting empiricism – even on the part of poets – than do others.

I’m particularly glad to see, in a thread like this, your introduction of a different critical standard. There needs to be more traffic between the different discourses. I’d be fascinated to here from both the author of the poem, and of course, from Camille, about what you have to say.

Martin

Zachariah Wells beat me to the punch. Karen Solie is, IMHO, the best of the younger non-metrical print poets.

“Irony takes you out at night
but appetite drives you home …”

“…the waiting moment, buckling into circumstance…”

– K.S.

.
Mockingbird

I see God’s hand in amber clouds
with golden rays above blue seas,
in black stripes on orange fur.
I see His plan in honeybees,
in mockingbirds and flowering trees,
in every desperate cur.

Call me crazy…well, they do,
but I see His thoughts in cobras, too.
I see His will in crocodiles.
They see God in human beings
and Satan in the wild,
but I see the Devil in you and me
and in every human child.
The roots of Poison Ivy
always grow new vines.

I see that mockingbird on the fence over there
just winked his eye at me.

.
Copyright 2008 – SOFTWOOD-Seventy-eight Poems, Gary B. Fitzgerald