A hole in the news the size of poetry
A hole in the news the size of poetry
It's not about the Times. It's not about the times. It's about the poetry.
The NYT poetry editor quit. Maybe we care, sure, but I don’t want to talk about it. I want to talk about what poetry does.
Let’s set this resignation letter alongside Allen Ginsberg’s quote:
“The only thing that can save the world is the reclaiming of the awareness of the world. That's what poetry does.”
Anne Boyer’s letter is prose. But she leaves a poem in there. And that is a magic trick. It’s invisible.
She basically says: I have an issue with this war, so I am “reclaiming my awareness of the world” in my way. Here, this is what absence looks like.
Her poem is the “hole in the news the size of poetry.” Her poem is nothing.
“That’s what poetry does.”
I have never liked a poem that existed of nothing until now, and I would have never called emptiness a real poem until now. This is the part that fascinates me about her resignation.
My scurf for the day is to call this out for anyone who didn’t notice. It’s not easy to see an invisible poem.