Now That's Some Pretty Cool Poetry

Today and for some of next week, I will be off-island so I am unable to share any current or new insights from my classes at the moment. Although, there is one thing that really stuck out to me from the other day in my literature class. Each of us were assigned a poem in our text to read out. There were the basics - the different rhyming patterns, the ones that really touch a person's soul, the funny ones, as well as the ones that were too deep and in between the lines to comprehend. But there was this poem that stood out from the rest:

Constantly Risking Absurdity 

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BY LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI

Constantly risking absurdity 

                                             and death 

            whenever he performs 

                                        above the heads 

                                                            of his audience 

   the poet like an acrobat 

                                 climbs on rime 

                                          to a high wire of his own making 

and balancing on eyebeams 

                                     above a sea of faces 

             paces his way 

                               to the other side of day 

    performing entrechats 

                               and sleight-of-foot tricks 

and other high theatrics 

                               and all without mistaking 

                     any thing 

                               for what it may not be 

       For he's the super realist 

                                     who must perforce perceive 

                   taut truth 

                                 before the taking of each stance or step 

in his supposed advance 

                                  toward that still higher perch 

where Beauty stands and waits 

                                     with gravity 

                                                to start her death-defying leap 

      And he 

             a little charleychaplin man 

                                           who may or may not catch 

               her fair eternal form 

                                     spreadeagled in the empty air 

                  of existence

Now even without having to read the poem, the reader can clearly see how the lines are organized and see the spacing and gaps between the words. A person's normal instincts are to read from left to right. This poem, however, can be read multiple ways. It can be read by just the left column going down or by just the right column going down, as well as backwards reading the poem going back up. I have not been introduced to a poem with this particular kind of wordplay and free structure before, so it really amazed me. Ferlinghetti definitely had some skills with this one.