More and more, the poetry groups I see and visit
Are into Contemporary and even into so-called Slam.
Some of them think the day of Classical poetry is done--but is it?
Even Moderns like Frost and Dickinson, they think, are done.
At least in this way: New poets MUST write for a New Day,
In a New Way--namely, THEIR WAY.
I think not.
Although I do like much of Contemporary, and Slam can wax hot.
I like much of Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and Alan Ginsburg;
And that Charles Bukowski can make you smell the blood of a bar fight,
Or see the winos the way you've seen them panhandle on a downtown street.
I really dig the poetry of Performance Art and the lyric of Beat.
But, as a Person and as a Poet, I have--some would say--skeletons in my closet.
And, as a Poet, one of the skeletons in my closet is the skeleton of William Shakespeare.
Now, I find a lot of New Poets are afraid of, or rather repelled by, Shakespeare's skeleton.
They don't want to see that great big polished-bone skull with the large deep eye-sockets.
Staring at them like some Yorick of a supposedly dead literature, whose tongue
Is not supposed to be here anymore, nor heard, nor be able to sing or speak.
Shakespeare's tongue, of course, lived and still lives in his writing pen.
His living mind has for centuries, and will for centuries, so come to life again.
Within the hearts and minds of those who read him, children, women, and men.
But still, many Contemporary Poets and Slam Performers disdain the Bard.
They don't want the bones of Shakespeare's skeleton to rattle at them.
Certainly not in iambic pentameter lines of blank verse, nor
In decorated declamations of supposedly dead words.
I heard a Poet I respect upbraid a fellow once, for reciting Shakespeare at a poetry reading.
"Shakespeare is dead," he said.  "Why read him, when living people are writing?  What for?"
My other friend, the Shakespeare-reader--he was my friend, too--
Clearly felt put down, and sad; his spirit inwardly was bleeding.
He never came back to that locale; and I don't believe he ever gave another reading.
On the other hand, also, some snobbish types look down on any and all Contemporary and Slam!
But not as many, as the reverse; many Contemporary never vary into Poetry's variety,
And many of Slam like Slam, but for anything else, just don't give a damn.
But as for me, Shakespeare is as cool as Kerouac, as salty as Bukowski,
As critical and emotional as Ginsburg, as insightful and creative as Burroughs.
Actually, Shakespeare is MORE of all these things, than all of these people--
Even if he is a skeleton in my closet that some people think I shouldn't let out.
(At least, not when I'm enjoying a cup of cappuccino or black espresso).
But I don't know who cooks up the rules
In the arbitrary Cool-Rule Rule-Books,
And I don't buy them.  Just because I dig the Beats
Is no reason at all why I can't get off on Shakespeare, too;
Or others, like Shelley and Keats,
Like Tennyson, Dickinson, Poe, and Baudelaire.
Does someone rattle out the rules to me? 
Well, I rattle Shakespeare's bones right back at her or him:
Shakespeare is NOT to spurn, but to love and learn.
I will not be limited, neither by great minds nor by little minds.
Life is too damned short for people to be giving each other a fit.
Alas, poor Shakespeare!  A fellow of infinite wit:
I know him and I love him well.
And those who think that isn't cool, well--
They rob themselves of riches, in their shell.

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Written by Michael LP, aka MLP
aka PoetWithCancer, aka PWC, aka (thanks to Luna Marie) Mr. Poet
Written on Thursday, August 26, 1993  8:42 pm
Copyright (C) 2011 by Michael LP.  All rights reserved
(I still copyright my writings, for my estate)