Who Should Crave For Poems?

 

Our very own society is defined by elegance, as well as uselessness; swiftness and well as staidness. We live in an 'unpoetic' time. Prose is in the air we breathe, and prose is what we consume, as well as dwell in. prose, exist in a form that is, at times, benign, and could even nourish our minds, most times. But to exist in a world, where the manner of social convention is badly-written and blunderingly spoken prose is tantamount to lacking the ability to use the full power of language.

One unpleasant truth of poetry is the fact that some love poetry, much more detest it, and everyone do not buy it. These days, there is a month in which poetry is celebrated and recognized, there is an award given for the best poetry work (which to me, is totally unnecessary) and neo-poetry in the lines of old-fashioned and new school music lyrics, and movie works, but do the vast majority of people crave poetry?

It is as disastrous as it might look. A great number of the populace, will not attend a poetry open-mic, or a  book launch of an anthology. Poetry for long, is a special art that is appreciated by the minority. Poem writing is not lucrative.

Although there are few exceptions though, those are the misfits, the introverted or socially-akward, and the artsy, who find poetry appealing. They find the archaic and obscure verses of Soyinka delectable, others embrace the vivid imagery in J.P Clark's poems, while some find soltitude in the vibrant lustre of Osundare's poetry. They realize the void of this sentience can never be felt by reading a novel or by listening to Wizkid's song.

Arts, like plants, have their season of bloom. While some have been comatosed into other larger niche, others have endured painfully through the years, although no more beaming  their incandescence. Hundred of years ago, poetry did not exist in the small and insignificant magazines as it is today. In those days, poetry shone it brilliance and aesthetical pride on popular magazines and newspapers.

Today, art form of poetry is gasping for survival, it is ignored at schools most of the time. In universities, in courses where poetry are studies, it is just one form of expressing the author's idea, there is no careful analysis of the obscurity and glorious supremacy of verses and the exciting shade of meaning that gives poetry its poeticness. In secondary and primary schools, poetry is often vilified, as it is treated with high-handedness,making children to become terrible readers of poetry.

My lofty suggestion is that reading should be taught to the Nigerian child through poetry. Clark and Okigbo and Osundare by the time he/she is in the most senior class in junior secondary school. In senior secondary school, Okara and Soyinka. If a student knows how to syntactically analyze sentence through the poems of say, Okigbo, he will surely appreciate the fanciful meanings in Dennis Brutus and Leopold Senghor's poem. But the fact is that such a world is not where we live in, and even poets who are still alive to this day, may perhaps not wish for a world of that kind.

One can live out his/her existence without appeciating poetry, just as it is possible today to never listen to Bethoveen or see a Matisse. Some sort of art exist around us. Music today, is art in its most complex and basic form. Though, poetry will never garner the kind of audience that 'Jenifa Diary' have. The optimum power of language is what Poetry is. The survival of language, is the survival of poetry.