Bob:
There's no guessing how someone's going to take a poem, and there's often very little to go on in interpreting what he or she might say about it, even assuming the person is sincerely trying to explain the reaction. I think that people's ability to put words to the experience of a poem is often as limited as some folks' ability to read in the first place. Worse yet, their limited ability to explain sometimes backs them into a reaction. By that I mean that once their words get going in a certain direction they are persuaded that that's where they meant to go. (I don't mean for this to be a blanket condemnation of readers or even of those who offer a negative take, only a caution.) So what the hell might "soul" mean? Well, from experience I know that for some readers it means no easily catagorized wound -- no abused childhood? no social oppression? no substance abuse? What business, they seem to ask, have you in writing poetry that doesn't have a point that will fit on a bumper sticker? The music of language is harder to hear and far, far harder to describe than is a screed of psychological or sociological dogma. Before I pay much attention to anyone's reaction I try to determine whether that person much cares or knows about poetry as poetry.
Whew, I feel better!
Richard
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