[Erik Olson]

"The basis of all excellence is truth: he that professes love ought to feel its power." (Johnson)
An effective poem is such that it brings truth to bear of some kind or other and makes it accessible to the reader. The truth need not be what you would get from a philosophy book necessarily, though it sometimes is; it is very often some truth, even indefinable as it may be, that is gathered or felt of the human experience. The ultimate function to result from effective poetry and indeed literature is to preserve and celebrate as well as to help realize truths about our human experience we might not otherwise have realized or apprehended so potently. This does not mean one need sit down and think from the outset I will convey this and that truth by means of poetry (there can be hazards in that, when taken to its extreme); but in writing effective poetry, truth may come to bear and be made accessible to an audience.

Poetry helps us come into a fuller awareness of our being and also to preserve our awareness and wisdom. Sometimes the motives of poetry as a primary end can include teaching this or that, rather as a secondary and subordinate component under the main. But I think in all cases truth can be gleamed from effective poetry whatever the kind, as poetry in its essence helps us face and sense some truth about our being. As Heidegger put it Poetry and language helps us dwell:

"What then does ich bin mean? The old word bauen, to which the bin belongs, answers: ich bin, du bist mean: I dwell, you dwell. The way in which you are and I am, the manner in which we humans are on the earth, is Buan, dwelling. To be a human being means to be on the earth as a mortal. it means to dwell. The old word bauen, which says that man is insofar as he dwells, this word barren however also means at the same time to cherish and protect, to preserve and care for, specifically to till the soil, to cultivate the vine."