There has been considerable clatter regarding the cinquain on the Sphere recently, and it bothers me because I think we are making a great deal of fuss about a form which encourages facile pseudo-poetry, and has little else going for it.
The demonstration of this, as far as I am concerned, is that virtually all of the discussion on this Board and Mastery - with the exception of some good analysis by Victoria Galle, and some language-related comments by Jerry Hartwig - is focused on the mechanics of the form - the number of syllables, or feet, per line. You would think we were a pack of accountants, rather than poets. Almost nobody seemed interested in what the cinquain is intended to accomplish (or seemed to know), how it should be constructed as a poem, why and how it evolved. I know Adelaide Crapsey invented the thing, but - as opposed to, for example, the haiku - it seems a poetic form without a poetic pedigree, without a sense of purpose, or a structure beyond mechanics.
Consequently, the form seems to lend itself to portentuous, but ultimately banal pronouncements, and most of what i have seen here - including Ms. Crapsey's work - is unimpressive.
To prove a point: here are a series of cinquains I wrote this afternoon. I normally spend days or even weeks on the work I post here. These probably averaged about three minutes each. The two stanzas might have required ten minutes total. I don't think any of them have any depth - but I felt that way about every cinquain I read. A few may be "shallow good" - they give the impression of being decent poetry, even if they aren't. Some humor and wordplay helps a bit. Compared to other cinquains posted, including Ms. Crapsey's, I don't think they are significantly better or worse, and in some ways more interesting. But it was all just quick-quick gabblegabblegabble. We can all count to eight, and most of us can write an interesting sentence or two. It was like doing ditties for the FunExcise Forum. I'm not finding much beyond that. (Further comments after the last poem.)
(1)
Hooker.
She used to stand
on Eighth and Forty-Fifth
and now she's gone. I guess she found
a fix.
(2)
Faceless
on rain-slick streets
I prowl the city; slide
through midnight crowds and never touch
a soul.
(3)
Wet snow
falling all night
encloses the cabin.
"Winter," she says, stretched by the fire,
"Winter!"
(4) (stanzas)
It was
one of those things
Piss call at three AM.
and yesmyloveyesmyloveyes!
Then snores
And she
now wide awake
can hear the fucking clock
remembers he was reading Joyce.
Of course!
(5)
Cinquains
I regard them
as poems for poets
who will not take the time to write
poems.
<u>Comments:</u> In writing these I found that I was unconsciously going for a twist - or a least a ta da in the last line, to add interest, and was also depending on irony and/or humor. But I do that all the time, so I'm not sure it's cinquain-inspired. I was basically digging into the old tool box and trying to make the dogs sing.
(1) and (2) are extensions of the kind of pretend city-smart tough guy stuff I wrote as a kid. Banal. But they seem to slide into this form, and the form makes them seem better than they are. (And, yes, nyctom, I know that (1) is outdated since Times Square was Disneyed and the hookers moved to the meatpacking district. It's a retro poem.)
I agree with Alicia's comments about the form possibly lending itself to stanzas, played with this a bit in (4), and I think it's the most successful of the group.
(5) pretty much summarizes how I feel after playing with the form. I feel it doesn't offer enough depth or challenge, and can encourage "lazy" poetry.
Dee - apologies for combining poetry and an op-ed piece, but I didn't know where else to put this. God knows it's not Mastery. And I didn't want to use General Talk as an excuse for posting my own stuff (particularly after recently criticizing David Halitsky for doing the same thing.) It would not be considerate to append it to Yolanda's thread. So - since it's a week since my last Poetry Board post - I put it here.
Michael Cantor
[This message has been edited by Michael Cantor (edited April 16, 2005).]
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