why i like poetry

[This is day #18 of my 30-day microblogging challenge. You can and should still join!]

I like poetry for the same reason I like running
because it makes me feel free
it’s an escape from the constraints of daily life
(and, paradoxically, from language itself)

I can choose to end the sentence
here
or here
or there
I can decorate the pages
like skyscrapers
create shapes
highlighting
whatever
I wish

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I like my poems straightforward
and I like my poems dense
I like feeling dumb, then witty
and confused before they start to resonate

I enjoy being marvelled by simplicity
or impressed by words picked with care
simple, opaque, or decorated
ultimately, they all feel the same:
deeply human

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Diving into a poem feels like spinning a roulette
every author with their themes and flavor
holding me by the hand
taking me on a ride
through unfamiliar landscapes
a new reflection every time
kept as a souvenir

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It would seem that poetry is a layer of abstraction
a puzzle, a riddle
but really, poets try to capture what’s real
what feels real
with the only primitive, constraining tool at their disposal:
language

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Poetry (definition):
an experiment in capturing
textures and hues of life
dimensions beyond the usual
from angles unexplored
with language as both substrate and matter

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Don’t ask me about poetry;
I have truly terrible taste.
I find beauty in much of it,
as I honor it as a miracle:
a proof of our existence,
a display of entropy-taming
by the ones entropy tames.