There I was, minding the earth's bizness in the field near my cabin, and  "whaaa?" -  a twinkle from the otherwise green/yellow/red/brown living surface that is the field showed a bit of WHITE.  Snowball white, coconut covered Hostess SnoBall white with cream inside, cloud white, whiter-than-white. I leaned over and parted the blades of grass, brushed away the leaf litter, and behold! The white shrooms of Pure Amazement! And I was glad . . . .

Maybe I'm missing something big, but what is this deliberate obfusication of meaning in the poetry of so many writers? Are they simply being hermetic for the sake of their own protection or amusement? Protection against what? Why bother writing if you aren't attempting to communicate meaning? Or is it an indication of our lack of astute readership that is the problem here? Hey, I know I won't "get" everything that comes across my own particular filter, nor do I suggest content be "dumbed down," for any reason, but I'd like to offer some writing advice: just say it. Say it with allusions, metaphor, whatever tropes you find delicious, but say it so we can hear it.

It is difficult not to regard this category of poet as somewhat pretentious. Ezra Pound, no doubt, still engages certain readers with buried allusions that test your smarts and "inside joke" metaphors, but this leaves so many of us out of the fold. With the so-called tenuous state of poetry today, wouldn't it be better to speak plainly and offer the reader (especially the fledgling reader of poetry) something a bit more accesible to grab ahold of?

When I was about 5 years old, an older neighbor girl (she was probably 11 or 12) took me into the yard and told me about what "men and women do to make a baby." I listened politely, then went back to my jumprope or whatever and promptly forgot about her revelation until years later when it surfaced in my memory as a sort of dull "aha." It didn't hold much meaning for me at 5 - I simply wasn't ready to hear about it yet. Wouldn't this same principle apply to knowledge in any form? If we are ready to absorb it we will. If not, it will pass over our heads like so many birds. No real reason to deliberately shield it from the light, is there?

One of my principle joys in poetry are the layers of it, the "no ideas but in things" treatise of William Carlos Williams' that measures out meaning in gigantic heaps or small spoonfuls perfectly suited to my own brain's capacity to absorb them. This "show, don't tell" approach has its own built in security; there is no need to be deliberately shaded. As for those poets who do not choose this approach and weave their impervious lines - what can I say? Make yourself happy. Readers are free to do the same, elsewhere. I go to poetry to enrich my understanding and hopefully savor something I may have missed in the everyday. It don't hafta be fancy, honey. Just say it plain and let me see the light glinting off of it on my own.