To respond to many of the people above, I'd like to touch on the idea of poetry in my personal life and how it relates to analyzing poetry personally in my life. I think poetry is able to display ideas that any other art form or form of literature can, as it requires a great deal of interpretation in a different method than the other forms. I personally have always read poetry and enjoyed it, but as I've grown older I think that I'm able to more effectively determine its meanings as I read.

@bunkymoo What made you think you understood poetry? We have spent a lot of time during our school careers discussing different type of poems and how to write them, and I can agree with your frustration on not being able to understand them either. What made the click for me was understanding their structure. I was spending to much time focusing on the words and pushed away an important part of looking at a poem. I talked about it in one of my other forum posts, but the structure allows the reader to push away the words and how they might be in weird places and focus on the theme. 

@alechayosh07

I never really thought about poetry in that way. It is very true that the difference in the structure of a novel and a poem, for example, is absolutely massive, yet both are trying to convey an idea, just through different means. I have always looked for the words and their meanings in the context in poetry, which may be a key reason that I have yet to ascend beyond the basic understanding of the meanings authors wish to convey!

@alechayosh07 I also agree with this frustration. I have issues understanding poetry as it is, and I cannot even begin to understand how to write it properly. Like you said earlier, it is all just so foreign to me... Im gonna try your strategy though, in that maybe if I can understand the structure of a poem first, maybe I could understand the meaning of the poem later.

@alechayosh07 I think what made me understand them better is reading them looking for meaning and purpose instead of just reading them with no intention involved. It makes me engaged to the text instead of it going in one ear and out of the other. I also believe we haven't been introduced to poetry on this type of level yet, so I am very intrigued in how they work to provide a story. I enjoy searching for meaning behind the words. I also find interesting the different ways you can write and speak poems.

@delphine I think that your observation on how the older you get the more you understand about poetry is based on experiences. Growing up you will encounter a lot of these experiences that authors write about which gives you this understanding. For example when a poet writes about death in any way we are able to recognize it no matter how straight forward or vague they are being. So I can definitely agree that my personal life has helped in my understanding of poetry, or at least a little.

@carlatortelli This is so true. As literature and poetry both serve the same purpose, I like how you tie poetry into literature. When I think of literature, I also think of poetry being an inclusion. However, when you dissect the two from each other individually, you can see their varying attributes and how both form of writing can take you to this new figurative world in a different way.

@xmysterio I love the way you worded this. Poetry and other forms of writing transport the readers to different aspects of their lives. Reading poetry really makes the reader think and make interpretations based on their own lives. Pieces of literature like novels transport the reader to the lives of other characters. They're just all so different in beautiful ways.

@delphine the word transport is a very neat way of describing something, especially when you are talking about the emotions of a human. I truly do believe that reading poems or really any piece of literature can transport you to a certain area of your life that you connect to. They can also change your thought, and transport you to a different way of thinking. Also with what you said about characters, I have connected with plenty of characters in books I have read, and it made that book so much more enjoyable. I would relate to what they were thinking and doing just by putting myself in their shoes.

@delphine I like what you said here about how literature can transport you to a certain part of your life and how you related it to movies. This is totally true. I also feel this can be true with music as well. All of these are somehow linked to literature and all literature can be interpreted and applied to someone's personal life. 

@delphine Thank you, I feel that literature (including poetry) has a sort of obligation to transport the reader into that world. When writing, it’s the writers opposition to write a world that is capable of encapsulating the reader into it. This is why I believed poetry should be considered a type of literature.

@xmysterio

Posted by: @xmysterio

When writing, it’s the writers opposition to write a world that is capable of encapsulating the reader into it.

Ooooh, I really like the way that you put this. I too agree that poetry should be considered a type of literature. To change my opinion from what I said earlier, I don't necessarily think that poetry is totally up to the readers interpretation (compared to novels), but I think it's more dependent on the length and wording of the poem. Your descriptions just really help drive home your point too, I like how you used the word encapsulate. 

Reading this entire thread just makes me extremely happy. As one of our very first threads, it's so exciting to see that over the last six months we've continued to find new and beautiful ways to describe the art of poetry and poetry as literature. I invite everyone to share how poetry makes them feel and why those feelings should classify it as literature (or not literature). 

@octavia Yes! The art of music is also so powerful in what I would argue is the same way. The power that each piece of individual literature holds is one I will never truly grasp, and music is so magnificent in the way that we can observe the art of lyricism as well as the composition of the notes themselves (in a vocal piece of course). Music and poetry are very similar to me as they can both be interpreted differently by so many people. Instrumental music especially is just so exquisite, because it can mean whatever the listener needs to hear, yet there is an extremely intense connection between the listener and the performer.

@delphine Me too! Throughout the week when I am writing some of my posts I always seem to come here first and read all the new responses to see if any new ideas have emerged. It's truly crazy to see how far this thread has come and ho many students might've changed their mind on their personal opinion when it comes to poetry and how they think it does or doesn't connect to literature. I started posting in this thread towards the beginning and was not happy with poetry, I often voiced my opinion on how i struggled with it and how i didn't think it related with literature and couldn't sum it up as one. Now I look at myself and I have mild enjoyment for poetry and can no understand the claim of poetry=literature. I think everyone has grown from the ideas shared in this section and its really really cool to look at that progression.