Poetry is the familiar, nostalgic sensation that made me want to rip my hair out back in seventh grade when my English teacher asked me to analyze ‘The Listeners’ for the tenth time in one week.
We’ve all been there, sitting at our desks hoping Walter de la Mare would jump right out of the paper before us and eloquently elaborate the unrecognizable, secret messages hidden in his poem.
But what is poetry? What is this head-scratching form of literature that comes so quickly to some but dodges the desperate talons of others? What is this art form that has so shrewdly escaped the snare of words, whose essence can never indeed be expressed?
Poetry, in fact, is much like a painting, crafted by amalgamating the broken, mosaic pieces of the poet’s heart to form something beyond the capacity of mere words. Poetry is more than just its rhyme, rhythm, meter, and themes; the epitome of something being more significant than the sum of its parts. Poetry is the rare rendition of pain, love, and heartbreak through the ambassadors of language: words. Poetry is a structured arrangement of messy emotions. Poetry is the universe’s gift bestowed on humanity. Poetry is as universal as it is individualistic. Poetry is the heart’s deepest, darkest desires portrayed as a renaissance painting because what better way to present misery than as a rose without thorns?
You see? The definition of poetry itself is poetry.
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