What is the point of poetry?

What is the point of poetry?

Am I just a brainlet? I don't get it.

Poetry is basically writing that has been extremely refined, similar to how you see a sketch of a painting with extreme detail/precision, though it doesn't take up much space.

Basically it's an aesthetic pleasure that can let you appreciate what it's trying to convey in different/interesting ways, which can in turn help you in understanding.

in English, doc?

A E S T H E T I C S

Ask reddit.

Poetry imparts an abstract beauty, like classical music, paintings, sculptures, and all other art. There is no "point" if you look at it as a utilitarian.

so how is it different from prose?

Structure and less emphasis on story-telling. They're both abstract media

It's condensed even further than the densest prose. The liberty of abandoning all rules of prose gives you the opportunity to only keep the most important words. On the other hand, poetry introduces new rules: meter, rhythm, rhyme, etc. Not all of these need to be present, but they give poetry a more musical quality.

I majored in literature. Almost all poetry comes down to ego-stroking of the writer although poetry fans will deny it. That's the point of it.

Most poets consider themselves to be god's gift to humanity. Literally. They think of themselves as actual prophets and their poetry as containing a more profound truth than anything else in human experience.

Romantic poets are the most blatant in that regard. Shelley actually called poets prophets. Keats unironically claimed "beauty is truth, truth beauty" by which he meant "my poetry is truth." Wordsworth called children prophets, but all that meant was "hear me: my personal sensibilities are truth." Blake created his own bible. So did Whitman (who is not a Romantic), consisting of 365 poems (one to be read each day of the year).

Ginsberg (and even Dylan) are considered prophets or claim to have some greater claim to truth than everybody else "the greatest minds of my generation" etc.

"So profound and beautiful :^)" is a meme that poets came up with to trick people into accepting and even celebrating their narcissism and egoism.

Which isn't to say that poetry isn't pleasurable to read or hear.

>t. Plato

rhymes

It all depends if you are talking about modern or classic poetry.

Classic poetry has tons of Ars Poeticas, so you'll find plenty of "points" there. Modern poetry tho, it's a whole different history...

>Write a bunch of extremely uninteresting bulshit ideas
>Obscure them in a sea of extremely simplistic metaphors and shitty attempts at breaking grammatical rules.
>Put up a "WOW SO DEEP" facade for the pseuds to circlejerk each other.
>Congrats, you're now a top tier poet.

Poetry = masturbation

>Most poets consider themselves to be god's gift to humanity.

So you have to spent 5 years of your life to discover that?

where have you been? poetry is so niche now that almost all poets are just in it for fun. besides, byron already lambasted the fuck outta the romantics for their stupidity. that battle was over before it started.

Those rhymes suck nigga.

good poetry is more feels inducing than literary prose. literary prose uses style to arouse an emotional response in the reader, but falls short of the manipulation of language that poetry can achieve.

we learn language through repetition and beats, and these things are hardwired into our understanding of language. good poetry uses the kind of language and sounds which makes your brain remember how it learnt language and how it longs for comprehension.

read poetry aloud. it'll help you hear its flow and mimickry more easily.

tl;dr- poetry first music of the soul you have become

>the point

youre a brainlet for looking 'a point' in it.

Masturbation. That is all.

Language used in pretty, ornate way. Poetry is shallow because musicality and imagism precede ideas.

Read one in your own native language

Fuck translations

I think the point of poetry is to abstractly capture human experiences and emotions, which is probably the only way how. Other forms of writing are more structured, and they don't seize the vagueness of what it means to be alive and to observe the world around us.

there isn't one singular point