This Washington Post article says poetry is going extinct. Another article from CNN insists that poetry still matters, and explains why. What do you think? Tell us in the comments below what you think poetry’s status in society is as we approach 2017.
Shawn Hatfield
First and foremost, I love music and writing. Since I composed my first pieces of music and poetry I've been obsessed with creative output. Music and writing are a constant puzzle I want to solve, whether it is a blog piece, recording session artists, short stories, or full length albums. I am the owner and head engineer of Groove: Music Studios. Currently, we offer professional audio mixing and mastering services. I am also the Senior Editor/Staff Writer at The Borfski Press, an independent publishing company that I co-own with my wife, Dagney. I am currently working full time in music retail at a small business and part time as a professional musician and writer. I love working in a local shop, building customer relationship management skills, and having the opportunity to sell things I love. My expertise include audio production, live sound, music retail, writing/blogging, and publishing. I especially enjoy writing and learning about music gear, specifically vintage pedals. There's something very special and exciting about stomping a pedal's switch or flipping an amp on for the first time.
The Borfski Press 
February 14, 2017 at 2:06 am
Poetry has great potential, but like all other art forms, it has to adapt to the climate it’s being written in. People have short attention spans. A lot of readers have English as a second language and NEVER studied Latin so Latin phrases in Italics are arrogant unless submitting to a high end magazine. People like to hear poetry but not necessarily to read it. There are 20-30 poetry readings a month in Toronto, Canada, and many are standing room only, yet the poetry establishment still want to publish books. As far as I know, there are no poetry apps (and I don’t mean for only spoken word; I mean for well-read page poetry, too — and not all poets read their own work well). I’d like to see a “So You Think You Can Write” competition on TV to engage the audiences with the written word, I’d like to see poetry on flash drives to listen to in traffic jams. I’d like to see readings recorded on MP3 players and ipods and downloadable from music sites. There has been an explosion of poetic response to the American political scene although I haven’t seen any yet and mine has being rejected 3 times already probably because it critiques the progressive establishment’s pre-election errors. The same thing is going to happen in Canada if we don’t learn from looking south and if we don’t REFLECT. And poetry is often about reflection. I think we need a literary revolution as shocking as the revolution of the alienated who put Trump in power, poetry in newspapers, poetry on the radio, interviews with poets with an analysis of events as well as an analysis of the use (and abuse) of language. I don’t want to see poetry go the way that religion has gone, irrelevant, distant, ignored. THIS is what AWP should be talking about. Are they? The League of Canadian Poets is having its conference in June in Toronto. I will be vocal in calling for these topics to be aired there…but I doubt I’ll get anywhere. Anyway, good luck down there. You have a tough row to hoe through present history but you have 100 times the magazines, both in print and online not to mention all those hundreds of MFA courses (we have 2)but I don’t like a lot of them) Sharon Goodier Toronto
Sharon Goodier is a poet from Toronto, Canada. She has had poems published in Carte Blanche (Montreal), 11th Transmission (social realism – London, Ont), Dove Tales Nature Anthology (U.S.2015) and Adana, an anthology of women’s spirituality (U.S. 2015). She was long-listed for the Mary K. Ballard award (U.S.) in 2014. Legends Anthology published her short story “The Year of the Donkey” in 2016. In 2016 her poetry appeared in Koru (U.S. online) and Quilliad (Toronto). She is a co-founder of The Art Bar poetry series . She recently completed a mentoring through CSARN with Canadian poet Gerry Shikitani.
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