I’m not much of a poet. To be frank, I don’t really understand poetry. I particularly don’t understand “free verse,” which does not follow the structural demands of rhyme and meter that we usually associate with poetry. Robert Frost once compared free verse to “playing tennis without a net.” I think it’s too easy to do it wrong because no one can tell you have to do it right. Free verse makes me think of the tortured poet reading his poetry at the front of a dimly lit coffeehouse. The poet gives meaning to the words of the poem through emotional delivery and many pregnant pauses. After the reading, the audience murmurs in quiet appreciation and perhaps snaps their fingers.
This having been said, I wrote a poem in free verse to serve as an introduction to my 52 Ancestors book. Here it is.
I don’t really know what makes this a poem, but I think it is a poem. You have my approval to murmur appreciatively and snap your fingers if you are so moved.
Hey, you and Amanda Gorman!
I have been moved (no pun intended) to murmur most appreciatively and snap my fingers, most happily! 😎