1000 chews

[chibi575]

In our instant access world culture and our growing penchant for short attention spans (BTW have I lost you already?), is the short poem the equivalent of fast-food faster (fb, twitter, blog, etc., ...)?

I saw a movie about survival in the POW camps of WWII, and, a technique recommended to a young boy in the camp was to chew a bite of food 1000 times.  This, also, I believe metaphorical and spiritual.

Could this technique ever be embraced for our short (attention span) poems?  I just wonder?!

If so, how and why would a poet (reader/writer) do it?

???

ciao...

[AlanSummers]

Well certainly I enjoy the entries to the With Words competition and read the shortlisted haiku at least 400 times and continue to enjoy them over the years.

All entries are read 200-300 times as well.

I also read haiku elsewhere several hundreds of times and will continue to read them so I will reach that number happily in time.

Whether some haiku or attempts at haiku reach that target is another question.

Alan

In our instant access world culture and our growing penchant for short attention spans (BTW have I lost you already?), is the short poem the equivalent of fast-food faster (fb, twitter, blog, etc., ...)?

I saw a movie about survival in the POW camps of WWII, and, a technique recommended to a young boy in the camp was to chew a bite of food 1000 times.  This, also, I believe metaphorical and spiritual.

Could this technique ever be embraced for our short (attention span) poems?  I just wonder?!

If so, how and why would a poet (reader/writer) do it?

???

ciao...

[chibi575]

Hi Alan!

Is the re-reading as the chewing or is it the ah-ha... hmmm... ah-ha?

What of a short poem allows or triggers or stimulates more mastication, do you feel?

Some of the more chewed short poems have often the WTF? factor to me.  This maybe the author (knowing or not-knowing her/him, certain flavors of word usage and words, poem components, my mood, my muse's moood... just to mention a few things), so, it's not the number of times a poem is read, necessarily, although, that is one aspect, it's the other things that are part of the chew.

I'm thinking also of "glance poems" and "flash poems", too, that may make up the majority of modern treatment of short poems.  It may be the many chews but one spit.  Do one ever go back and chew again?

... jus a few marbles rolling around tis all

ciao...