I've never liked poetry that much. It's so annoying. It has the potential, of course, but so often it's just so annoying. I feel it has an artificial measure and fragmented quality about it. Sentences are supposed to flow from one word to another, one idea to another, one breath to another. Poetry stilts that. And it's ever so cryptic, so much duality, triunality, sometimes it isn't clear that the poet himself has thought clearly of what he is trying to say, nor the words with which to say it. And the imagery is far-flung, melded from the bizarre. Words are employed in unfathomable, painful new ways. Themes of melancholy, loss, bitterness abound. I need to hear a voice speaking, and I don't get that unless I get a hint of the character speaking the poem's lines. I've never liked poetry that much.
But I've never heard a poem by Mister Rogers, and he is a poet to me. I've never been touched by a poet, but Mister Rogers' poem has me.
What do you do with the mad that you feel
When you feel so mad you could bite?
When the whole wide world seems oh, so wrong
And nothing you do seems very right?
Oh, it's you I like. (It's a beautiful day in the neighbourhood ...)
