A Poet's Voice

[David Campbell]

Thanks, Shelley. I’ve been a bit puzzled by the lack of responses to this question, and can only assume that there aren’t any extended families with a strong interest in poetry. I suspect a family picture might be something along the lines of: “Hector collects stamps, Ruprecht is a trainspotter, Henrietta does quilting, and Hermione enjoys skydiving. Oh, and Wilberforce is a poet. He does a really funny one about a swarm of bees attacking a village fete.” So poetry is just another hobby that’s seen, if anything, as light entertainment, not a useful way of making a statement about some issue.

When Dennis wrote for the Melbourne Herald he fulfilled much the same role as today’s cartoonists...Leunig, Spooner, Tandberg, Leak, Petty etc. I reckon many people check out the cartoon on the Comments/Letters page before anything else, and I’d love to see a short, pithy poem each day forming the basis for discussion/debate. Because, in a sea of prose, verse stands out as different, and the strength of metre and rhyme is that it can say something memorable in a few lines. Many of our familiar nursery rhymes originated as topical/political comments about events, so the history is there. It’s an avenue open to exploitation, a way of helping to make written verse more recognised in the public arena.

Cheers
David

[mummsie]

David wrote:]

As long as that confusing word “bush” is there that’s probably going to be a struggle anyway

.
I have to agree with you on that David. I was called on to do a rather impromptu performance last Friday night- (a couple who had attended one of my performances in the park before had asked of the new managers if I still performed, they had arrived with 10 other couples- I just happened to be visiting at the time )- I always inquire before reciting as to peoples interest and knowledge of our craft, preferences etc. When asked what their idea of bush poetry was, most answered with the classics and I gathered from that, that's what they were expecting to hear. This opened the door to an introduction of how interesting/informative/funny modern bush poetry can be(with a couple of classics thrown in)and gauging by the feedback, tears and laughter, the night(11/2 hrs)was very much appreciated. The small audience seemed to really appreciate the banter between poems and the invitation to join in the old and even play a roll in the new and hopefully in doing so, now have a new appreciation for "bush" poetry.

[Catherine Lee]

Hi David,

My family has always been very supportive, distributing my poetry to friends at home and overseas, and sharing it in social gatherings. Quite a few friends in various places ask me fairly regularly if I’ve ‘written any more poetry lately’ and ask for copies, but the only time I’ve experienced someone saying “Let’s do some poetry” was in PNG when one guy had a couple of Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson books that were his pride and joy and he’d ask all his visitors to take turns reading from these whenever he had barbecues, etc. I loved this idea as you can imagine, and so did most of the others, but have never met anyone else who’s done it in the same way - nor known enough interested people in one place on my travels to do it myself for that matter.

PNG was also where I self-published a small booklet and sold it in the local market, which was a wonderful experience. The book sold out and the enthusiastic response from the expatriates buying it was that they so much preferred the rhyming style, both to read for themselves and to listen to when I did a couple of readings…but this was all a very long time ago. These days, although people do ask if they can read my poems from time to time, like you and Shelley this would be a smaller percentage. It’s not that they don’t like it, but it’s just not something they think about much as it’s not ‘in their face’ on a regular basis, so I also agree with you on how it can often be seen as something separate, or a niche interest.

One thing I do remember was when I took my friend, who had no interest in poetry whatsoever to Tamworth in 2010, she was amazed at the variety of subjects in the performances and said “I never knew poetry could be as enjoyable as this!” …So I agree with Shelley that it’s our job to continue to get it out there at every opportunity, and kudos to you for posting on that public forum. Personally I still think we often fight a tough battle against those who feel as if rhyme is ‘doggerel’ and only worthy of a ‘pat on the head’ – and certainly nobody ever seems to offer outrageous money for it in the same way as they seem to do with free verse. Regardless of this however, as I said earlier I just think we all need to do whatever we possibly can to keep it alive.

[Shelley Hansen]

It’s not that they don’t like it, but it’s just not something they think about much as it’s not ‘in their face’ on a regular basis, so I also agree with you on how it can often be seen as something separate, or a niche interest.

Catherine, you have hit the nail on the head with that comment. When you have a chance to get it "in their face" the results are sometimes surprising. Our stalwart supporter I mentioned earlier was hosting a lunch event for a retiree's social club (about 25 people involved). It was an Aussie BBQ and she asked us to perform our poetry. She told me she had included on the invitation a request that anyone who wished should bring their favourite Aussie poem and be prepared to recite it. I thought, "Oh yeah, we'll get about 2 if we're lucky!" I was amazed at the response - not only the number of people who came prepared, but the quality of their reciting. We didn't just have the "expected" poems either (someone even did "Turbulence"!). Significantly, every one was a rhyming piece. I will always remember the fabulous effort of one man who had suffered a stroke (so had the perfect excuse to decline), yet gave us a classic rendition of "Said Hanrahan". Now, if my friend had not made that request to her guests, we would have performed to spectators, not participants.

As Sue's experience shows, and as you've said, Catherine - it seems we just need to keep doing whatever we can, whenever we can, to encourage people to become involved in something that probably doesn't cross their daily orbit.

in a sea of prose, verse stands out as different, and the strength of metre and rhyme is that it can say something memorable in a few lines

David, you are so right! This reminds me of a competition that ABC Classics ran in their Limelight magazine a few years ago, to tell in so many words the story of a popular opera, with a comic or quirky twist. I wrote a prose piece - as did hundreds of others. The winner was a poem. It rhymed, had short pithy lines and was an absolutely brilliant retelling of Gounod's opera "Faust". I kept it as a reminder that poetry WORKS!!!

I agree with you that our craft is so often dismissed as no more than a "nice hobby". Years ago when I was a kid our local paper had a weekly poetry feature for local writers to comment on events. I was too young to participate then, but I loved it - and it played a significant part in shaping my feelings about bush poetry - as most if not all of the poems were rhyming. Then a new editor abolished the feature. Now of course, there is much less interest in that kind of local input. It's a pity.

You are right about the nursery rhymes - our tour guide in Britain in 2010 was compiling a book of their origins and we learned that "Ride a Cock Horse" commemorated Queen Elizabeth I's royal visit to Banbury (on a white horse), "Three Blind Mice" was about the blindfold execution of the three bishops at Oxford by Mary I (the farmer's wife), "Mary, Mary Quite Contrary" is Mary Queen of Scots who was a lover of flowers and a keen gardener, "Little Jack Horner" is about the dissolution of the abbeys by Henry VIII and the cunning of one man who kept a concealed property deed hidden in a pie, and "Little Boy Blue" is Cardinal Wolsey, who as a kid used to read his books and go to sleep under a tree while he was supposed to be watching his father's sheep and cows!

As I said, poetry WORKS !!!

Cheers, Shelley

[David Campbell]

Hi Sue

Well done on that impromptu performance! It’s always fascinating to see what happens in situations like that. I generally avoid the word “bush” altogether and just talk about rhyming verse. And I usually run presentations in a feedback format, encouraging people to get involved and ask questions, either about the poems or the writing process itself. There’s never any lack of involvement and, interestingly, most queries are about the latter: “ How long does it take you to write a poem?” “Where do your ideas come from?” “Do you always know how a poem will end when you begin it?” And so on. There’s also a fair bit of reminiscing about poems learnt long ago at school and the way individual poems link to their own lives, particularly with those about war or old age. The ones that relate to personal experience (like “Wasteland”) always provoke the most comment.

Catherine, that’s encouraging news about your family, as is your PNG experience. One of the difficulties with getting poetry “out there” is that we often tend to overestimate what level of understanding Joe and Josie Public bring to the table, a criticism regularly levelled at non-rhyming verse, but it can also apply to ours as well. People seem puzzled by poetry, a sort of “How (or why) do you do that?” reaction. Which only adds to the “niche” perception. So we need to demystify it as best we can by making it more readily available. That doesn’t mean we should descend to the banality of many pop/rap/hip-hop lyrics, but there has to be some middle ground that will still strike a chord. The internet is an obvious vehicle for communication, but we can’t rely on people clicking on a poetry-related site (for example ABPA, ABPA Facebook, or on-line magazines like Maureen’s)…they need to come across it on sites that have nothing to do with poetry. Where it might make them stop and think “Hmmm, that’s interesting!” In other words, if we’ve got something to say, why not say it in verse? Bob, for one, has done that in his local paper, and Shelley has had success with “Teddy, Teddy!” In that context, last year I submitted “The Man Who Wasn’t There” to both The Age and The Australian for Remembrance Day, a poem about the “stop the boats” issue (it won the 2014 NSW Champs) to The Age, and wrote an article about Clive James’ support of rhyming verse for the weekend Review supplement of The Australian. Unfortunately, all were knocked back. Poetry is a hard sell!

Shelley, your “Faust” story is a reminder of a certain Dennis classic we know so well! It was probably the first introduction quite a few people had to Shakespeare…as you say, poetry WORKS! And there is so much happening around the place today that cries out for a different approach. I had a few poems published last year (as on-line comments following articles on topics such as the upcoming US election and the obsession with guns) in a couple of American papers. Only small stuff, but they attracted some attention. Rhyming verse is particularly suited to satire, and there’s plenty of subject-matter (a nursery rhyme about Donald Trump?) on show at the moment!

Cheers
David

[Bob Pacey]

My into to performances first up tells the audience Who I am and that I'm a rhyming poet or what we call in our Australian vernacular A Bush Poet.

Combines the two and you would be surprised at how many say afterwards so that is what Bush Poetry is about I never imagined it could be so entertaining, Oh I will say that I have seen a lot of performers try to mix up the performance with jokes thrown in but I only ever do one or maybe two at the most because I feel that they are there to hear poetry.


Off to play the pokies wish me luck.


Bob

[Maureen K Clifford]

As poets there are many opportunities to poem bomb relevant sites using a poem to make the comment which can't be any worse than some of the negative comments some posts receive. Some of the photos that appear on line offer an excellent opportunity to do this. Eg. Photos of our drought areas beg for a few lines from dorothea

the current big hay run is an opportunity for a verse or two on Aussie mate ship or the Anzac spirit. Generally speaking poetic comments seem to be well received or at least no one has abused me for doing it as yet

[Shelley Hansen]

Ah, David, you're right again! The Play was certainly my introduction to Shakespeare (or at least, the contents of his plays). I studied it in Grade 8 at school, and it wasn't until Grade 9/10 that I did my obligatory Shakespeare play - in my case Macbeth, which seemed very dull in comparison to CJD's version of The Bard!!

To this day, it doesn't matter which manifestation of Romeo and Juliet I see (the play, the movie, the opera, the ballet), and it doesn't matter how superb it is or how heart-wrenching the performances are ... when Juliet draws her final breath the same words always fly into my mind. Yep, that's right ... Peanuts or lollies!!

It's a shame Doreen didn't drag Bill to the whole theatre season - I'd have loved his take on A Midsummer Night's Dream!

Bob, in our performances Rod and I also include a short feature explaining "bush" poetry and its modern relevance, lest our audience think we are going to be stuck in the droving days. Like you and Sue and Maureen have mentioned, post-performance feedback usually reflects pleasant surprise at the diversity of our craft. It's all about education, isn't it?

Cheers
Shelley