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We at Four Branches Press exist as an independent press dedicated to the return of poetry to a
place of prominence in the lives of people, even those who are not poets.
We recall a time when quality poetry found space in virtually all newspapers and magazines, and was
read, talked about, cut out, tucked into wallets and pockets, sent to friends and loved ones. Poets
were guests on popular talk shows. Poetry mattered to the majority, not just to the few.
What has happened?
We have heard for three decades the cry (from poets) that the public no longer reads, or that the
average person lacks the depth to understand the poetry being written.
We reject that conceit, and compare it to the chair-builder who, after building a chair few can sit on,
blames the backsides of his customers.
We posit that poetry has ceased to care about communicating with people outside of literary circles.
Instead, it has become a playground where the most distorted images are celebrated, the language is
twisted beyond recognition, and meaning is so carefully hidden that the average reader-with-intent
looks on the craft as an oddity and an irrelevancy.
Poetry that speaks only to poets is an incestuous, sterile beast.
We have watched this shift and bemoaned it because of its deleterious effect on the place poetry has
in the lives of people. Poetry doesn't matter except as it relates to people, changes them, enriches
them.
Overall, there has been a movement in poetic aesthetics trumpeted by (who? academia? publishers
hungry for a new spin?) that has strived to pare poetry down to a form of verbal architecture that is
inconsistent with the richness of life and language. The farther poetry has drifted from the language,
and the linguistic structure, of the people it purports to represent, the fewer have been those who
care about it. This is a terrible thing, and if we as poets are furthering this in the name of novelty or
verbal architecture or a desire to be published, we need to revisit the point of it all or simply stop
writing.
None of this is intended to exclude these literary forms from the wide expanse of poetry. Rather, we
seek to reclaim language the recent aesthetics have rejected: full sentences, punctuation, narrative,
clarity, articles, gerunds: the rhythms and parcels of natural speech. We are not calling for particular
TYPES of poetry. We strive here to emphasize ACCESSIBILITY, the building of a highly-crafted
chair that people can actually sit in, not just decorate their entryways with.
The emphasis on "word-unit" in modern poetic aesthetics has swung to an extreme. The writer,
according to this aesthetic, must pare the poem to stark spareness, often to the point of doing
violence to accessible meaning. Many poets and critics operate according to this aesthetic.
We accept that some poets may find their natural voices in such a setting. And with great skill, such
an aesthetic can still communicate clearly to readers-with-intent.
But there is a spell woven by poetry that often requires more space than the word-unit allows. If the
general populace has rejected poetry as a viable expression of life as it is lived by the regular
person, we believe that rejection gained full head when the word-unit mentality set in among poets.
We do not speak in wordsalad, nor do we try to hide our meaning when we communicate in daily life.
We speak (more or less) in a flow of complete thoughts, clearly linked and related, if not
syntactically, then conceptually. And we do that with common words, adapted to fit their context and
audience. We do not mean to imply that poets should not strive to say the old thing in a new way. But
it is more critical to say the old thing with a new slant than to find convoluted structures and strange
wordplay: only poets read that. Back to incest we go.
Importantly, word-unit emphasis often slaughters rhythm, a vital component too often missing in
much of what is published today. While revision requires the poet to choose words carefully (poetry
is a precise mode of communication) simply paring out a word may take mediocrity and throw it into
poverty by robbing it of its rhythm.
At times the overall poem, through its layers of rhythm and meaning and wandering concepts,
weaves the spell that cannot be analyzed at the level of the word-unit, and that spell may need a
large sea indeed, afloat with -ing's and articles that serve only to shape the wave, carry the reader to
the crest. This is not wordiness (a ridiculous term, really, when applied to poetry.)
When poetry's emphasis became "edginess" (which we believe coincides historically with the absurd
notion that sincerity is uncool) all weaving of spells for the average reader went out the window. And
we believe with great conviction that if poetry is to regain ground it must recall itself to be the
language of magic. Not just for those of us who are well-read, well-versed, but for anyone who reads
with intent. The language is rich! We needn't stretch it to its limits of absurdity to be original. It
provides for writers, within the limits of common words, commonly used, a wealth, a virtually
bottomless cup, of opportunities to beautifully convey new insights, new perspectives, to leave the
heart floating, or pierced.
We believe poetry must again expand its horizons and allow the return of the more natural poem.
These are the ideas with which we begin, fearful of the inevitable pummeling that is to come.
Importantly, the impetus for this concept came about upon hearing poets speaking wistfully of their
former voices, voices that were richer, fuller, more accessible. When asked why they changed, some
could answer, some could not. Strikingly, those who could answer did so by stating a variation of this
sad idea: "I changed so I could get published."
We know there are exceptions, but we address ourselves to the broth, the overall atmosphere
shaping not only poets, but their readers and critics, shaping the very definition of poetry itself. It is
that broth, we suspect, that took many poets from their richer voices and led them to an unnatural
and inaccessible spareness. We are not surprised that many now want to return.
It is our intent to offer one place to which they can.
place of prominence in the lives of people, even those who are not poets.
We recall a time when quality poetry found space in virtually all newspapers and magazines, and was
read, talked about, cut out, tucked into wallets and pockets, sent to friends and loved ones. Poets
were guests on popular talk shows. Poetry mattered to the majority, not just to the few.
What has happened?
We have heard for three decades the cry (from poets) that the public no longer reads, or that the
average person lacks the depth to understand the poetry being written.
We reject that conceit, and compare it to the chair-builder who, after building a chair few can sit on,
blames the backsides of his customers.
We posit that poetry has ceased to care about communicating with people outside of literary circles.
Instead, it has become a playground where the most distorted images are celebrated, the language is
twisted beyond recognition, and meaning is so carefully hidden that the average reader-with-intent
looks on the craft as an oddity and an irrelevancy.
Poetry that speaks only to poets is an incestuous, sterile beast.
We have watched this shift and bemoaned it because of its deleterious effect on the place poetry has
in the lives of people. Poetry doesn't matter except as it relates to people, changes them, enriches
them.
Overall, there has been a movement in poetic aesthetics trumpeted by (who? academia? publishers
hungry for a new spin?) that has strived to pare poetry down to a form of verbal architecture that is
inconsistent with the richness of life and language. The farther poetry has drifted from the language,
and the linguistic structure, of the people it purports to represent, the fewer have been those who
care about it. This is a terrible thing, and if we as poets are furthering this in the name of novelty or
verbal architecture or a desire to be published, we need to revisit the point of it all or simply stop
writing.
None of this is intended to exclude these literary forms from the wide expanse of poetry. Rather, we
seek to reclaim language the recent aesthetics have rejected: full sentences, punctuation, narrative,
clarity, articles, gerunds: the rhythms and parcels of natural speech. We are not calling for particular
TYPES of poetry. We strive here to emphasize ACCESSIBILITY, the building of a highly-crafted
chair that people can actually sit in, not just decorate their entryways with.
The emphasis on "word-unit" in modern poetic aesthetics has swung to an extreme. The writer,
according to this aesthetic, must pare the poem to stark spareness, often to the point of doing
violence to accessible meaning. Many poets and critics operate according to this aesthetic.
We accept that some poets may find their natural voices in such a setting. And with great skill, such
an aesthetic can still communicate clearly to readers-with-intent.
But there is a spell woven by poetry that often requires more space than the word-unit allows. If the
general populace has rejected poetry as a viable expression of life as it is lived by the regular
person, we believe that rejection gained full head when the word-unit mentality set in among poets.
We do not speak in wordsalad, nor do we try to hide our meaning when we communicate in daily life.
We speak (more or less) in a flow of complete thoughts, clearly linked and related, if not
syntactically, then conceptually. And we do that with common words, adapted to fit their context and
audience. We do not mean to imply that poets should not strive to say the old thing in a new way. But
it is more critical to say the old thing with a new slant than to find convoluted structures and strange
wordplay: only poets read that. Back to incest we go.
Importantly, word-unit emphasis often slaughters rhythm, a vital component too often missing in
much of what is published today. While revision requires the poet to choose words carefully (poetry
is a precise mode of communication) simply paring out a word may take mediocrity and throw it into
poverty by robbing it of its rhythm.
At times the overall poem, through its layers of rhythm and meaning and wandering concepts,
weaves the spell that cannot be analyzed at the level of the word-unit, and that spell may need a
large sea indeed, afloat with -ing's and articles that serve only to shape the wave, carry the reader to
the crest. This is not wordiness (a ridiculous term, really, when applied to poetry.)
When poetry's emphasis became "edginess" (which we believe coincides historically with the absurd
notion that sincerity is uncool) all weaving of spells for the average reader went out the window. And
we believe with great conviction that if poetry is to regain ground it must recall itself to be the
language of magic. Not just for those of us who are well-read, well-versed, but for anyone who reads
with intent. The language is rich! We needn't stretch it to its limits of absurdity to be original. It
provides for writers, within the limits of common words, commonly used, a wealth, a virtually
bottomless cup, of opportunities to beautifully convey new insights, new perspectives, to leave the
heart floating, or pierced.
We believe poetry must again expand its horizons and allow the return of the more natural poem.
These are the ideas with which we begin, fearful of the inevitable pummeling that is to come.
Importantly, the impetus for this concept came about upon hearing poets speaking wistfully of their
former voices, voices that were richer, fuller, more accessible. When asked why they changed, some
could answer, some could not. Strikingly, those who could answer did so by stating a variation of this
sad idea: "I changed so I could get published."
We know there are exceptions, but we address ourselves to the broth, the overall atmosphere
shaping not only poets, but their readers and critics, shaping the very definition of poetry itself. It is
that broth, we suspect, that took many poets from their richer voices and led them to an unnatural
and inaccessible spareness. We are not surprised that many now want to return.
It is our intent to offer one place to which they can.
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