What Ever Happened to Poets?

Ever wondered why the field of Poetry disappeared from the main-stream of culture, only reappearing as an abstruse whimper in the fringes of the left-wing's Pretentious Pseudo-Art Department?

Who is the Byron of today? Where can I hear a post-post-neo-modern Shelley? Whose rhapsodic lyric will I mumble to myself in the winter of my discontent? Where can I find counsel from a highly-tuned and sensitive conveyance to reconcile the darkest emotions with the need to carry on? Who will give voice to my despair, my hopes, my failings, my concerns?

Poets have not stopped being born. Poetry has not perished nor faded.

Poets and Poems thrive. You are surrounded by them. In fact, they are more popular today than they have ever been. You just haven't noticed them in their new clothing.

Think about it. What group of talented, artistic visionaries are out their today, have been for decades, who write about the passions and want us to hear their words?

Musicians.

Authentic musicians who write their own lyrics are today's Poets.

Get hold of some song lyrics from your favourite classics and read aloud. Then read a Keats, a Thomas, a Blake. They are the same.

As Robert Frost (above) explained:

"A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness. It finds the thought and the thought finds the words."

Freddie could have said the very same.

You Lucky Old Bastards

Old people.





Take a good long look at old people.



Keep looking right into their eyes and you'll start seeing what I mean.



Sooner or later, the eye will give away the soul and you will glimpse a contentment far beyond your own reach.

Old people are the luckiest and happiest people on earth...

...compared to you.

Compare 2010 to 1960:

You left school having competed, sweated and battled over complex societal issues, philosophical debates and abstract concepts with the smartest and the best, locally and even internationally, for just good grades.
They left school with the most basic skills and a naive view of the world, having expended very little intellectual effort in doing so.

You are paying HECS at around $50 average per week for about ten years.
Their higher education was free.

You need a degree or higher qualification for the basist of jobs.
They didn't need degrees. They only needed to know someone.

You started looking for employment when unemployment was around 4-6%.
They looked for work when no-one was unemployed, by choice: 0%.

You struggled to gain entrance into the work-force, through pain-staking application processes, difficult interviews and selection processes, just to gain the bottom pay-scale in your industry.
They knew the boss.

You compete with the whole country just to get promoted, and only after applying for the position, even if you've been acting in the job.
Their boss promoted them with a phone call.

You will be lucky if you can get into the housing market at all, with the average home and land purchase costing seven and a half years average salary and only after saving 75% of your salary just for the deposit.
They bought houses that cost one and a half years salary. Their parents gave them the 3 months salary for the deposit.

You'll be paying the bank interest and principle for at least 25 years.
They bought their house easily in under 10 years - with one income.

You will need both yours and your partner's full-time salary to pay all your bills. 30% of this income will go to your mortgage.
They paid 15% of their income to their mortgage. And Mum didn't work.

Mum has to work now, so babies/kids have to go to day-care, costing $3-400 per week on average.
Their mums stayed at home and palmed the kids off to family to go shopping.

You have an endless host of lethal and debilitating illnesses, health risks and environmental hazards just waiting to knock you down at any moment. Many of these striking you in youth or middle age.
They're still alive.

You are bomarded by media reports of how fragile your life and life-style are.
They didn't have a clue.

You don't have a GP. You go to medical centres where you see a different indifferent foreigner every time.
They knew their GP.

You need insurance, security plans, alarms and locks for everything you own.
They didn't.

You may not live to be old.
They bet you to it.