Is Poetry Dead? Listen to the Poets.

To the Editor:

Re “Poetry Died 100 Years Ago This Month,” by Matthew Walther (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Dec. 29):

Just because poetry is not a popular art form in North America doesn’t mean it’s dead. If Mr. Walther would look closer, he’d see it thriving in local scenes.

Poetry is free to change into something Mr. Walther doesn’t recognize as good, but it is not free to die. A poem is a process set in motion by a compulsion to sing in the teeth of death.

As the world changes, poets change forms and Mr. Walther has a right to feel shortchanged, but his neglect for everything fabulous that’s happened since T.S. Eliot “finished poetry off” is puzzling.

For instance, he ignores the influence of Whitman and Surrealism on the Beats and the impact of French poets like Apollinaire on the quotidian rhythms of New York poets in the postwar American boom, bypassing it all to insist that everyone after Eliot was cursed to rewrite “The Waste Land.” No vision so negative can win.

In fact, as a teacher and a poet whose work has been published in this newspaper, I’ve found that our art form’s thrilling and nearly secret history of struggle and triumph is one that most laypeople want to learn about. And I would guess that many young poets, M.F.A.’s or not, are captured by the thrill of becoming part of the story.

America today is poetry-curious, and it would be wonderful to see more articles in The Times talking about poetry culture with love and humor.

Julien Poirier
Berkeley, Calif.

To the Editor:

Matthew Walther’s lament that poetry is dead because poets are no longer in touch with mysterious forces of the natural world raises once again questions that never fail to excite me: What is a poem? Is there a “right” poem and a “wrong” poem? Not really. Is there an aesthetically “good” poem and a “not so good” poem? Yes, but how different readers arrive at their assessments is as variable as the wind.

Mr. Walther implies that we are separate from “nature” and that perhaps poetry could be revived if we returned to a pre-technological sensibility. But what is “nature,” exactly, and where is “nature”? Outside the city, in mountains or sea?

What if “nature” is inside every one of us? Aren’t we as much “nature” as the bird and the tree? Our “nature” as a source of poetry is inexhaustible.

Barbara Blatner
New York
The writer is a playwright, poet and composer.

To the Editor:

As one of the judges of the 2022 National Book Critics Circle Awards in poetry, I can assure Matthew Walther that his concerns about the demise of the form are premature.

Having read several hundred volumes of poetry written in 2022, I can also reassure him that the vast majority of poems include no references to “an empty plastic bottle” or “an iPhone with a cracked screen.”

Rather, they are wondrous and inventive, blazing and desperate, vibrant with the same joys and agonies and mystic awe that have kept poetry alive since the origins of human language. Fortunately, neither “The Waste Land” nor any critic can kill these voices or silence their rhythms.

Jacob M. Appel
New York
The writer is vice president and treasurer at the National Book Critics Circle.

To the Editor:

Poetry is dead? No way. I’m a trauma surgeon. I know what’s dead when I see it.

A year or two ago, I stood with my team in the emergency room awaiting the arrival of a severely injured patient. Our chaplain was there, as usual, and we chatted about an essay that I’d read on the Poetry Foundation website about chaplaincy and poetry. She’d already heard about it from another hospital chaplain.

Our nurse leader chimed in. “I love that site,” he said. “I get their poem of the day.”

Then the injured person showed up. We stopped chatting and went to work, inspired by our unexpected connection in poetry, which is definitely not dead.

Elizabeth Dreesen
Chapel Hill, N.C.

‘All Polls Are Not Created Equal’

To the Editor:

Re “Skewed Polling Washed Away ‘Red Tsunami’” (front page, Dec. 31):

I agree that partisan polls erroneously created the expectation of a red wave/tsunami for the midterm elections. But that’s only half the story. Why did poll aggregators and election analysts embrace these knowingly partisan polls? Yes, costs for independent, nonpartisan polls have skyrocketed.

In response to this challenge, organizations like the Marist Poll and others systematically revised methods to address the mounting difficulties of reaching voters and rising costs without sacrificing accuracy.

The Marist Poll’s final round of surveys included a national poll and battleground state polls in Pennsylvania, Arizona and Georgia. There wasn’t a trace of a red wave/tsunami to be found in any of the poll results.

What can be learned about poll coverage from this election cycle? Consider the source of the information. That may be the cornerstone of journalism, but it doesn’t drive poll coverage. Partisan-based polls should be treated as if you were hit over the head with a frying pan.

In addition, more is not necessarily better. Relying upon the influx of partisan polls will likely only send you in the wrong direction. Making statistical adjustments for a polling organization’s partisanship, as some forecasters do, is not an elixir.

Independent, nonpartisan, transparent polls conducted by an organization with a time-tested record must rule the day, particularly in our current partisan charged environment. All polls are not created equal, and it is a mistake to treat them as such.

Lee M. Miringoff
Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
The writer is director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion.

The Myth of the American Dream

To the Editor:

Re “What Lies at the Heart of the American Dream” (Opinion guest essay, Jan. 8):

Costica Bradatan misses a wider reality about the so-called American dream. He speaks of the “fear of failure” that, he believes, is at its core. But for that fear to be operative there needs to be the opportunity to fail.

So, to better understand the American dream, I suggest that Mr. Bradatan travel to cities and towns and rural communities throughout this country. Perhaps then he’ll understand that this dream is only a myth. For countless people, trapped in low-wage work and cycles of poverty, it’s just too dangerous to even think of dreaming. They can’t worry about failing when there’s no opportunity to even fail.

Indeed, if we look beyond the surface, the rhetoric surrounding this American myth is just a convenient way to maintain the status quo. It rests on the false foundation that everyone can lift themselves up by their bootstraps — and risk failure. That if you’re poor and struggling, it’s a failure to take personal responsibility.

In the end, the American dream ignores the structural, systemic issues that keep this dream beyond so many people’s reach. The dream is just some rhetorical phrase often used to ignore the deep chasm of inequality here in America.

Arnold S. Cohen
New York
The writer is an adjunct professor at Fordham Law School and former president of the Partnership for the Homeless.