fyoot's avatar
1. Eh, I really like Keats and I really like Coleridge. I've been on a big Dylan Thomas kick lately. I like Simon Armitage's stuff a lot. I like the viscerality of Nick Burbridge, although I don't rate him technically. I like some of TS Eliot's poetry but I find some of it uncomfortable to read. Favourite overall of all time probably Keats.

2. Loads. I like poems that have an immediate impact, but I can only really judge their merit by their lasting resonance. The only poem on dA I've read that had that, for me, was ~shotgunmessiah's Khe Sanh Rivers, which someone posted at [link]

3. I know lots of sonnet-length pieces; I used to memorise them a lot at university for closed-book exams and I find it calming to recite them to myself from time to time. Keats' Ode to a Nightingale is the longest I can recite all the way through, I think, but then it was definitely worth learning. I know a Spanish one which I memorised when I was 11. I can still recite it although I no longer know what it all means.

I find it much harder to learn unmetrical pieces. I tried to learn Howl at university when I went through a Ginsberg phase, but I don't recall whether I succeeded. I certainly can't remember more than a couple of lines now.

4.Offhand I can't think of anything specific, no. I'd like to have more of a Classical grounding and knowledge, really. I know that's not necessarily what you're asking, but missing or half-grasping at allusion is frustrating.

4.I used to recommend Bloodaxe books' Staying Alive anthologies, but on re-reading I find they haven't aged well for me. The selection of writers is a little limited and eh, western-centric, which I think is probably true of a lot of anthologies. I'd still recommend them to people who don't read much poetry, though. I do enjoy the micro-anthologies fuselit books put out. They're cute and quirky.