“But a problem with a lot of the formal poetry I see is that it’s still stuck in the 19th century, or earlier—not just stylistically, but in content, too. (It has an olde worlde aroma: I don’t mean that it deals with subject matters that have been constants in poetry since the beginning.) If writing formally, there has to be some reason for the form of the poem. Form itself is a metaphor. Used well, of course, it can be exhilarating. I can’t see why an exemplary poem in form couldn’t win a competition. Traditional forms such as a ballad used in contemporary ways could interestingly riff off their predecessors in ways that add extra resonance.
Jack Underwood: I’ve got nothing against ballads! Or at least I’ve nothing against ballads for being ballads. I think that form isn’t something on its own, but rather form does something, whether that’s the regularised repetition of sounds, or the way a prose line gives you more words to read uninterrupted. I’m more interested in what the doing of form does. But I’m happy to receive a ballad in the post. Knock me out.
Jill asks: Would there ever be a situation where you didn’t read beyond the first line of an entry and dismiss it immediately?
Moniza Alvi: I don’t think so! And after all, even less accomplished poems are often of interest.
Gerry Cambridge: No. But often you can take in at a glance a stanza or two, or a dozen lines or so, which are enough to show the writer doesn’t know what they’re doing. But this is a delicate matter. Poems can be tricksters. One has to always allow an element of doubt that a poem might be more clever than you are and, accordingly, proceed with caution.
Jack Underwood: I don’t think so. But there might be poems where however much of a switcheroo takes place, the first line turns out to be irredeemable. I’m not sure you can expect a reader to enjoy hanging around to find out whether you really do hold noxious views, either. The ice is usually quite thin, right?”
How my heart sings 