October 23rd, 2009 / 10:05 pm
 Uncategorized

Very Bad Poetry

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stinky

Very Bad Poetry, as the name of the journal would suggest, publishes very bad poetry — but if the intent is to write a bad poem, and that intent is met, does it not become a good poem? Or maybe the poems are indeed bad, yet rendered aesthetically effective by the journal’s conceit? Maybe the journal is simply bad as are the poems. Or maybe the journal is great and so are the poems. It is impossible for the journal to be good and the poems to be bad, and it is impossible for the journal to be bad and the poems to be good. For those who question my authority on the subject of impossibility, may I remind you that I cannot fly.

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13 Comments

  1. October 24th, 2009 / 3:05 am alec niedenthal—

      this reminds me of watching “the cleveland show”

      has anybody seen that show? fuck.

  2. October 23rd, 2009 / 11:05 pm alec niedenthal—

      this reminds me of watching “the cleveland show”

      has anybody seen that show? fuck.

  3. October 24th, 2009 / 3:40 am Matt Cozart—

      Perhaps it succeeds in its mission while not succeeding in being interesting….

  4. October 23rd, 2009 / 11:40 pm Matt Cozart—

      Perhaps it succeeds in its mission while not succeeding in being interesting….

  5. October 24th, 2009 / 9:26 am Matt Jasper—

      Uninteresting at times, yes. But only because I sent in some poems a month ago:

      http://www.verybadpoetry.com/people/show/mattjasper/

      It is up to us all to make bad poetry better. Or worse. I can’t sort out the contradiction either.

      I’d also like to thank the folks at NOO for taking bad lines and titles I made and transmogrifying them into astonishingly good bad poems:

      (linked to via this because I think NOO has switched to RAD poetry. Please hire them to write your next poem for you. They are brilliant and need the money. I plan on hiring others to write all of the poems in my next book. It would have to be better. )

      http://www.gillesdeleuzecommittedsuicideandsowilldrphil.com/2008/05/pistol-press-matt-jasper.html

      “Also: NOO Journal released a mini-chapbook of bad poetry. They do a bad poetry fundraiser where you can pay a couple bucks and people will write bad poems for you. I wrote a couple once, and one is in this echapbook: Matt Jasper: A Collection of Bad Poetry. I don’t know who Matt Jasper is, but the poems in it are funny, including shit by K. Silem Mohammed, Tao Lin, etc.etc.
      Posted by BLAKE BUTLER at 4:58 PM
      Labels: bad poetry, pistol press”

      Also: about two thirds of my readers complain that my book (Moth Moon) makes no sense at all. I try to convince them that this is because it’s perfectly isomorphic with the topic and language of schizophrenia but so far only about five people believe me.

  6. October 24th, 2009 / 5:26 am Matt Jasper—

      Uninteresting at times, yes. But only because I sent in some poems a month ago:

      http://www.verybadpoetry.com/people/show/mattjasper/

      It is up to us all to make bad poetry better. Or worse. I can’t sort out the contradiction either.

      I’d also like to thank the folks at NOO for taking bad lines and titles I made and transmogrifying them into astonishingly good bad poems:

      (linked to via this because I think NOO has switched to RAD poetry. Please hire them to write your next poem for you. They are brilliant and need the money. I plan on hiring others to write all of the poems in my next book. It would have to be better. )

      http://www.gillesdeleuzecommittedsuicideandsowilldrphil.com/2008/05/pistol-press-matt-jasper.html

      “Also: NOO Journal released a mini-chapbook of bad poetry. They do a bad poetry fundraiser where you can pay a couple bucks and people will write bad poems for you. I wrote a couple once, and one is in this echapbook: Matt Jasper: A Collection of Bad Poetry. I don’t know who Matt Jasper is, but the poems in it are funny, including shit by K. Silem Mohammed, Tao Lin, etc.etc.
      Posted by BLAKE BUTLER at 4:58 PM
      Labels: bad poetry, pistol press”

      Also: about two thirds of my readers complain that my book (Moth Moon) makes no sense at all. I try to convince them that this is because it’s perfectly isomorphic with the topic and language of schizophrenia but so far only about five people believe me.

  7. October 24th, 2009 / 2:37 pm Phoebe—

      “but if the intent is to write a bad poem, and that intent is met, does it not become a good poem?”

      No. Doing something well is not inherently the same as doing something good.

  8. October 24th, 2009 / 10:37 am Phoebe—

      “but if the intent is to write a bad poem, and that intent is met, does it not become a good poem?”

      No. Doing something well is not inherently the same as doing something good.

  9. October 26th, 2009 / 1:12 pm Merzmensch—

      Great, I will submit there something really bad (and I have many entities of it)

  10. October 26th, 2009 / 9:12 am Merzmensch—

      Great, I will submit there something really bad (and I have many entities of it)

  11. October 26th, 2009 / 9:35 am “Crack Monkeys,” “wangster gangsta jew,” & Other Bad Poems | Lit Drift: Storytelling in the 21st Century—

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  12. December 10th, 2009 / 12:27 pm Merzmensch aka kosmopol—
  13. December 10th, 2009 / 8:27 am Merzmensch aka kosmopol—