Real men write poetry.
The Good Life takes up the reins of the weekly themed sections on The Good Men Project, and shifts the focus to redefining for ourselves, in the present century, what “the good life” is. What does a good man’s life look like, and what does a man need to make his life “good?” Is learning important? Creative expression? Sex? Humor? Do you need beauty in your life, for it to be worth living?
The next themed section is on poetry. Submissions of essays on the theme of men and poetry, as well as submissions of poetry, are invited. Email your questions, pitches, essays, and (no more than three) poems to justin@goodmenproject.com with a brief bio by Saturday, May 26 for consideration.
—Photo credit: Photo of current U.S. Poet Laureate Philip Levine courtesy of the U.S. Department of Labor
About The Good Life @ GMP
It is a widespread belief in our society that Poetry – both reading and writing it – is for girls. If a man writes poetry, then he’s a sissy. But this view is historically out of whack.
Historically, poetry has been a predominantly male venture. For poetry to be taken seriously, it had to be written by a man. In fact, it has only be relatively recent that women have begun to be taken seriously in the field of poetry (the past 100 or so years). What can account for this drastic change in the views of who composes poetry? How has it gone from a “manly” and honorable artform to the realm of “sissy-men”?
I think to answer that, we need to look at what poetry is. Essentially, it is the rendering of life. A poet takes his worldly experience and distills it into something pure (which is why, in poetry, every word matters). Poetry is life under examination. It is a way for a person to look at his emotions, his feelings, his actions — and analyze them, present them to the world.
And that, I believe, is why poetry is no longer seen to be a past-time for “manly” men. The word “poetry” connotes sensitivity. It connotes emotion. It connotes thinking instead of acting. Each of these things are things that men are not supposed to be. Men are supposed to be hard, not sensitive. They fight, they don’t emote. And they act first and think later (if at all) — it just isn’t supposed to happen the other way around.
At least that’s what society tells us.
But I disagree. There is nothing unmanly about a man writing poetry; I write it, and I’m proud of that aspect of my life. It takes a great deal of courage for somebody — male or female — to look at their own life, evaluate it, and turn it into art, share it with the world. It is my opinion that the men who write poetry are the manliest of them all, because they are not afraid of the ridicule.