Your take on poetry?

[Sins]

I have discovered the most talented poet recently, and I am completely hooked! One of those people whose words still turn and twist in your mind hours after reading it.

Do you read/write poetry? How often? Who is your favourite poet?
This is where I read his poems, and I think he is one of the best I have ever come across. I spent hours reading and re-reading. :-)

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.viewCategory&FriendID=31 7971045&BlogCategoryID=25


silly me! Back to work!
Zim - I hang my head in shame... I do not know them. Can you give links please? Some of the other answers are close to my own choice. What are the chances any of you will publish your own on here for us to see? :-)

[Cakes]

I´m not into "heavy" poetry, in fact, I am not a great fan of poetry. I like short humourous pieces. Ogden Nash is one of my favourites with his amusing rhymes:

http://www.westegg.com/nash/

One of my only poems that I remember from my youth is one of Robert Browning: How they brought the good news from Ghent to Aix. I loved it because it had the rhythm of a galloping horse.

[Coral S]

My favourite poet is Helen Steiner-rice.

[Innocentia]

I love Maya Angelou!

I'm not sure about my relationship with my own poetry. I've filled at least 7 books in my lifetime and what I've realized is that I'm inspired by my own misery. The number of sad poems outweighs the happy ones. So I dont know if I really want to write because I'd have to be sad in order to.

General has started a publishing company RenegadeQ, I'd like to submit some stuff, but I dont want to slump into depression because I know I surely will if I read my stuff again.

[EMJAY III]

I love poetry, I prefer it to reading novels. It would be difficult to give one favourite poet in English, Afrikaans, Spanish or Italian (languages which I read). I cannot say....dis al....! : ) Please tell us who the poet you have discovered is?
A brief selection

Byron
Blake
Milton
Shelley
Keats
Shakespeare
Dante
Plutarch
Jorge Luis Borges
Lorca
Torres
Breyten Breytenbach
Old Koos (ja he wrote poetry too)
Van Heerden
Joan Hambidge (I actually knew her at UCT)
Celliers

My favourite poem of all time:-
Dis al

Dis die blond,
dis die blou:
dis die veld,
dis die lug;
en ’n voël draai bowe in eensame vlug –
dis al

Dis ’n balling gekom
oor die oseaan,
dis ’n graf in die gras,
dis ’n vallende traan –
dis al

[Zim..$]

Yes, I do read poetry...my favourites are Lebo Mashele and Don Matera......I also like some from Ntsiki Mazwai.....

[kris k]

I love poetry,,,

[thumba]

I read very old poetry Lord Byron ,Kahlil Gibran.
I have read some poetry by a SOUTH AFRICAN Thomas C Kantha.He talks a simple message.Life , Love . Nature Africa etc.

[Darth Vader]

I like Edgar Allen Poe's poems. I write my own little poems sometimes. It is very infrequent though.

Sins if you go back in my answers, you will find a few examples.

[T.I]

Yepp for me my favouriteSouth African poet is definately Lebo Mashile and there's this guy who's poetry composition is called " And they said black men can't write poetry."
Link to one of Mashile's poems
http://poetry.about.com/library/weekly/aa090203d.htm

Maya Angelou's "phenomenal woman" is my favourite poem as it expresses, precisely, the woman i am. "Phenomenal Woman- That's me!"

I'm also a Shakespeare fan.