In my mind, POETRY is meant to be the opposite of destruction

In my mind, poetry is not meant to be a destructive force field nor a hazardous competition nor a playing field role reversal of right versus wrong.

I feel like some people in poetry land almost want to force other people in poetry land to pick a side and announce the side they picked and why.

I don't want to pick a side; I want to pick a poem.

I don't feel the need to unfriend someone, completely distance myself from them, and cut them down just because we're not on the exact same side - or semi-publicly slam somebody just because I disagree with parts of them - or lay out exactly how I feel about another person so that other people can narrow down which side I am or am not in support of.

If anyone wants to know how I feel about someone or something, then they can feel free to ask me one-on-one and I will probably respond - but I'm probably not going to get involved in some group attack that combines some legitimate points with a bunch of people making fun of a bunch of other people.

Sometimes it starts to feel like some sort of aggrandized agenda, but I'm not even sure where it's heading. To destroy people you disagree with? To destroy people you hate? To destroy people who hate you? To destroy people before they destroy you?

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By the way, this post isn't directed at any ONE or any particular THING or any particular SENTENCE or any particular CONVERSATION or any particular GROUP or any particular agenda. I don't have any particular agenda. I'm just expressing myself and this is directed towards how I feel IN GENERAL about poetry friendship. Of course, there are always exceptions to everything too.

I've had people try to control me before and I didn't like it at all. I will try my best to be myself AND listen to others. I will try my best to stay in control of myself without trying to control anyone else.

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I try to expel my own negativity (and all kinds of other feelings too) via creating my own poetry and art. Not by attacking other poets and artists or anyone else.

Here is a video of me reading some of my poetry this past May (part of the Take the Knight Off poetry reading in Canton, Ohio).

I just happened to encounter the video yesterday and thought I would share it today.

Flesh-tearing shark shaped snarks

Maybe I sometimes phrase things wrong by saying I don't give a fuck about scenes (in regards to poetry/art).

Sometimes I have little word issues and question my own words and wonder what certain basic words even mean and maybe "scene" wasn't the right word to express my discomfort, because all a "scene" really means is a place or an acting sequence, I guess, and "place" is so broad scale and the type of "scenes" I was thinking of are small.

My mind seems to associate scenes with small group trends and that sort of thing.

I'm not particularly interested in the latest trends, but I am interested in poetry community.

I don't disrespect or discredit the desire for community; in fact, I think that poetry/art communities can be very necessary and very positive. I guess I just don't think that my interest causes me to fit into any one particular scene; but maybe it does if the scene is POETRY.

I do enjoy being around people with similar interests, or at least communicating with people with similar interests.

What I don't enjoy, don't respect, and don't understand the positive points of are the sort of scenes or groups or communities (or whatever you call them) that seem like popularity contests.

Like they're competing against each other and want to bash others down.

Like they get off by lashing out at others, carelessly picking on others, and creating their own mean non-mainstream cheerleader squad routine.

I've seen/heard poets bitch about other poets, have little snark-fests about other poets, and so forth.

Those are the kinds of scenes I dislike. The scenes that create their own narrow groups who pretend to be diverse when they're stabbing other people behind their backs.

The communities filled with a small infestation of snark-festing, as if they get off by cutting others down and trying to drown them, like flesh-tearing shark shaped snarks patrol these waters and can't get enough of others' blood.

Poetry in and of itself is non-mainstream, yet some of this non-mainstream community seems to want to fit in to the more mainstream approach grouping themselves into smaller groups and then attacking the other groups.

Maybe everything in life is like that and I just notice it more in poetry land, since that's where a lot of my personal attention and energy is directed.

When it comes to poetry and art (and other things too), I don't really care whether or not someone has a college degree (or what their degree is in), whether or not they're social or antisocial or somewhere in between, whether or not they consider themselves academic or independent or something different.

I don't desire to quickly narrow my poetry friend list down into any particular sort of group.

I care about whether or not they're genuinely poetic and whether or not I like their poetry and their personality (although it's also possible for me to like someone's poetry, but find their personality very bothersome - and vice versa).

What is up with one word definitions?

Several of my friends have posted a link today about how it's “Invisible Majority Bisexual Pride Day” - and nothing against them posting that - and nothing against bisexual pride - but I'm not a fan of the WORD bisexual - and similarly, I'm not a fan of any of those words that supposedly define you by placing you in a group with one word naming it.

Like for example, if you're a poet, why would you want to define your own creative work as academic or as outsider or as mainstream or as non-mainstream or whatever? What if it's parts of all of those things and more? What if it doesn’t fit into any group name or dynamic?

Maybe I slightly diverge from mainstream sensibilities here, because a lot of people seem to really enjoy being involved in groups.  I'm reminded of how some sports fans commit to one group (and dislike the others).  Plus how many people define themselves politically as either a democrat or a republican. Plus how many people define themselves religiously/spiritually.  This team or that team.  This group or that group.  This belief or that belief. Rah rah rah. Yes or no, wrong or right, black or white, where do you fit in?

Back to bisexual, obviously it’s not black and white (or all kinds of bright rainbow colors like a lot of the gay pride labels) – it’s “invisible” yet the “majority”, but yet needs to be positioned into a group.

What IS bisexual anyway? How do you define it? Why would you define it?

What if you're  a woman who is about 98% attracted to men, chemically and sexually speaking  (but have sexually experimented with women and might do so again) - but sure like looking at women (including scantily clad women) physically speaking, maybe even more than you like looking at men physically speaking - but when it comes down to getting close up and naked with someone and having some sort of scintillating sexy physical contact with them, then men are prone to making you tingle way more than other women do - but when it comes to mental/conversational contact, you could go either way.  Is that bisexual?

Quite a few women I know who identify themselves as bisexual are mainly predominantly involved with men, relationship-wise.  If you’re a woman who is primarily involved with men and/or if you’re a woman who is predominantly attracted to men but is also willing to get physical with other women in order to turn men on, is that bisexual ?

Or is that more of an exhibitionist fetish to turn yourself on?  Or both?  Or neither?

Everyone is an individual who has their own needs/wants/desires, right? 

So why do so many people like to classify themselves into a one word group?

Why are so many people so into DEFINING all kinds of things, including feminism (of which there are many different definitions and varieties) and sexual proclivities (S/M, dominant, submissive, kinky, vanilla, bisexual blah blah blah blah blah…).

I’m not against any of those things per se; I’m mainly just saying I don’t understand why people feel such a need to define and place themselves in a group. Maybe part of the reason is to relate to “like minded others” – but obviously not everyone in the bisexual (or other) group is going to be like minded so...

How do you define these parts of yourself and why do you want to?

Is this post of mine partially derived from an exhibitionist fetish streak? 

Just wondering and thinking/expressing out loud. Not defining anything.