" WHY POETRY ?"-- T V SATYANARAYANA

      Should poetry be written for the sake of poets? Many novels, stories and  plays are being written in Telugu. Though every one reads, many claim that they get a headache in case of poetry. There are many who would say, “why do you write poetry, isn’t it better to write stories.” Indeed many read stories. All my friends buy weeklies – not for them selves but for the members of their families. Somehow I don’t feel like writing stories. Pen doesn’t move to write stories. That’s one reason for writing poetry;moreover I read poetry more. There is some pleasantness, relief and secret in poetry- don’t find them in prose. If some people say there is reality in prose , I say, why do I need reality.

       For the last one hundred years, there has been lot of effort to write prose and bring it into popularity. But in the frenzy for prose, we have forgotten that there is something called poetry. In reading prose repeatedly, we have turned deaf to poetry. We are forgetting that there are beauty and music in language. Colloquial language is okay. But modern people  in getting habituated to street music have forgotten that Koel will sing.. Listening to film songs on radio, gramophone ( no TV at that time) , they are getting separated from the melody in human voice. We’ re getting confused on seeing pictures on the screen-it has become rare to enjoy real beauty- then, do you ask why do we need poetry?

     There‘s secret power in poetry. I can’t tell what it’s. in rainy season, when we see black cloud, when rainbow appears and a lightening is seen some sort of joy is felt. Nature appears to be revealing its truth. Some feeling, raising of hair, trance—some dreams fears surprise—all are experienced in a moment. I can’t tell what is the loss if they are not felt. But I say such experiences make life aware. So does poetry. Every day you can’t see rainbow or lightening. Every day poetry is not born. My religion is that in those who see when poetry is born, new streams of consciousness will arise.

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      In the era of   machines ,we can’t  live without machines. The poet may take even a machine as an object of poetry. But to reject nature and writing  poetry is arrogance. Poetry has to reveal the relation between man and nature. The poet has to see nature and reveal its beauty through poetry. But I don’t say that nature alone has to be admired though there are some who did so-yet I maintain that those poets who have taken human life are great. Though human life appears more in prose, there are some depths beyond prose and accessible to poetry alone. Some of he modern novelists- especially in America and France – have tried to turn prose into poetry. Their works look like another name for

poetry. But I opine it’s not poetry .Some may say that modern poetry is inferior to prose and poet are using the language of the street.  One can’t find the are no tempo of Tikkana’s poetry, earnestness of Srinadha’s  poetry or flavor of Mukku Timmana’s poetry and prose writers are better than poets. I won’t say anything to this. There has been   a lot of change in the trend of world poetry since Walt Whitman created new poem. Some say that Whitman and others after him have been writing prose but not poetry. But when observed closely , one can find a lot of difference in poetry like prose and poetry mentioned above. No prose writing is equal to the poem Whitman wrote on Abraham Lincoln or Eliot’s ‘The wasteland.’ The anguish, emotion and music of that poetry  is not found prose writings. 

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     Another word. Some modern poets wrote poetry in a way inaccessible to people due to their doubt that poetry turns into prose. Such poetry seems to be apt for reading by other poets or for researchers in a university. Such poetry, in my view , is more sterile than free verse. No poet should write poetry for other poets or intellectuals.  Moreover, there are some who say “I am not   writing for any one. I am writing for myself.”  Such words are superfluous. Poetry must be written for people. It must be intelligible to them. Suppose people say “we don’t want to read “, It must be written in a way to interest them to read.

     The desire to read and zeal  must be created in people. Perhaps the latter also have to  change their opinion that poetry is unintelligible raving and have to learn to taste the joy of reading.  You may say that one can read twenty or thirty pages per hour instead of reading twenty lines and breaking one’s head to understand it. But don’t break your head or think about those twenty lines. Some word or line will come to you at sometime or other in future- like a lightening. Then read that poem again at your leisure. You can find something. If you read some times in that way, you can feel   its beauty and happiness.

    Thus if poetry has to survive in modern days , the responsibility lies on both the poets and people. Poets should not equate poetry with some gimmicks. People should not think that poetry means  pomp of words. A poet should write for people. People ought to understand poetry with patience and sympathy. A poet out  of favour  with  people is not a poet. People who don’t  have regard  for are not people with culture. It takes some time for any poet to get recognition and for people to enjoy poetry. If both the sections show mutual love, it would be better for the nation.         

(Translated from preface of “Vaitarini”(1969) by late TV Satyanarayana, my beloved teacher who worked in Acharya Nagarjuna University. He taught us courses- 'Poetry' and   'European classics' and inculcated a deep taste for literature. )