Change of Mind: Poetry

Before seeing Rives's TED poem, I always thought of poetry as either rhyming lines in an ABAB pattern, or free verse pieces with such depth and metaphor that their message is buried beneath the surface. Mockingbirds was neither of these. The message was clear, but the words and the delivery were totally different from what I used to think of as traditional poetry. Yes, there was rhyming, but it was subtle and arbitrary. And the mockingbirds were used as a metaphor, but the metaphor was not intimidating or difficult to grasp. The delivery was so natural it was almost as though the poet was just having a normal conversation. The whole thing flowed like a song and the timing was so perfect; it kept me hooked. 

To be honest, I have never like writing (and, frankly, reading) poetry. It always made me feel incredibly inferior and unintelligent because during writing, I could never come up with intelligent metaphors or make myself sound smart enough, and during reading, well, I couldn't understand poetry at the depth at which it was intended to be understood. Now I have a whole new outlook on poetry. This type of slam poetry is my kind of poetry. It doesn't require exceptional intelligence or vocabulary; rather, it asks for artful manipulation of language, which I think I could handle more easily. If I could learn to write like this, I wouldn't be intimidated by poetry anymore. I really would like to hear more of this kind of poetry to help me understand it and appreciate it even more.