A Reader’s Expectations & A Poem’s Expectations (2015-07-02)
“Two things to be grateful for: poets accomplish poems; and poems accomplish nothing.” —Hippokrites
To often we come to poems with a set of expectations, and if they don’t meet those expectations, it is easy—but very wrong—to dismiss the work. Poems aren’t utilitarian, which doesn’t mean they aren’t still valuable.
While we shouldn’t have expectations of the poem, poems do expect a lot of the reader.
