ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

Following on from David's thread, I find myself pondering further on the differences between poetry and music. While poetry seems still be under the thumb of academics, music has broken free completely. Academics are still involved, but they are no longer calling the shots. It is the overwhelming popularity of music that has allowed this to happen, with the academics being forced to follow rather than lead.

There is a now a wide variety of musical genres, all of them (with the possible exception of 'pop'...and perhaps 'country') receiving a large measure of respectability in mainstream circles.

Vic talked about a similarity between 'folk' music and 'folk' poetry.

What about 'roots' music? That seems to reach back even further than 'folk', although perhaps it implies an Afro-American influence that our rhyming poetry lacks. It is certainly achieving a measure of popularity and credibility that few other genres can match.

We 'bush' poets are, in a sense, radical conservatives (at least in terms of our chosen poetic form, if not in our personal politics), and we are also reaching back to the 'roots' of poetry.

'Roots' poets. What do you think?

Stephen!!!

No? Maybe not?

Some folks’re over-drinkin’,
but me? I’m over-thinkin’!
For them, it’s booze they’ve drunk,
with me, it’s thoughts I’ve thunk.
Me doc sez mental strainin’
will only do me brain in,
so clear the data bank
an’ let the mind go blank.
I’m very sorry, Stephen,
I’ll ’ave ter leave yer grievin’,
I can’t discuss yer ‘Roots’…
me brain’s ’ung up its boots!

I suspect that for those who are too lazy to think much, or for those who want to impose conformity, overthinking is actually their word for the process of thinking.

A 'niche within a niche' doesn't sound a lot of fun.
Why crawl or stall or stumble when you could stand tall and run?
Why fiddle on the fringes when the world is at your door?
Why preach to the converted when you could do so much more?

There are strategies in politics, and strategies for walkers;
There are strategies for writers, there are strategies for talkers.
Success can be elusive. It's not simply sold or bought.
It mostly makes its visits in the aftermath of thought.

I may never be successful on a grand, enduring scale.
Perhaps I lack the skill to weave a universal tale.
They say the journey's bigger than the final destination,
And for me the journey's little more than humble cogitation.

A good way of looking at it, I reckon.

There you go Stephen . . invent a sub-genre of poet and it doesn't take someone long to stereotype you (all) as dirty, dredlocked poets. Onya Marty

I once wrote a poem about me roots

Shaddap!

Rack off!

Gawd! It's got so a bloke can't vegetate in peace any more!

Cogito ergo sum (I think because things don't add up)

Of course there'll be no dreadlocks for those whose only dread is that they don't have any locks.