/lit/ - Literature

>>18553376
You don't have to know, just enjoy the images and words used.

>>18553389
Do most people read poetry this way, without understanding? I feel like I'm missing out when I can't grasp what is happening.

>>18553417
Nature of the art form mate, it’s all distilled into a short form piece. You’re supposed to read it over and over again and ponder it’s meaning.

>>18553376
Examples of the poems you're reading and failing to understand? Maybe you should start with something simpler.

>>18553376
Poetry is the biggest scam in human history. It was started by a caveman to sound deep and mysterious, and over the millennia, no one has been willing to address that the emperor is naked. Everybody is just playing along.

>>18553417
No, most people understand the form before anything else. The meaning on the other hand is a different matter...

>For, if I mistake not, it is with "Meister" as with every work of real and abiding excellence,—the first glance is the least favorable. A picture of Raphael, a Greek statue, a play of Sophocles or Shakspeare, appears insignificant to the unpractised eye; and not till after long and patient and intense examination, do we begin to descry the earnest features of that beauty, which has its foundation in the deepest nature of man, and will continue to be pleasing through all ages.

>>18553462
https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/do-not-go-gentle-into-that-good-night/

https://www.poemhunter.com/best-poems/dylan-thomas/altarwise-by-owl-light/

Picked up about Dylan Thomas after hearing a lot about him and I don't understand shit

>>18553550
Ok, try this one; I think it should be easier for you to understand. The vocabulary and syntax are straightforward, except maybe the words "eremite," which means a hermit, and "ablution," which means a ritual washing done by a priest or other religious official.

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art—
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors
No—yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,
Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever—or else swoon to death.

This is the ultimate book about understanding what is said in a poem, it won't help you "feel" it though.

>>18553649
translation?

>>18553663
Couldn't find one, sorry anon.

>>18553550
"Altarwise by Owl-Light" is *not* the poem to start with, dude. "Do Not Go Gentle" is a lot more straightforward, but even then, it's still an extended metaphor with lots of other metaphors along the way.

Why not start with something straightforward? There are many good poems which don't use any heavyweight literary devices; they just say something neatly and succinctly and forcefully.