Really uncomfortable when poets say "I'm better than you!"

Something I read earlier on Facebook, reprinted here: This Friday, don't miss "So Bad It's Funny" a reading of (intentionally) bad poetry by the famous and infamous and anyone with the guts to read their own! There will be featured bits by [poets' names redacted] and [redacted] as emcee and reader of arcane but ridiculous verse. It's all happening at [Los Angeles poetry venue name redacted.]

I'll say this one more time: I really hate the idea of "intentionally bad" poetry, whether it's intended for an evening of laughs such as the above event--or used as a Wergle Flomp-esque bludgeon over the metaphoric cranium of "we'll take your money" poetry contests/expensive-see-yourself-in-our-book scams.

Poetry communities have enough difficulty as it is with members who perceive themselves as superior poets/people exercising dominion over their supposed inferiors.

So, please, cut it out before the world of poetry becomes so small that those considering themselves Brilliant are all which remain--and they begin destroying each other in lieu of laughing/ignoring alleged "bad poets" to death.

POETRY POLICE

New poem: POETRY POLICE from my upcoming chapbook IMPERFECTIONIST.

POETRY POLICE

the poetry police
is traveling through
my neighborhood
in a big squad car
with sirens
and a giant loudspeaker
on top

the loudspeaker shouts:
IF YOU DON’T WANT YOUR POETRY EDITED,
DON’T SUBMIT TO US!
WE’RE TIRED OF RECEIVING PROSE
IN VERSE FORM!!
WE’RE NOT A VANITY PRESS!!!!
WE DON’T PUBLISH EVERYTHING WE GET!!!!!
IF YOU’RE TALENTED AND WANT TO PUBLISH
SOMETHING BAD ON PURPOSE,
SEND IT TO WERGLE FLOMP INSTEAD!!!!!!

the poetry police
stops its big squad car
at a free verse house
to round up dissenters
and haul them off to poetry jail
where they’ll be detained indefinitely
without trial
to keep my neighborhood
safe and content
so we can avoid
this changing world
and not have to be soiled by
the disgusting degrading decline
in literary standards

Time for the Wergle Flomp deliberately-bad-poetry contest to die.

http://www.winningwriters.com/contests/wergle/we_guidelines.php

Like a lot of poets, I'm aware that some poetry contests are little more than con jobs that will publish your poem--in hopes you'll buy a pricey book that it is anthologized in. And the contests are designed to separate people from their money instead of being a measure of true poetic worth.

But the idea of the Wergle Flomp contest--write something deliberately "bad" to send to a con-job contest and then send it to winningwriters.com--is more snide and asinine than good for the craft of poetry. Unfortunately, a lot of people enjoy the stick-pins-in sadism of Wergle Flomp because of the "I'm SO superior to you" virus in certain poets--particularly those with pretensions to literary worthiness.

If you go onto the Winning Writers website, take a look at their links regarding poetry contests. And refuse to go the Wergle Flomp route--so both the "con"tests and Winning Writers will get the message.

[UPDATE 3/29/09: Here's my response to the comment made by Adam of Winning Writers: Thanks for your letter, but I stand by my original post. Winning Writers' information on dubious contests should stand on its own without the throwing-of-literary-feces represented by Wergle Flomp.]