Why is modern poetry non-ryhming, and why do publishers say they won't publish ryhming poems?

Question

I've been writing poetry for some time now but have had no choice but to conform to the standards of today; that is, write poems that do not ryhme, but are instead flash fiction chopped up. Nobody wants to publish ryhming poems...

Answer 1

For my 2 cents worth.
I like rhyming poetry.
I write rhyming poetry.
Most people who read
my work like it.
Some don't,
that doesn't matter.
Some of what I see
Looks and reads a lot
like this.
No rhyme,
No rhythm,
No sense of timing
at all. I might as well
be writing a
comment to a
question, and breaking
the lines into
disjointed segments.
I like to reread
Robert Louis
Stevenson, and Ralph
Waldo Emerson. Easy
to read and understand.
But, That is
MY
opinion.
hmmm, wonder if I could
call this poetry? I
think, therefore
I think
not.

Answer 2

First off: you ALWAYS have a choice.

Secondly, an editor who states in public that they will not accept rhyming poetry is a poetic simpleton and why on earth would you care whether or not your work appears in a simpleton's magazine.

Now, the Formalists I know all complain about being a minority and there's some kind of media bias controlled by the post-modern poobahs and "blah, blah, blah," until they begin to sound like republicans. The truth is, most Formalists that I know and have read are the kind of people who love rules and order and making sure all the labels in the pantry point in the same direction, and they deny that any of the great Formalists ever broke a rule or fudged a meter or did whatever was necessary to get the message of the poem across without it or the art suffering for it. The fact is, a good Formalist knows when and how to break the rules and isn't afraid to.

I would say the majority of magazines do not publish formal poetry exclusively, but most publications I've read do publish formal poems.

Now how do you explain a Post Modernist Formalist like Annie Finch? She gets published in all those Post Modernist pubs, but the poems are in form. Hmmm. Could it be her diction and vocabulary are contemporary and her poems do not suffer the usual clunkiness that most formalists suffer in trying so hard to make the rhyme.

The other thing I've noticed is a lot of internal rhyme in contemporary poetry. And I do mean a LOT. Seems the focus is on musicality.

I'm wondering how much formal education in poetry you've had since the above is fairly common knowledge. I've spoken to a lot of professors and teachers over the years and I've never heard one, not one, discourage or show disdain for formal poetry. In fact, most of them will site a formalist like Dickensen, Pound, Elliot, Frost as a favorite.

Learn well.

Answer 3

I know what you mean about the tendency to avoid rhyme in poetry. When I started writing in my teens, of course I rhymed everything. Then I joined a poet's critique circle (like a pen pal chain that exchanged and critiqued poetry), and everyone I sent my poems to told me that rhyme is only for beginners, and if I wanted to be published, I needed to "grow out of it." Even in college when I took Poetry Workshop, the professors kind of looked down on rhyming poetry unless they had assigned a certain type of poetry as an exercise.
I write both rhymed and unrhymed poetry now, and unfortunately have yet to publish anything. But I can understand what someone else said about some use of rhymes being doggerel or just so predictable that it's not even worth reading. Still, I say go with your heart, and whatever style YOU feel compelled to write is what you should write. When the time is right, you will find someone who will publish YOUR works written in YOUR style. (God, I sound like my mother giving relationship advice).

Answer 4

Poems that rhyme in an interesting, complex, or non-conventional way are often considered by literary journals. Also, very formal poems that adhere to strict meter/rhyme/syllabics are admired by many contemporary poets, editors, etc. The problem with most people that write rhyming poetry is that they do not write in counted feet, and they favor end-rhymes. The only thing these "writers" do in their poems is rhyme and moan (or else they’re deliriously happy/in love. . . quite an emotional range). Editors often ask that would-be submitters not send rhyming poetry (meaning doggerel) in order to make their jobs easier---the slush-pile is a soul killer!

I don't know your poetry, specifically, but I would say that if you're writing interesting, complex, rhymed verse and you're considering syllabics and/or form, you should not be afraid to send your work out.

If you're writing what we call doggerel, and you want to be a better poet, look into meter (even picking up a forms book might be interesting), and, above all, make sure your poems are substantive, that they do something that is authentically yours (eg. not everyone else's).

Contemporary lyric poetry (for example) cannot read like "flash fiction, chopped up;" it is, by definition, not narrative.

Good luck!

Answer 5

It is not that modern poetry is non-rhyming. There is always a sound pattern in poetry, even in contemporary poetry, and sometimes rhymes. It is not so much that rhyming poetry no longer corresponds to our contemporary world, but it is rather the conventional forms of poetry that do not reflect our modern world. The sonnet, for instance, was invented in Italy in the Middle Ages. It was then a favoured form in sixteenth-century Europe, but only for a few years, and in England, it was used again in the nineteenth century. Nowadays, if you want to use the sonnet form, you have to be creative and invent a new way of using it, because it cannot possibly reflect the ways of our world. A closed, harmonious form cannot say much about what the world is today.
I hope I answered your question, somehow... Continue writing, but don't think that contemporary poetry is just "flash fiction chopped up". Read more poets, read great poets.