Poetry International: A Global Poetry Community
The most singularly unique quality of the Internet is the way in which it allows people who live far apart to engage in meaningful dialogue. Poetry International, an online poetry magazine, seeks to exploit this unique quality of the web to create an online, global community of poets.
Andrew Bailey, editor of the UK section of poetry international, conveyed to me that this was very much the goal of Poetry International from the start. He explained that 'poetry has always been about communication. Poetry International encourages a diverse dialogue between poets from across the world, allowing all lovers of poetry and literature to feel part of a community.'
A sense of the world, with all its diverse cultures and traditions, permeates the writing in Poetry International. The poems published are frequently pervaded by a keen sense of place, which roots the writing in the cultural and social circumstances of its author. Often the poets chosen come from corners of the globe where few people would think poetry would be flourishing. The publications of poetry from Iraq a year after the American and British invasion communicated the rarely told experience of Iraqis forced to live through the warfare.
Andrew Bailey said this was an important part of Poetry International's work. He described how quite often 'a country is only know in the popular imagination for the war, or violence that is going on inside it. Poetry allows us to open another window on that country, a window that shows the richness of a country's culture. '
One of the most interesting aspects of the site is its blog, which allows poets from all the countries Poetry International represents to write entries. The most effective poetry blog entries contain snippets of stories or momentary reflections, captured and published online. The result is a mixture between a conventional diaristic blog entry and free flowing poetic verse. The collaborative nature of the project means that different voices are entangled together, providing a matrix of contrasting, fractured, recorded experiences.
Again those that contribute often come from countries that, while often in the headlines, have populations whose voice and experience is rarely heard. A Zimbabwean poet, named Christopher Mlalazi has recently contributed two poems to their blog. The first discusses how hyperinflation has ravaged the population of Zimbabwe, turning the only viable profitable business money lending. It is juxtaposed with 'spring flower'; a meditation on the mopane trees flowering in spring. Ostensibly a contemplation of nature, the poem shows a Zimbabwean population stubbornly clinging to the beauty of the world despite the horrendous actions of the Mugabe goverment.
Organisations like Poetry International are encouraging the kind of global dialogue and exchange that optimists had always argued the Internet would foster. However a younger generation of poets are using the Internet as part of a wider attempt to mix poetry with other media. The results may change the way poetry is both written and received.