It's good and dead, long live zombie poetry.

seems to me, you have people on one side that know what they want but dont understand it; and on the other, people who understand what they want but dont know (in all honesty) what it is :P

maybe there have always been weak, attention seeking worms? merely they lacked the distance/anonymity to be bothersome :P (and yes, I do end every sentence with an emoticon or netstyle acronym)

Also I think there's probably a more subtle line between ignorance and naivity, but im still in a stage of life where I focus on the positive elements of people :P

Maybe I'm wrong. but it seems to me that egocentric poetry/prose doesn't lend itself to real self-examination so much as it sets up the naive or hack writer to babble incoherently and become immediately offended by anyone suggesting that their work isn't brilliant. Those are not craftsmen/women in any real sense of the word because they can't understand the language of writing, so they mimic the 'sound' of it. It's highly likely they never read challenging works in different genres or styles because it requires too much work.

Someone who is addicted to/serious about writing will usually pass through this phase and submit better initial drafts even if the editing process is painful. Some will see their work as too precious and avoid this step. Others will have no idea how to perform this process and will abandon every first draft if it isn't 'born perfect.' I'm convinced the number of novice writers who want to become highly skilled poets is inversely proportional to the number of submissions flooding the net. Good poets are rare and bad poets are legion.

I know it’s been ages since I’ve replied to anything here.   I had the shingles and I was real bitchy and I didn’t have anything positive to say;)

Leanne, you always bring up interesting subjects for discussion.  I’m trying to leave “I” out of my poems for the most part.  Why, because “I” is boring.   We all need to make each word count which means thinking and even using a dictionary or thesaurus, if needed.  I also think as writers, we need to separate ourselves from our written word.  Once you put it out there, it doesn’t belong to you anymore, it belongs to the reader to interpret.  And what you think you said and what you actually said or two different things.

I don’t want to be a dead zombie poet but I know they’re out there sucking the metaphors out of poetry like a mindless black hole.  Cover yourselves with garlic and go towards the light.

Why does everyone pick on zombies? That kind of sanguinary bias is a form of intolerance. Don't be so judgmental!

Z of York

I think it began before the web. In the ‘60s, authenticity became the word of the day. It was necessary to ‘let it all hang out’ – a reaction to the ‘up tight’ attitudes of their (the teens’ and twenty-somethings’) parents. Be genuine! Let out the primal scream! Someone once asked Baba Ram Dass how he would act at one of the weekend happenings, in which the participants were to let go emotionally – popular during the ‘70s. He answered that he would do exactly what he usually does: Sit quietly and observe or talk or read.

The really strange part for me is the twin rules that you should put yourself in a poem, but avoid the use of the word “I”. On the Weird Scale of 1 to 10, that’s at least a 9.

The web has merely taken the already extant dumbing of the world and increased its intensity by increasing the quantity of communication and decreasing the barrier to entry.

I do agree that TV and other forms of propaganda have increased conformity and decreased original thought.

Finally, apples (like vegetables) CAN “kill someone”. The antidote is dark chocolate.

Mmmmm chocolate!

Does this site also appear to be mostly dead as well? Or have I just been away too long? Maybe I just need some zombie chocolate...

wow.  a self-demonstrative comment!  Hello?

Not at all, they've migrated to inside their own heads, where everyone is fascinated by them and they get a million comments full of admiration without putting in the slightest effort.  It's a bit beige there but the loss of colour is a small price to pay for such fulsome praise.

At least the discussion of the degree of metaphoric deadness of this site has provided some life support for the carcass. Or is this just a reflex?

As for the carcass that you mention Bill: if postmortem reflex is anything like sarcastic wordplay, you may be on to something. Personally, though, its snowing outside, I've been to the dentist, my teeth are cracking and breaking due to extensive night clenching, my body is deteriorating, and I'm afraid postmortem reflex is all I have left.  As a metaphor, that is. The website, perhaps, is only a bunch of bits to start with, so I fear postmortem may be a misnomer.

Dead as a doornail: Etymology (from wiktionary)

"Probably from William Shakespeare's play Henry VI, Act 4, Sc.10, l.40-1 John Cade: "...and if I do not leave you all as dead as a door-nail, I pray God I may never eat grass more." Although there is some evidence that the phrase was in use before this time.

When doors were built using only wood boards and hand forged nails, the nails were long enough to dead nail the (vertical) wooden panels and (horizontal) stretcher boards securely together, so they would not easily pull apart. This was done by pounding the protruding point of the nail over and down into the wood. A nail that was bent in this fashion (and thus not easily pulled out) was said to be dead. Thus the expression - dead as a doornail"

In other words, the dead doornail is not deceased, only bent. And dodo's, as you observed, are not blue, though embedded links to their skeletons sometimes are