pro-crastination

So I've been working on this poem on and off for about 9 months now. I've been working on the final revisions for the last few weeks, and today have decided to type our once again all of the newly revised poem. It's 10 sections long (a little over 20 pages) and I just finished the third section and have been, for the last 2.5 hours, done everything but finish typing it out. Writing is such hard work!

This brings me to an interesting thought. I was just reading Dr. Reynolds' blog where he answers some questions about Intelligent design. Some person had made the claim that scientific endeavor is unique in that only it performs research, and provides results that furhter our ability to manipulate the world around us to our own purposes. (On a side note, doesnt that explaination make science sound like alchemy? magic? witchcraft? but I digress). I have foudn that writing a poem takes alot of reserch time. I probably spent between 20 and 40 hours researching the subject of my poem before I really even wrote any of it. As for poetry making us able to manipulate the physical world to our purposes, I sort of doubt it. I think there is a poetry pendulum in my brain that swings back and forth between thinking poetry is useless drivel, and thinking it is the "unacknowledged legislator of mankind". (Shelly, for anyone who wonders)

What I think poetry can do, perhaps, is discover and reveal things about the world that may persuade us to change our purposes for it. It seems that scientific inquiry cannot do this: it can tell us how to manipulate, but never to what end we ought to manipulate. I realize the introduction of the word "ought" here would bring up the question: what, then, has ethics to do with poetry?" Let's sit with this question. Actually, you sit with it––I have a poem to finish.