Celebrities, poetry and the policing of creativity

I read the the following article by Myf Warhurst Celebrities, do your worst with verse – just don't call it poetry at the Guardian and it grated ever so slightly.  Sure I don’t like Gina Rhinehart’s poetry, but it is poetry- technically poor poetry, offensive to the ear perhaps but it is poetry.  I tend to agree with Anthony Lawrence’s opinion on Clive Palmer’s poetry as well ie :

“I really celebrate the fact he’s done it, I love the fact he’s taken the time and care to explore his emotions and his affections for someone in verse and I think that’s a big deal. Most people stop writing poetry in high school and move on and he clearly had something to say and felt poetry was the best vehicle for that.” – Source: Guardian.

Jimmy Franco, I haven’t heard but I’m sure there’s much that’s worse and better.

The reason why I didn’t write poetry for a long time is because if the weight of expectation attached to it, both personally and by the public - whether they have read anything published in the last 50 years or not. 

It’s only with the encouragement of friends that I was able to start writing and start writing bad poetry, stuff that makes me cringe.  But I began to get better and I began to read more, began to realise that our most lauded poets wrote some absolute clangers at some stage. Half the time I feel like I am an apprentice to an absent master. The other half I just enjoy expressing something about my life, an observation etc.

I’d rather people wrote more poetry, talked more poetry.  Sent doggerel into newspapers, had fun with words.

Your thoughts?

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