Not only do I VERY STRONGLY disagree that “song is a very different discipline” from poetry, but I think such a statement disregards the fact that in some cultures and histories poetry by definition is (or was) sung. I am reluctant to refer to Pound as any kind of expert on anything, but when he wrote that “Poetry atrophies when it gets too far from music,” when I first read those words as a teenager (someone gave me The ABC of Reading on my 14th birthday), I instantly, emphatically, and intuitively agreed.

Poetry needs to be grasped by its very horns and wrenched back into the arena of song.

The more I hear poetry in its current fashion of oral presentation, the more I am convinced of this.

The more carefully I listen to singers, the more I am convinced of this.

Trying to do my part…