From "Definition of Poetry"

Once

I took a course in aesthetics:

Three hours credit

If I could learn

What a poem was.

A poem was

“the record of the best and happiest moments of the best and happiest minds”;

“The best words in the best order”;

“A criticism of life.”

But what was “best”?

....

A poem was metered, rhythmic, regular—

Except free verse.

A poem rhymed—

But not blank verse.

A poem had consonance, assonance, alliteration, onomatopoeia—

Or none of these.   

a poem used a “higher concentration of imagery” than prose.

“But how high is high?

.....

Finally we were told, “A poem should not mean, but be.”

Be what?

To answer the question for myself

I wrote a term paper

“A Definition of Poetry.”

The instructor gave it an “A”

But I never wrote

A poem.

Lynn Z. Bloom

Butler University,  Indianapolis