week 1/ Ginsberg & Corso

This weeks reading focused on Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso. What is the most striking about their poetry is the frank and, in quite a few places, vulgar language. It seems that these poets are angry at the world and everyone in it who simply lives their lives in the day to day monotony of American life. Ginsberg and Corso seem to rail at the social injustices of current life and strike out at the general unknowing public. Many, would find this poetry offensive at first glance, even by today's standards. In fact, Ginsberg's "Howl" was taken to court for it's vulgar content (which only allowed the poem to gain more popularity). I myself was stricken by the first couple of lines in "Howl" and by the brash accusations of Corso in "Bomb"; until I looked closer and really read the poem. If the reader allows themself to absorb the frank vocabulary and breathtaking content the act of reading the poem itself can become a catharsis. One must free themselves first, before one can rebuild and rethink. Indeed, both Corso and Ginsberg tore down the curtains of society to reveal the dark and dirty secrets they hid. Sensoring this literature can be understood when one realises that both Ginsberg and Corso were accusing America of hiding from the truth of life. That's scary. It takes a brave person indeed to evaluate oneself and find oneself lacking. I found the gritty language almmost refreshing when juxtaposed against the flowery writing of Shakespeare and Wordsworth (both very good poets in their own regard). In this time and age when the internet and the atom bomb are common terms that are thrown around to the point where getting to know someone new never has to take place face to face and killing can be done with the press of a button. We need poetry like this. We need people who are willing to strip themselves bare infront of a world (as Ginsberg so eloquently put it) who is no longer interested with personal opinions and "wishy washy" feelings. Be a man, grow up, go insane. The basis of our culture. At what point do we force ourselves to stop and reevaluate the situation? At what point do we open ourselves to the hopes and fears of another? We are scared and silent in this world of autonomy, because to open oneself is to become weak. Ginsberg and Corso laid the lines out bitterly and without fear; with just enough humor to make the general reader really hang on long enough to listen and understand. So what if they got a little dusty while ripping down that curtain. At least the rest of the world got a chance to see the sunlight out of the dark.