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The World's Shortest Poem

11/16/2017

 
by CeCe Ramey
Picture
This is my favorite poem and if you hang in there and read, I’ll explain everything.

An Intro and Recollection of My Personal History with Poetry

My current relationship with poetry is quite distant. I only briefly run into poetry when others mention it in their work. I admire it from afar.

Perhaps the first time my ears heard a poem was when my parents taught me the “Itsy Bitsy Spider” or maybe it was my father’s voice calling out as he closed my bedroom door close “Sleep tight. Don’t let the bed bugs bite!” The first time my eyes saw a poem in physical form was in the children’s books with gorgeous colors and shapes I would spend hours delving into such as the work of Dr Seuss.  

In grade school I remember reading poems that rhymed with lines and stanzas. The simple ABAB and ABBA later lead to understanding and memorizing the complex Shakespearean Sonnet rhyme scheme. All this knowledge of the kinds and rules of rhyming just to have my mind blown upon discovering the Haiku, a poem that needs no rhyme at all… But then..

What is a Poem?
Here are a few definitions that you may piece together to help form the path of an answer:

Poetry (ancient Greek: ποιεω (poieo) = I create) is an art form in which human language is used for its aesthetic qualities in addition to, or instead of, its notional and semantic content. - poetry.org

Poetry can be differentiated most of the time from prose, which is language meant to convey meaning in a more expansive and less condensed way, frequently using more complete logical or narrative structures than poetry does. This does not necessarily imply that poetry is illogical, but rather that poetry is often created from the need to escape the logical, as well as expressing feelings and other expressions in a tight, condensed manner. - poetry.org

It is a literary art that takes elements of language, such as aesthetic and rhymics, to mean more than it normally would. A poem doesn’t need to rhyme or contain multiple words.

A poem helps the mind play with its well-trod patterns of thought, and can even help reroute those patterns by making us see the familiar anew. - Mark Yakich

Poetry is an imaginative awareness of experience expressed through meaning, sound, and rhythmic language choices so as to evoke an emotional response. Poetry is an ancient form that has gone through numerous and drastic reinvention over time. The very nature of poetry as an authentic and individual mode of expression makes it nearly impossible to define. - Mark Flanagan 

Although poetry is hard to define, I find we can rely on what we like and don’t like about poems to help in understanding. We don’t like cheesy poems that follow tropes or lead us exactly were we think they will lead. We enjoy poetry we can read again and again, each time taking in a new rhyme, a new detail, a new emotion, a new memory recalled or even created.

Picture
Return: 
This is my favorite poem by Aram Saroyan. It’s made in a thick slab serif typeface. Like the typefaces used in old typewriters and movie scripts. It looks stretched towards the sky. 

It’s called the world’s shortest poem by the Guinness Book of Records. It’s “a closeup of an alphabet being born” – Bob Grumman. Maybe it’s a cell in the process of dividing, ‘m’ and the ‘n’, not quit separated. Some see it as a pun on “I am”, implying the formation of consciousness. 

When I first read it, I hear the “mm” I make when I’m thinking. The “mm” I make before I decide on what to do next. The “mm” I make as the last sound before I fall asleep. 

Is it a m+n? Or a m+n? Three n’s? Is it a letter at all? The puzzle of it makes me think about our language. The history and evolution of the alphabet. The idea that words are a code that we have developed to describe the world to one another. That the code which our communication relies on is imperfect and thin. The longer I look at it, the less it feels like language.

I look at it again and I see an animal. I see an organism moving it’s long lanky limbs and a head.
When I stare at it, it becomes form alone. It reminds me of Roman aqueducts moving water along. My eyes love to stay on the boundary between the slab serif and the vertical columns. Despite it’s small size on my screen, I feel as though I can walk under it.

This is why it’s my favorite poem. Every time I read it, I see something new. I take my knowledge of the world to question it and it in return questions my knowledge of the world. 

Sources:
http://www.poetry.org/whatis.htm
https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/11/what-is-a-poem/281835/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F7quI-MbzY
https://www.thoughtco.com/definition-of-poetry-851673
http://www.peopleofar.com/2013/07/02/worlds-shortest-poem/
Heather B.
11/20/2017 05:09:40 pm

There is something beautiful about the way you are describing the introduction to your first poem. It seems as if poetry and artist books go hand in hand. Aram Saroyan produces minimalist writings that evoke questions about what poetry is or is not. I really enjoy this quote: "...poetry is often created from the need to escape the logical."

Y Nguyen
11/21/2017 08:51:16 pm

Very interesting!
When I first saw it, saw an animal and a m then a n. But I didn't really get it until I read through your explanation.
I'm really like "Poetry is an imaginative awareness of experience expressed through meaning, sound,..."

Ellie Weber
11/21/2017 11:42:39 pm

I like this personal glimpse into your definition or experience with poetry, because it seems like more of an investigation. I am very curious what the author of the poem has to say and even the Guinness Book of Records, paired with your interpretations. I have skepticism with a book that is about breaking records though, especially in context of ingenuity or innovation, mostly if it was an intended goal in the poem itself. This seems like an homage or connection to the history of typeface, and not without satire. It is also important to look at when this was written and the movements of art in culture at that time. Thanks for sharing!

Timothea Haider
11/26/2017 09:03:03 am

I see a lot of irony of writing a 300+ word essay on a poem that is... A letter? A word? A misprint?

The poem is strangely complex in its simplicity. How was it conceived? How was it first made? Did someone hand carve this type or paint it?

The poem itself is silent and I doubt its ever been recited, but it has me making noises at it? I love it.

CeCe
11/28/2017 01:21:02 pm

Thank you, Timothea for finding the irony.

In regards to your questions about the materials and creation of the poem: Upon further research, Aram created the "lighght" poem on a typewriter and as it was the 1960's I believe that mn was also created on a typewrite, blown up in size, and then the last right most curve was copied and spliced onto the m.

I found more insight about Aram's conception of his minimalist poetry in an interview with the poet and playwright:

"My first big interest, pre-dating poetry, was photography"
"I wanted to make a poem as immediate as a photograph. Eventually I realized the immediacy of a photograph had to do with it being instantaneous, and a poem necessarily has a reading process. However, a one-word poem, or a two word poem, and maybe a slightly longer one, is virtually instant, has virtually no reading process."
"I was influenced too by Warhol and the sculptor Donald Judd, and American advertising. I wanted a poem that would look good on a billboard"

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/68913/you-call-that-poetry
http://dirt-zine.blogspot.com/2006/10/aram-saroyan-interview.html

Louise
12/3/2017 02:14:56 pm

Looks like we had some similar interest with type and poetry! :)

I like thinking about this poem as well. It reminds me of a zen koan (word for poem). I.E. "What is the sound of one hand clapping?"

Your imagination is pretty expansive, I think most of the population would just brush this off as a typo. Haha!

Daniella Ozair
12/3/2017 02:54:16 pm

I loved how you talked about your relationship with poetry in your introduction. It was an unexpected approach at this assignment and I thought it was such a fantastic way to begin.

I love your passion for typography and your curiosity towards different ways of expressing it. Your blog post was a joy to read and I can't wait to see more of your typographic projects in the future!


Comments are closed.

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