Entry 307 — Columpetry?
Some lists of best poetry collections published in 2010 have been posted recently at New-Poetry. Needless to say, I was contemptuous of the selections. I wrote a variation of what I always write about such rankings: “My first thought is that even if these lists were compiled by critics with a knowledge of the full range of poetry being composed nowadays, they are premature. The year has not ended yet. My second, much more intelligent thought, is that the lists that ought to be compiled should be of the best collections of poetry published in 2000. A minor third thought is that if the latter lists were said to be of 2010 collections, few would realize it from the poems in them (assuming topical references were deleted).
Remembering my coinage, “magnipetry,” it crossed my mind that these lists were not of the best collection of that, but of . . . “medipetry” (mee DIH peh tree). No, I thought, some of the collections on some of the lists are superior however short of magnipetry they are. What they are is . . . I needed a term for good but unadventurous poetry. If I got it, it next occurred to me, I’d need one for adventurous poetry, for not all adventuours poetry is magnipetry, nor all magnipetry adventurous. Hence, “Columpetry” for poetry to finds new worlds. But which is disqualified by its “lump.”
So I gave up. But not permanently, I hope.