Poetics 2

"A tradition becomes inept when it blocks the nesessary conclusion; it says we have felt nothing, it implies others have felt more."
Creeley means simply that if the tradition of poetry leaves the reader feeling nothing, it has missed its mark and purpose.
"A poetry denies its end in any descriptive act."
Here is the flaw of many readers. To think the poet is simply giving a picture in the mind and nothing more. Of course a poem will give the reader a picture in the mind, but that is not the point.
"The process of definition is the intent of the poem."
A poem must define itself and be the object of the readers reation. The reader and the poem are defined when the energy of a poem is communicated. And the poem must be treated as an object that has been defined in and of itself, not a concept existing outside the poem.

The Language

"Locate I"

Do it. Go on, locate I! The only location I can be is right here. The Self as a metaphysical entity cannot be located apart from the physical location of I. Creeley starts in right off the bat with a challenge. Objects may be located, the physical I may be located. The title, The Language, is straight to the point. Language is, just as the Self, unable to exist without the physical. He is not merely referring to a body to make an arbitrary symbol or sound, but also to objects which must exist in order for the mind to have something for which to make an arbitrary symbol.

"little. Words / say everything." Words, and by implication language, are the only reason we can have a cognitive idea to define objects. In other words, if we did not have language we would not be able to give objects any value in our mind. Cognition would be only instinct and no reason.

"I / love you / again, / then what" The "I" is separated from "love" because, since I is only capable of being located in the physical sense, it must be separated from love. Love cannot be located, is a concept, a metaphysical idea. Being so there is only one object to represent love, a little word. l-o-v-e So words are objects, are concrete, are full. Maybe that one little word is enough on which to locate the abstract idea of love.

Unfortunately, what words are full of is holes. The hole is known as the poverty of the input. One must have objects to label with words. But reciprocally objects must have words before the mind may define even to oneself any object. This is the inescapable power and inability of language.