Young, digitally astute poets with loyal online followings have catapulted onto the best-seller lists, where poetry books are scarce

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/08/business/media/web-poets-society-new-breed-succeeds-in-taking-verse-viral.html?smid=nytcore-ipad-share&smprod=nytcore-ipad

I've been at this a long time.  Trying to get noticed is ever a tricky thing. Without resorting to stunts and gimmicks, or relying on the kindness of strangers, I have managed to carve a modest niche for myself. My expectations go as high as the worth of my work. I figure my lack of success means I'm just not very good. So standards of quality are upheld in some esoteric way.The above referenced article in the New York Times prompted me to immediately publish a poem on Face Book. Which is an old poets venue, I suppose, as opposed to Instagram or Tumblr. Poetry, as with all beauty in Art, is in the eye of the beholder. Most poets dream of getting their work in front of as many appreciative eyes as possible. I guess that is what the "game" is all about. The new generation is forging ahead, clearing their own path. Kudos to them and their society.

If you read further into the article you will learn that a few of the poets have been given a leg up, riding the popularity of established celebrities. Poetry over the ages has proven to be the most democratic of arts. Its popularity ebbs and flows with the times and it is good to see a resurgence flourishing on our latest new democratic medium of the internet. Critics will not be impressed, but given a choice between critical acclaim or popularity, I think most poets would rather have their work read by as many people as possible rather than face being insignificantly obscure. 

Am I bitter? Good question. If I am it is only because I have been drinking my coffee black, for the most part, all my adult life. I have the sense that when I get serious, when I really put the work in that's required, then it will all fall into place. What ever that "IT" is supposed to be, I have yet to decide.

For my few fans of this page, here is what I wrote the other day on my flight from NYC to Greenville, NC, long before I read this article:

Amateur Poet

I stab at truth
With my words
Their points dull
So that no piercing
Insights
Penetrate
To draw blood
Unlike Allan Ginsberg
Wandering a neon fruit
Section
Illuminating night
Like a full moon
In autumn
Following Fathers Walt
And Lorca around
Tuned to their
Frequent and varied
Fires
Which rest in
Promethean hands
Dancing like stars above
Olympus.

I excel
At futility
My fusillade of verbiage
Wounds no one
Except, maybe
Myself.