Poems that you love

[milo]

I've always called it a found poem. Ready-made has a nice homey ring to it though

Yes, the school has been renamed by most modern practitioners s "found poetry" in an apparent abandonment of its dadaistic roots. Things I don't care for in the renaming:

1. It abandoned the dadaistic principle of taking a mundane or common article and creating art through the interaction between the consumer and the label.

2. It demotes the situation and the labelling focusing instead on the aesthetic that dadaism rejected. (Retinal art)

3. It produces endless streams of "jingle-ism" - people presenting the writing on their starbuck's cup as "found poetry" when in actuality it was written in a desparate attempt to sound poetic and is actually not poetic at all.

I'm on board. I never liked the label "found poetry", but for much different semantic reasons than you point out--that I won't get into here--though I don't see any reason to disagree with your arguments, nor can I think of any reasons to make up right now. (sadly--it's been awhile since I've enjoyed a good debate.)

Your label, and "ready made" seems to correct the issues that I had with other, though. "Found poetry" is only a label I'm familiar with, not necessarily something I ascribe to.

I enjoy collage, but yeah the "starbucks trenders" have taken all the fun out of the other. There is no creativity, and no eye for the relevant, no eye for metaphor, left--just a bunch of jokers hopped up on their favorite bean and astonished by all they see. (not that being hopped up is a problem, if you're not just another chum...err chime)

what's great is that "ready made" was itself taken as a ready made. In the early 20th century, American produced goods had to be categorized as either "hand-made" or "ready-made" which referred to mass produced factory goods. The Dadaists actually made a metaphor out of the naming of their metaphors!