The Poetic Leap

• Some may perceive Zen Koans to be poetic. Why? Maybe because they lack a decipherable "meaning" that is easily defined, universally accepted, and definite. Often in a Koan, there is moment of enlightenment in which a subject understands something immediately. 

A monk asked Chao-chou, "I have just entered the monastery; can you give me a teaching?"

Chao-chou asked, "Have you eaten your breakfast?"

The monk replied, "I have eaten it."

Chao-chou said, "Then go and wash your bowl."

The monk was enlightened.

This moment of enlightenment, I think, is parallel to a technique found in poetry called "the leap" or the "poetic leap" which takes the reader out of the real and into the surreal, in an immediate, quick way.

• These "leaps" are not limited to imagery. They show up in other ways throughout the forms of poems: syntax, diction, subject, voice. 
• The common thread is that the leaps move the reader from what is  EXPECTED, to what is NOT EXPECTED. 

• The "leap" has been a part of poetry for a long time. 
• Pre-modernist poets would leap from the physical to metaphysical, then, later, from the real image to a surreal image. Take Edgar Allen Poe's "Alone" in which the last line surprisingly reveals the cloud as a "demon in [his] view." (Not what the reader expected of a cloud?)

• Leaps in L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetry—and other post-modern practices of poetry—are not so much concerned with the subject within the poem, but instead focus on subversion of the reader's expectations of basic forms of language and poetic conventions.

Example: Gertrude Stein's famous line from "Sacred Emily" 

Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose. 

Loveliness extreme. 

Extra gaiters. 

Loveliness extreme. 

Sweetest ice-cream. 

Page ages page ages page ages. 

• We see a rose and say Arose, which draws the reader's attention to the multiplicity that exists within the system of language that we forget to pay attention to in everyday speech/writing. The poem also draws attention to pages ages page ages page ages to show how similar these words are; and questions the validity of our superficial, subscribed word "meanings." These words are not trying to mean anything here but instead asking the reader to REALLY LOOK at them

• Mindfulness. Right speech. Right intention.