In class this week we talked more about digital poetics and the influence of form on poetry. I feel like I’ve sort of made my case on digital poetics already, so I thought I’d do a little critique/commentary on a particular e-poem. It can be found at www.poemsthatgo.com. It is called “The Last Day of Betty Nkomo,” by Young-Hae Chang. Go watch it and then come back and read what I have to say. 

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Okay. If you’ve just watched/experienced/whatever-ed this poem/art/slideshow, then you are probably wondering how exactly this fits into your definition of poetry. For me, this is closer to poetry than other instances of digital poetics I’ve seen.

There is a linear quality to the poem. There are no aspects of computer interaction, nor are there images or video to accompany the poem. If you were quick enough, you could write down the words in the order they are presented and the poem could exist pretty closely to the way it does online. Though the music and speed control reading to a large extent, the poem could be written on the page and the speed of the reader controlled by spacing, something like this:

Today it’s cool in the shade.

My cheek is cool against the dirt.

Yes it is!

I will lift my head up today, then see if I can sit up.
I will lift my head today.
I will stretch my arm from the shade and set a hand in the sun.

I will look up and out the doorway now at someone passing
Will he come?
And if that someone is my son, I will smile.

I will lift my cheek from the dirt and set my hand in the sun.
I will lift my head today, or maybe tomorrow.

Don’t believe it! Ha! Ha! Ha!

The rats go in, the rats go out.
The sun goes up, the sun goes down.
The world goes ‘round, the



Of course it’s not exactly the same, but then that’s why digital poems aren’t exactly poems…

I also think this “poem” succeeds because the simplicity keeps the words in focus, and any multimedia elements that exist are very carefully added to bring more of a context to the poem. It’s almost like learning about the poet or what the poet intended when reading a poem in print. If it’s a decent poem, it’s probably not necessary to know those things, but it always makes it interesting to find it out. That’s sort of how I feel about a digital poem like this one. The music, the author’s name, the minimalist aspects of the presentation, all suggest a particular cultural setting. One can imagine a Korean village; a woman broken by age and poverty, lying in her dirt-floored home, gazing out the window into the hot sun, hoping that today will be the day her son returns. Perhaps he is at war, perhaps he is at work, perhaps he is dead. It is a powerful poem, I think, and a powerful presentation at that. I really enjoyed this “digital poetics.”