FOUNDING STATEMENT

The art of poetics has undergone some considerable transformations through the 
centuries. None perhaps have been so discouraging as that which have beset 
the field in the 20th century. This project is but a small part of the struggle to 
resurrect poetry from the doldrums with which it has found itself saddled. 
There is no presumption here that what may be offered will rank among the classics,
but without such effort, the devolution which we have experienced will continue 
perhaps unchecked into the next millenium. 

That is neither to suggest that nothing that has been penned in the last hundred years 
is without value. But poetry has for some time fallen upon bad times. It has often 
approached the level of the 'great wasteland' one of its erstwhile figures has assigned 
to another medium. 

It is the high ambition of this forum that it can begin to offer a much higher vision 
of the practice of poetics than we have become all too accustomed to finding. 
Although Poe once wrote that there is no such thing as 'a long poem' -- he then 
offered his little known EUREKA as somewhat of just such a  long poem -- 
however it is defined, history has recorded some inspiring exemplars of just that. 
What will appear in this journal will be efforts at such narrative verse -- at least 
predominately. Not to be pretentious, they may not rank with the works of Homer, 
Shakespeare,  or even Longfellow, but that is the spirit the effort intends to promote.
 
The first four volumes of POeTRY will be such narrative compositions of the 
and editor. Subsequent and continued publication will have to rest on the creative 
contributions of others. Submissions toward that end are solicited. They should be 
sent to The Editor, POeTRY -- attached to e mail at:  rzieg97818@aol.com.

A second issue will be entered onto the internet during the summer of 1997, with 
a third added in the fall. An important aspect of this project is that it is to be a 'free' 
publication -- in the spirit of Homer, whose father bemoaned his not entering the 
practice of law. Your contributions are eagerly anticipated. 

Ronald Gordon Ziegler, Editor

May 1997

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