The Acmeist poet Zenkevich declared in 1911 that when he first met Anna Akhmatova he was struck by her saying that poetry was 'something organic', and that she was amused at the idea of the poet Valery Bryusov schooling himself to write a certain number of lines each day. 'Organic' is a word now considerably overworked, but the little anecdote does suggest aspects of an elemental distinction. Poetry has always been 'something organic', and also an art to be practised at a certain length each day, in order to retain and develop not only verbal skills but a poet's habit of mind. Organic poetry (like Akhmatova's) is delivered, and is silent. It has none of that daily discussion which animates the poetic art that keeps itself always in training. In fact, 'organic' poetry does not and should not seem like 'poetry' at all: its delivery compels an absolute concentration on the reader's part, something wholly hit-or-miss. True of it what for Larkin, another organic poet, is true of time.

LRB 18 August 1983 | PDF Download