: Re: Poetry when unstructured? Like most kids, I went through the All Poetry Must Rhyme phase. Then a little later in school, rhyme was less essential (especially in English, a less rhyme-compatible

@Bethany377

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This may sound wishy-washy but it comes from having my own understanding of poetry continue to grow over the years. I think if the writer intends what they are writing to be a poem, and lacking any strong evidence that it is something else (like a script), then it can probably be considered a poem. There are prose poems and many styles (including ones labeled "experimental") that will ignore one or more or possibly many of the aspects we normally think of (meter, rhyme, etc).

What this does not address is whether or not it is an effective poem (I prefer "effective" rather than "good" or "bad"). One problem that can happen with some poems that ignore a lot of those structures is that the structure (or lack) may be distracting. Line breaks and other things are clues to the reader. Intent has a lot to do with it. Does whatever you are doing on the page support the effect you are trying to have or the point you are trying to communicate? Anyway, that's my 2 cents.

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