Written in response to a terrible assault on the creativity of the written and spoken word over at GP,  in this Poetry Is Doomed article.

Here, in no particular order, except that the first is a heinous crime, are 50 reasons why poetry is way better than jazz

1. Jazzercise.  No one ever asks you to dance about weirdly to poetry (not since 1969 anyway).
2. Poetry has a long history with a large body of work.  Jazz doesn’t even rate as antique yet.
3. You can read poetry to yourself on the bus.  Listening to jazz on a bus will make people want to kill you.
4. A tone poem is not a real poem.  Really.  Not even a little.
5. If you read jazz lyrics to girls in a park they’ll think that you haven’t been taught about consonants.
6. Bad poetry is mostly about suicide.  Bad jazz makes you want to actually kill yourself.
7. Professional poets don’t need to big themselves up with false titles like “Duke”.  Bryon was actually a Lord.
8. No poet ever blamed a poor performance on using the wrong kind of pencil.
9. Jazz is like real music only without decent grammar or punctuation.
10. Even though Microsoft gives away free jazz with every copy of Windows, everyone just deletes it.
11. Most good jazz isn’t jazz, but swing, skiffle, blues or simply “easy listening”.
12. Ask a random kid to tell you a poem and they will.  Ask them if they like jazz and they’ll call you a pedo.
13. Nobody ever wrote a great jazz song about a cool Canadian Fed-Ex Lady.  (Google it up mo-fo)
14. No-one can be creative in the jazz uniform of cheap hideous suit and a polyester tie.
15. If you study poetry at college it might be your major.  If you study Jazz it’s definitely just for an easy credit.
16. Musicians always try a bit of jazz on the side (the b side for sure).
17. Whilst Google has 61 million entries for “bad poetry” is has 307 million for “bad jazz”.
18. Any jazz song is way better when sung by Tony Bennett and his big band.
19. Playing for drinks at the downtown club between shifts at the drive-though is a jazz players dream.
20. Even Bill Clinton is in a jazz trio.
21. The most important thing about a jazz albums sales is the cover art.  This isn’t so for chapbooks.
22. Most people in a jazz club are there only after their regular bar closed for the night.
23. Even the best jazz soloist needs the drums or bass to keep time and cover up the bum notes.
24. Jazz has no Dylan Thomas.
25. Jazz music only has seven letters but even then they often can’t spell out a decent tune.
26. A broken G string is much more interesting in a poem.
27. Ask 1000 random people to name jazz soloists and Lisa Simpson will always be in the top five.
28. “The Only Jazz Album You’ll Ever Need” only has 36 tracks.
29. No one talks about their poetry collection in terms of money.  No one mentions their jazz collection without telling you how much it is worth.
30. All lyrics are poetry.  Jazz without lyrics is just five sad guys without a date.
31. The most famous guy in the movies that  listens to Miles Davis is the male-babysitter in Jerry Maguire.
32. Say that you prefer Betjeman over Browning and it’s just an opinion.  Say that you think Chet Baker is better than Miles Davis and you’ll get death threats.  Too serious dude.
33. Elevator music is the best paid regular jazz gig.
34. At a poetry recital the reader wont add any words.  At a jazz recital it is impossible for there to be no extra notes.
35. All the emotion of a sad moment can be fully expressed in one good haiku.  With jazz its a 3 hour ear-bleeder.
36. I can listen to a bunch of bad poets in my local town for a couple of bucks.  I don’t need to go New Orleans for it to be authentic.
37. Early poetry tells you the thoughts and feelings of people in those times.  Early jazz doesn’t  even tell you how you feel now.
38. A poet at a jazz night is a lead vocalist.  A jazz musician at a poetry night is playing the bongos badly.
39. No-one reads a chapbook in a random order.  No-one notices if a jazz filled ipod is on randomise.
40. When a poet seduces a lover they don’t need Miles Davis only the tenderness of their own sweet lips.
41. Only 95% of modern poems are cliché ridden emo crap.
42. There are probably more good poems on jazz than good jazz albums.
43. Nobody got a Nobel prize for blowing their own air into a curly tube.
44. In some European countries jazz is pronounced jizz.  And for good reason.
45. A cat walking over piano keys was the best jazz solo I saw on You Tube last year.
46. On a desert island with my poetry book I’m all set.  After 8 hours you better have some mad Macgyver skill for that ipod.
47. Chaucer’s poems give us a social history of the 14th C.  Someone may have been tooting their horn “like the mad note” but if so he didn’t mention it.
48. Jazz groupies have vinyl to really feel the jazz.  Poet groupies have sex to really feel the poet.
49. When Honda know a car will be good they call it poetry, when they knew it would be boring, they called it the Jazz.
50. “That’s Poetry Man” is a well known compliment between jazz musicians.  Jazzy poems however are best avoided.