Response to Shell Fisher

Can Flarf ever be taken seriously?

I read and re-read the article, loved the picture at the top featuring our incredible and becoming instructor K Silem Mohammad (which I don't think I will ever spell incorrectly again) and have drawn a few conclusions:

As far as Flarf being taken seriously, well the definition of seriously has to be examined. Is Flarf serious, if Flarf poetry was a person would it work in marketing for bloomingdales and wear a suit and tie, probably not. I think of the Flarf poetry, especially google and internet searching for funny word phrases, as a readership gone right. Though it is not my personal cup of tea, you have to respect any poetic movement that has gained so much steam over the past few years. If an email readership amongst friends has grown into books and readings upon books and readings, in bigger anthologies and venues over the years, then we should be able to accept flarf as viable. Douglas Rothchild reminds me of an old film critic that says "this rubbish isn't cinema...Citizen Kane is cinema" in response to watching the boxoffice hit Johnny Knoxville movie "The Ringer". Though the script and story may not be as in depth and intricate, nor the acting as polished, both are technically films, shot with cameras and starring people, and whether something meets any persons personal standards or not does not detract from the art's personal merit. Flarf poetry, and The Ringer for that matter keeping along with the analogy, does not want to fit into the traditional canon. The traditional canon is boring, outdated, uninspired, and didn't have internet access. I think Flarfists would chuckle at the idea of being taken seriously, ironic though that "flarfists" is an accepted word and doesn't have a red squiggly. Look at the title of the movement "flarf" look at the way flarfists dress, or conduct themselves, or, and God forbid, what they write about and you will see that being taken seriously is not their intention. However, whether you take them seriously or take them as a set of poetic anarchists who's main goal is to destroy poetry and create a neo-linguistic society where incoherent utterances are our only form of communication, they are here and weird, get used to it.