It can take only a moment to realize that you are a poet. But learning your craft usually takes a lifetime.

To speed up that process, many young poets go the route of the modern-day literary apprenticeship – the Master of Fine Arts program, which traditionally focuses on three main areas: how to craft a poem, how to analyze one (and understand how it fits into the literary tradition), and how to read to an audience. Those skills are all crucial, but they aren’t enough – and I say that as an MFA-trained poet.

The one lesson writers often miss is how to function as an artist in the commercial world. Or, to put it another way, how to know the limits of your artistic license.

This license may not fit in your palm, but just as with a driver’s permit, you need to know how to get where you’re going without causing damage to yourself or others.

Take, for example, the case of Amiri Baraka, the embattled former poet laureate of New Jersey. I sincerely hope that no young poet will ever experience what he did.

As many people know, Baraka was named New Jersey’s poet laureate in July 2002, and he spend much of his time trying to keep his job. Baraka’s problems began after he appeared at the prestigious Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival in September 2002. There, he read a piece called “Somebody Blew Up the World,” about Sept 11, 2001. The poem contained this passage:

Who knew the World Trade Center was gonna get bombed
Who told 4000 Israeli workers at the Twin Towers
To stay home that day
Why did Sharon stay away?

Many people, understandably, objected to these lines, because they suggested that the Israelis knew about the attack and chose to stay silent, causing the deaths of thousands. Some poets hoped that Baraka would apologize to his critics.

But instead he defended his poem and his right to say whatever he felt was necessary for the sake of art. In October 2002 he told an audience in Newark that criticism from the Anti-Defamation League was “fundamentally an attempt to defame me. And with that, an attempt to repress and stigmatize independent
thinkers everywhere.”

For Baraka, the issue seemed to be about his First Amendment rights, therefore he never apologized or backed down from his position. After all, he was only doing what he considered to be one of the poet’s most important jobs – making people think.

For the governor of New Jersey, however, the issue was very clear-cut: Baraka was attracting national media coverage for all the wrong reasons. So Baraka had to go.

The final act in this tragedy – a head-on collision, really – played out this past summer, when the New Jersey legislature voted to end the poet laureate position.

So why should students outside of New Jersey care about this?

Because the position of poet laureate was lost not just for one person; it was lost for every writer who might have held the post in the future. And it was lost for the residents of New Jersey, who might have discovered the joys of poetry because of the state’s sanctioned bard. No doubt, Baraka paid dearly, too, whether you agree with his stance or not.

What I would hope is that young poets think about the responsibilities that go along with their licenses. There’s a difference between writing what you believe must be said, and knowing when not to read it. That’s especially true in a case like Baraka’s, where the state of New Jersey gave him an official platform.

Baraka may have felt he’d been given carte blanche because he had build his repuation as a “powerful and respected poet” – as The New York Times called him - by writing political poems. But in reality, he was entering into the contemporary version of the artist/sponsor relationship.

Now, I would never suggest that writers change their work to please an official, as some critics believe Shakespeare did when he portrayed Richard III as an extremely evil figure. I’m advocating the kind of sensitivity – or street smarts – that Elizabethan acting companies sometimes used. If they knew a play would offend their patrons, they wouldn’t perform it – at least not more than once. They knew that a certain savvy mindfulness was sometimes called for.

Billy Collins, who served two years as US poet laureate, also knows this. So when a reporter asks Collins a provocative question, he will laugh and say what he told me when I interviewed him for the Monitor last year: “Oh, you’re trying to get me in trouble.”

When Collins deftly skirts an issue, he isn’t just being politically astute. He’s also demonstrating how to successfully operate in the commercial world, where the No. 1 rule is “Don’t become a liability.” Learning how to promote artistic values in that arena is something that many MFA poets never learn in school. But it’s the lesson that may have the greatest impact on them – and their peers – in the future.

Let’s face it, most poets will not find permanent employment in the hallowed halls of academia, where their speech may be protected by tenure. Those who want to be advocates for poetry will need to work with the organizations that reach large numbers of people – the media and foundations that support poetry
events – and those groups operate the way businesses do. Knowing how to play the game gives you access to their audiences – and it allows you to redefine, somewhat, the realm of possibilities.

So does this mean that several new courses should be added to the MFA curriculum? No. What it does require is being aware of the larger world and thinking a bit more critically about the scope and limits of the poet’s role.

For example, during my MFA days, my peers and I argued bitterly about whether a poet should consider a reader’s needs and sensibilities when he or she was crafting a poem. Some of us believed it was the poet’s job to communicate, while others felt they were entitled to be as obscure or controversial as they wanted. To my ear, the latter sounds a bit like the argument Baraka made.

Both viewpoints may be valid in the realm of argument. But when you give a public reading, the whole equation changes. Theories mean nothing when your audience is staring back at you blankly or their faces are turning red with anger.

Young poets – and old – need to know that yes, their licenses give them incredible freedom. But if you don’t know how to use it, you and many others may end up stranded on the side of the road.