Who Buys Poetry?

This is a painting of The Reader by Fragonard. How nice for her. No American Horror Story episodes to keep on top of.

This pretty lady may have been a poetry buyer circa 1732 to 1806, but I would almost bet my last franc she wasn't a poet. Because I don't know who buys books of poetry now, but it ain't poets. I've been to twenty years of poetry readings and the little stack of books the poet puts out never sells. I've even asked my poet friends at these readings, "Are you gonna buy the book?" Even if they loved the poems, they usually say, "No, I'm broke and the book is 15 bucks. I'll find it at the library or buy it used on Amazon."

And the truth is my poet friends are broke. But if the people writing poetry and wishing to publish poetry to sell aren't buying it (and we pretty much know no one else is buying it), we're all in trouble. Big trouble.

Imagine a broke musician saying that. You can't, because the don't. People in broke bands still have huge record collections in their dumpy apartments. Because the force of their mad love of their art form compels them to keep buying albums they love, even if they have to go without dinner, even if they have to eat at Dennys. That's why they're all so skinny.

Poets used to be skinny.