Factions and fashions …

… Poetry in Britain | New Writing | Granta Magazine. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)

Both the simplest of great poetry, our nursery rhymes, and the most dramatic, the language of Shakespeare, have delighted and nourished the populace, the millions, not just an elected, selected few. Of course, poetry must always find new ways to sing, must be fresh, must surprise, must take us by the heart with its song, its imagery, its syntax. But it can still be simple, grammatical, and speak plain English.