Jeremy C Kester

An Essay? Or a Poem?

What makes a poem? Or an essay? Is what I write here, with words and fractional sentences —

An essay?

A poem?

What is it exactly that defines whatever it is a person writes? This could simply be a story after all, with a character speaking into the void, or talking to a loved one at said loved one’s grave. Use your imagination. Anything can be whatever it is, like picking an avatar to play in a video game. That is the world we live in now.

Definitions exist within lines. Well defined. Explicit. Implicit. Not randomness, but rather something solid. That we can wrap our minds around.

So is this a poem? Or can I get away with calling it an essay instead? Both are simply collections of words, strung together to mark down some idea.

An image.

Maybe the emotions spurred by the image of an idea.

I question this idea of what makes a poem a poem often. Stanzas could be equal to paragraphs, given it is a piece of an idea wrapped in a pretty bow of however many lines I decide.

And what of the lines within? What makes this a sentence in an essay versus a line in a poem? Maybe the broken— lines— dashed, incomplete ideas. Or funny punctuation to tell you something else will come after,

Whereas an essay should be complete. Perhaps; perhaps not.

People cry foul all the time when something doesn’t quite fit the idea or ideal they hold in their minds of what one thing should be versus another. These arguments persist even in the material world, where one can show sufficient evidence to better say one thing is this and not that. Art… those lines blur swiftly.

Things are appreciated when they fit nicely into a box. Even as our culture appears insane with the ever expanding list of new, unique things, they each must fit into some box which can be neatly closed. Basically, some ideas will fit, and other ideas are to be dashed aside. Refused. Callous actions to whatever it may be.

What happens when something might fit well in 3 out of 4 guardrails, to change the metaphor; things can get squirrelly.

I always tend to love the ideas of things breaking the rules, not always because, hey, fuck the rules, but also out of an appreciation for their existence. Begrudging the existence and insistence of editors, for instance

They were created for a reason

Whether we know it or not.

I like purposeful, honest rule breaking. To challenge not only myself, but maybe others, too. With so much of art being nebulous, all with clear lines one must not cross, I simply ask the question. What makes a poem a poem and an essay an essay might simply be only the mere claim of which is which. If I call this a poem, then what is to claim it otherwise?

“Except the deceit in how I subtitled this very word salad an essay,” I said to the gravestones of my deceased cats.

Just kidding, they don’t have gravestones.

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Photo and words copyright © 2025 by Jeremy C Kester – all rights reserved.

Note: this is also cross-posted to Poetically Unlicensed on Substack.