Poetry with Profanity

Recently, I’ve been writing a lot of poetry. It might be partially because I’m in a studies in poetry class and I write a lot during said class because it’s so hard for me to pay attention. It might be partially because reading poetry makes me want to write it. But it also might be because I’m just feeling particularly poetic lately.

Whatever.

I don’t write poetry like you’re “supposed” to. I have no rhyme scheme, no sensible line breaks, no particular form or shape. I suppose you could call my poetry “free verse” if you really wanted to label it, but I feel like even that’s a bit too specific. My poetry is all over the place, and by most accounts, it’s not very good. It’s barely poetry. It’s basically prose with certain words omitted and lots of

paragraphs

wherever I feel like

putting

them.

Also, my poetry isn’t something you could read. It kind of has to be performed, which is why I’ve started calling myself a “slam poet”. I feel like a giant douche calling myself that, but it’s the closest I’ve come to defining my style, because my public speaking and performance experience has started heavily bleeding into my writing.

But the other thing I’ve noticed is that I can’t seem to write poetry without swearing. In the last four poems I’ve written, I’ve used the “f” word at least twice in each. It’s not that I’m trying to write poetry that I can never post on YouTube because it would offend too many people, it’s just that that’s what comes out! When I write, especially when I write poetry, I have to get it all out in one sitting, otherwise I’ll lose my train of thought and it’ll never get finished. Maybe I’ll go back and edit it later, maybe I won’t. But for some reason, profanity flows from my fingers as quickly and as easily as self-indulgent blogs.

So here’s my big question: If I were to record myself performing my poetry (which I think is pretty good, despite all it’s strangeness and set-backs), would you be overly offended if I swore once or twice? I promise it’s not every other word- in general, I only swear two or three times per. I guess I could censor myself, but I’ve never understood censoring language, because oftentimes the sentiment is then lost. I’m a strong believer in the use of profanity in literature, because sometimes that’s the only way to honestly express something.

Thoughts?