Resisting the authorial voice in a poem (10.20.19)

Recently I listened as a poet read her work at a poetry reading.  The setting was a book store, and specifically, it was near the one narrow set of shelves set aside for the store's poetry collection (mostly themed anthologies, heavy on Mary Oliver and Billy Collins, with a few volumes by people of color).  The hush was a little like church.

One of the poems the poet read to us was what you might call a "true life" poem.  It was lyrical, packed with emotion, deeply personal, relatively unadorned and direct.  It was determinedly unironic.  It was a poem about suffering survived and adversity overcome, about being true to oneself.

And I didn't believe a word of it.  

Before we go further, let me clarify something.  I am not a complete cynic.  That is, I am no more or less cynical than the next person about life or people or the role of government or religion or the value of literature or ideas of community, fairness, integrity, etc.  I get as misty eyed as the next moviegoer when the lovers finally admit their love and the villain acknowledges his humanity at last, even when it's obvious the screenwriter, music director, film director, editor and actor have conspired to bring that tear to my eye.  

When I say I didn't believe a word of it, "it" is not the poet who wrote the poem and who read to our little coterie of book store poetry devotees.  Nor is "it" the event described in the poem or the feeling that description was meant to express and evoke. 

What she read certainly sounded like a poem, or at least the reading of it sounded poetic, flowing, full of a heightened use of language.  And she read it well, with ample eye contact, sonority where sonority sounded right, rhythm, meaningful pauses, stresses, etc.

So what was it about the poem (or maybe the experience) that I didn't find credible?  It was the poem itself.  Or, to be more precise, it was the authorial voice of the poem--not the reader's voice or the reading of the moment, mind you--but the voice built into the poem as literary effect.

This got me to thinking about voice in poetry, what it is, how it works, why it is important.  Actually, thinking about it has only raised more questions . . .

• What is voice; what do we mean by it in relation to poetry?
• Do writers of poems actually "write in their own authentic voices"?
• What is authenticity of voice?
• Is voice "style" or vice versa?
• When we write, do we / should we write with one voice?  Is it wrong to mix voices?
• If we write using more than one voice, which one is "real" and "authentic" and to be believed?
• Is there an "American voice"?  A "Southern voice"?  A "Yankee voice"?  A voice of color?  

I could go on with the questions, but the first one above, I think, is the one most worth beginning with, though maybe a little further reflection and reading would be a good idea before taking up the question.  So, later, then.