Poetry in modern literary culture emerged even before the First World War began. It was Virginia Wolf, an English novelist, who declared that the change came about on or before December 1910. The fervent desires of artists to break free from traditions were evident. They saw how traditional practices seemed no longer in keeping with the changes in the environment, especially with the breakthroughs of the technological era.

The innovations produced caused artists from all over the world to converge. This fermented new ideas that helped form movements that promoted cubist, constructivist, futurist, acmeist, and imagist cultures.

It was an era when artists desired to reinvent their art forms. They questioned old practices and tried to break free from them. The excitement lasted until 1914, the year when the First World War broke out.

The event tore families apart, forced men to fight in the war, and destroyed many lands. Many artists in Europe found themselves profoundly disillusioned by the values the whole of civilization was founded upon. As the war continued, modernism was also established.

American poets were the most instrumental artists that effected modernism. Here are some of them and how they made poetry in a modern era.

Ezra Pound: Ezra Pound was the most aggressively modern poet. He embraced nontraditional sources of inspiration.

T.S. Eliot: T.S. Eliot wrote the most famous poem of the 20th century – The Waste Land. He used revolutionary techniques, such as collage, to finish it. Like Pound, Eliot turned to nontraditional sources of inspiration. He embraced ironic poems from the 19th century.

Jules Laforgue H.D.: This French symbolist poet followed Pound to Europe. Here, he wrote poems that embodied his famous doctrine of imagism.

Wallace Stevens: Wallace Stevens was an American poet with the flair for flashy titles. Some of the poems he wrote were Peter Quince at the Clavier and Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird.

Marianne Moore: Marianne Moore was a brilliant poet who used quotations in her poetry. Her practice proved her attention to poetic imagery.

William Carlos Williams: William Carlos Williams wrote witty poems, presented in common objects and events. He provides freshness and immediacy in his poems that helped readers understand its subject matter.

Robert Frost: Robert Frost, even with his use of traditional devices such as sonnets, blank verse and rhyme, was a genius in American vernacular. His style was marked as peculiar with his cruel natural universe. Sometimes, people took him as a genial Yankee sage.

Hart Crane: Hart Crane was one of the most notable poets. His poem The Bridge symbolized the new world. It was also a metaphor that allowed him to cross into different periods.

Characteristics of Modern Poetry: Poetry in modern literary culture uses nontraditional practices. It can be characterized as the following:

It is prepared in open form.

It can be free verse.

It is a discontinuous narrative.

It shows juxtaposition.

It shows intertextuality.

It uses classical allusions.

It borrows from other cultures and languages.

It has an unconventional use of metaphor.

It is meta-narrative.

It uses fragmentation.

The rise of modernism encouraged poets to embrace new sources of inspiration. It made way for great poetry that takes on modern society.