In its truest manifestation, where it gives judgments, poetry is

“In its truest manifestation, where it gives judgments, poetry is super-luxury. It would be interesting to see what would happen to a High Court judge if he were forced to follow the true poetic formula, doing the job for love, being forced into pubs for relief.” Thus spoke Patrick Kavanagh, the Irish farmer-poet, whose verses carried both the smell of the soil and the weight of eternity. In these words, he strips poetry of romantic illusions and reveals its paradox: though poetry may offer the deepest truths and judgments on life, it often demands poverty and obscurity from those who create it.

The meaning of this saying lies in the contrast between poetry and professions of power. A High Court judge, cloaked in authority, is well-paid, respected, and protected by the dignity of his office. His judgments shape law and society. But the poet, too, gives judgments—judgments not of legality, but of truth, beauty, and the human condition. Yet unlike the judge, the poet must do this for love alone, without security, often in hardship, sustained only by inner necessity. Kavanagh wryly notes that this makes poetry a kind of “super-luxury”—something pursued not for survival, but for passion so fierce that one endures suffering for its sake.

The origin of Kavanagh’s reflection is his own life. Born in rural Monaghan, he worked as a laborer before turning to verse. He knew hunger, ridicule, and poverty. For him, poetry was not a profession that rewarded, but a vocation that demanded. He frequented Dublin’s pubs not as a gentleman of leisure, but as one seeking relief from the burden of poverty and the isolation of his calling. His bitter humor is born of lived truth: poets are forced to bear the cost of offering judgments on life without the worldly rewards given to judges of law.

Consider also the story of François Villon, the French poet of the fifteenth century. His verses judged society with biting wit, exposing hypocrisy and injustice. Yet while judges sat on benches clothed in robes, Villon wandered the streets, impoverished, even imprisoned, writing lines that still endure today. His judgments, though ignored by authority, carried the greater weight of truth, for they sprang from life itself. Villon, like Kavanagh, shows that the poet’s formula is indeed to labor for love and endure hardship in exchange for revelation.

The lesson here is not despair, but courage. Kavanagh’s words remind us that poetry—and all true art—cannot be pursued for wealth or status. It is born of love, of necessity, of the compulsion to speak truth even when no one listens. To embrace such a calling is to accept hardship, but also to embrace freedom, for the poet is beholden to no patron, no political system, no public opinion. His only master is truth itself. In this sense, though poor, the poet is richer than kings.

Practically, this teaching calls us to examine our motives. If we write, create, or labor for recognition or comfort alone, our work will falter when hardship comes. But if we do it for love—if the act itself sustains us—then we can endure even when the world withholds its rewards. The poet’s path is not only for poets; it is for anyone who chooses vocation over convenience, truth over ease.

Thus the teaching endures: the poet is a judge of the human spirit, but unlike worldly judges, he is paid not in gold but in vision, not in salary but in song. His labor is a “super-luxury,” for it is pursued for love, even at the cost of suffering. Kavanagh speaks with both irony and reverence, teaching us that though poetry may drive its makers to the pubs for relief, it also gives to the world judgments more enduring than any courtroom decree. Let us then honor the poet’s formula, and in our own lives, strive to do what we love for love’s sake, even if the price is heavy—for the reward is truth itself.