How does poetry act in the world?

An editorial: What W. B. Yeats’s ‘Second Coming’ Really Says About the Iraq War (NYTimes.com link -- free registration may be required.)

Shelley confronts the problem of how poetry acts can act politically in the world. This editorial from yesterday's New York Times offers one answer to this problem. We'll be tackling "The Second Coming" later this semester, but it might be worth looking through the Times's argument now (before the editorial moves behind a subscription wall) to think about the way poetry interacts with politics.