Japan is quite weird because they wait for you to say something before they respond. You can literally hear a pin drop, they don't make a sound until you say something to the crowd.
So, poetry becomes a means for useful dialogue between people who are not only unknown, but mute to each other. It produces a dialogue among people that guards all of us against manipulation by our so-called leaders.
God ceases to be God only for those who can admit the possibility of His non-existence, and that conception is in itself the most severe punishment they can suffer.