My Favorite of Shakespeare's Sonnets . . .

(This is the last of the scheduled Poetry Project posts)

I've posted this poem before (on last year's anniversary)

 and my interpretation is a bit different than most I've read.

Others speak of deceit between lovers to facilitate gain - of love or comfort.

But I see the truth that exists only in the eyes of the loved one.

When I look into the eyes of my husband of twenty three years, I see beauty, strength, and passion. 
Together we are young and full of life. 

A lie? Perhaps. But deceit? never.

Thank you, William.

When my love swears that she is made of truth,
I do believe her though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutored youth,
Unlearned in the world's false subtleties.
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young,
Although she knows my days are past the best,
Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue:
On both sides thus is simple truth suppressed:
But wherefore says she not she is unjust?
And wherefore say not I that I am old?
O! love's best habit is in seeming trust,
And age in love, loves not to have years told:
   Therefore I lie with her, and she with me,
   And in our faults by lies we flattered be.

The Lists That Started It All . . .

Way back in December of 2011 Kailana of The Written World had a crazy idea. It was originally called Read more: Blog More, but soon morphed into The Poetry Project. The intent was to encourage bloggers to read more poetry and then write about it.

In her initial post she offered two lists of poems. (a total of 131 poems) The Poetry Project challenge set for this month, is to revisit those lists. Seeing as my blog is ostensibly poetry, I decided to read, or reread all the poems on her lists for the challenge.

                   Don't laugh. I am not crazy! (My mom had me tested.) 

Many of the poems on her lists have already been featured here at The Hearth, and those which haven't soon will be . . . (as long as I can get a hold of them.) After posting for a few years, falling back on old favorites becomes too easy, and I am always looking for new inspiration.

I have reproduced her lists here and charted my progress (or lack thereof). Those I have read (or reread) by today are crossed out, while those I was unable to read for any reason remain as a continuing challenge.

As you can see, except for two that I was unable to find, I demolished the first list. (Yes, I know it's the short one.) For one reason and another, I've only dented the second list. I hope you won't think less of me. I'll repost when I actually complete the challenge. I promise.

As I find and read (With seven shelves of poetry books and anthologies, the odds are in my favor.) the poems I have not yet posted, I will put them up for you to enjoy as well. This challenge has, unfortunately, forced me to purchase more books of poetry. The sacrifices I willingly make for you, my loyal reader.

Jason's List of A Month's Worth of Poems:

1 - Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti
2 - Renascence by Edna St. Vincent Millay
3 - The Changeling by Charlotte Mew
4 - The Waste Land by T S Eliot
5 - If Not, Winter by Sappho (Haven't been able to get a hold of this one yet)
6 - Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth Barret Browning
7 - Daddy by Sylvia Plath
8 - The Second Coming by William Butler Years
9 - Poems for Akhmatova by Marina Tsvetaeva (Haven't found this one either)
10 - Orchard by H.D.
11 - Resume by Dorothy Parker
12 - The Lady of Shallot by Alfred Lord Tennyson
13 - To make a prairie by Emily Dickinson
14 - The Poison Tree by William Blake
15 - Batter My Heart (Holy Sonnet XIV) by John Donne
16 - High waving heather, 'neath stormy blasts bending by Emily Bronte
17 - For the Courtesan Ch'ing Lin by Wu Tsao
18 - The Wanderer by Anonymous
19 - Cinderella by Anne Sexton
20 - I Sing the Body Electric by Walt Whitman
21 - The Touch by Renee Vivien
22 - Advertisement for the Waldorf-Astoria by Langston Hughes
23 - Ozymandias by Percy Bryce Shelley
24 - As Kingfishers Catch Fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins
25 - A Ballad Maker by Padraic Colum
26 - There was a man of double deed by Anonymous
27 - Lunar Eclipse by Mai Yao-ch'en
28 - Donal Og by Lady Gregory
29 - Muse by Anna Akhmatova
30 - Sonnet #147 (My love is a fever) by William Shakespeare
31 - To One Hated by Lucy Maud Montgomery

Lu's List of 100 Poems:

1. “Please” by Yusef Komunyakaa
2. “At the Screen Door” by Yusef Komunyakaa
3. “The Sea is History” by Derek Walcott
4. “Cottonmouth Country” by Louise Glück
5. “All Hallows” by Louise Glück
6. “October (Section 1)” by Louise Glück
7. “At the Fishhouses” by Elizabeth Bishop
8. “First Death in Nova Scotia” by Elizabeth Bishop
9. “The Bat” by Claudia Emerson
10. “Daybook” by Claudia Emerson
11. “The Bat” by Ellen Bryant Voigt
12. “Tropics” by Ellen Bryant Voigt
13. “The Morning Again It Was In the Dusty Pines” by Mary Oliver
14. “The Kingfisher” by Mary Oliver
15. “Electrical Storm” by Mary Oliver
16. “Separation” by W. S. Merwin
17. “What the Body Told” by Rafael Campo
18. “Cultural Stakes: or, How to Learn English as a Second Language” by Kevin A. González
19. “To You” by Kevin A. González
20. “Hanging Fire” by Audre Lorde
21. “Never to Dream of Spiders” by Audre Lorde
22. “Dirge Without Music” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
23. “Hearing your words, and not a word among them” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
24. “Inland” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
25. “The Afterbirth, 1931” by Nikky Finney
26. “Aubade” by Philip Larkin
27. “I Have Started to Say” by Philip Larkin
28. “Flying at Night” by Ted Kooser
29. “Porch Swing in September” by Ted Kooser
30. “Daddy Long Legs” by Ted Kooser
31. “Artichoke” by Joseph Hutchinson
32. “Something About the Trees” by Linda Pastan
33. “Lines” by Ruth Stone
34. “Prayer for Sleep” by Cheryl Dumesnil
35. “Of the Parrat and other birds that can speake” by Nick Lantz
36. “i have found what you are like” by e. e. cummings
37. “the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls” by e. e. cummings
38. “i carry your heart with me(i carry it in” by e. e. cummings
39. “Grief Calls Us to the Things of This World” by Sherman Alexie
40. “How to Write the Great American Indian Novel” by Sherman Alexie
41. “Crow Song” by Margaret Atwood
42. “I Was Sleeping Where the Black Oaks Move” by Louise Erdrich
43. “Speaking of the Devil” by Leslie Adrienne Miller
44. “Cherries” by Leslie Adrienne Miller
45. “Blood” by Naomi Shihab Nye
46. “Last August Hours Before the Year 2000” by Naomi Shihab Nye
47. “Making a Fist” by Naomi Shihab Nye
48. “Hir” performed by Alysia Harris and Aysha El Shamayleh http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/07/01/748654/-Brave-New-Voices
49. “Pesto in August” by Katrina Vendenberg
50. “Op-Talk” by Rives (spoken word)
51. “Glaucoma” by Rives (spoken word)
52. “I Could Be A Poet” by Taylor Mali (spoken word)
53. “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens
54. “To My Lover, Concerning the Yird-Swine” by Julianna Baggott (This poem is not online. I will feature it in Poetry Wednesday one day.)
55. “When At A Certain Party in NYC” by Erin Belieu
56. “Here and There” by Billy Collins
57. “Fishing on the Susquehanna in July” by Billy Collins
58. “There’s Been A Death in the Opposite House” by Emily Dickinson
59. “Natural Wonder” by Diane Ackerman
60. “Buckroe, After the Season, 1942” by Virginia Hamilton Adair
61. “Louisiana Line” by Betty Adcock
62. “Language of Love” by Rae Armantrout
63. “Dusk” by Rae Armantrout
64. “Mothers” by Nikki Giovanni
65. “Poem for a Lady Whose Voice I Like” by Nikki Giovanni
66. “Entrance into wood” by Pablo Neruda
67. “Love for this Book” by Pablo Neruda
68. “The Lark” by Gabriela Mistral
69. “Lost in the Hospital” by Rafael Campo
70. “Firefly Under the Tongue” by Coral Bracho
71. “Boy Breaking Glass” by Gwendolyn Brooks
72. “This Corner of the Western World” by Jennifer Chang
73. “Bankruptcy Hearing” by Dana Bisignani
74. “Requiem for a Nest” by Wanda Coleman
75. “sweet reader, flannelled and tulled” by Olena Kalytiak Davis
76. “Weighing In” by Rhina P. Espaillat
77. “Bilingual/Bilingüe” by Rhina P. Espaillat
78. “The Sign in My Father’s Hands” by Martín Espada
79. “Kaddish” by Allen Ginsberg
80. “After Fifty Years” by William Faulkner
81. “Ways of Talking” by Ha Jin
82. “Chernobyl Year” by Jehanne Dubrow
83. “Visiting My Gravesite: Talbott Churchyard, West Virginia” by Irene McKinney
84. “Our Lady of Perpetual Loss” by Deborah A. Miranda
85. “Love Poem to a Butch Woman” by Deborah A. Miranda
86. “Out of the rolling ocean the crowd” by Walt Whitman
87. “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” by Walt Whitman
88. “Sometimes with One I Love” by Walt Whitman
89. “Clarinet” by Terrance Hayes
90. “Planetarium” by Adrienne Rich
91. “What Kind of Times Are These” by Adrienne Rich
92. “Genesis: The Resilient Colors” by Roberto Tejada
93. “As from a Quiver of Arrows” by Carl Phillips
94. “This Can’t Be” by Bruce Smith
95. “A Certain Kind of Eden” by Kay Ryan
96. “Paired Things” by Kay Ryan
97. “Flounder” by Natasha Trethewey
98. “Pilgrimage” by Natasha Trethewey
99. “Providence” by Natasha Trethewey
100. “Blackberrying” by Sylvia Plath

"I took a deep breath and listened to the old bray of my heart. I am. I am. I am."

Those words, of course, come to us from Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar. It was the prompts for the Poetry Project this month that brought these words to my mind. Don't ask me why. The connections in there are mysterious and elusive.

This month the Project asks us to consider:

What would have made me appreciate poetry more when I was younger? 

                                 & 

How would I raise a poetry reader?

When I was young, I looooooooved reading. But I didn't discover poetry until middle school. Even then, I didn't care for most of what we studied in school. (Some of it I still don't care for, and I think it may be specifically because I did study it in school.) 

We studied 'classic' poetry and were told how wonderful it was. It goes without saying that we were expected to love it whether we understood it or not, and most of us didn't. (understand it or love it)  We were told the exact meaning of each piece. (no room for interpretation) Each reading was for a specific purpose. (never for pleasure) And we were never made aware that there were many more choices either: poets, poems, subjects, styles . . .

As my middle school days were winding down, an English teacher encouraged me to write poetry. In doing this she changed poetry from something that was outside of myself and distant, to something that flourished on the inside. I never looked back.

I raised three avid readers; but although I love poetry and am constantly on the hunt for new (to me) poets and their offerings, none of my spawn really care much for poetry. 

What can I say? I tried my best. 

Ours was a house full of books, where reading was just what everyone did. I never had to force my kids to read. Because they saw it all the time, they internalized that it was just a normal part of life. For two of them, this was in spite of learning disabilities. (all bragging aside) 

We read together. I found as much 'child friendly poetry as I could for them, and I shared the pieces that moved or amused me. I also encourage them to explore their own creativity. All to no avail. As much as they all love reading, they're just not into poetry.

 
So, to recap ... While raising my own children, I avoided all the things that I believed turned me away from poetry when I was young so that I could encourage the love of poetry in them. 

And I found . . . that it made no difference. 

My highly scientific conclusion is that although we can foster an openness to great writing, we can't foment a love for any particular genre, writer, or piece. 

However, every bit of imagination and creativity that we feed our children nurtures their very being. When we plant such seeds, the gardens that grow can't help but be wondrous! 

  




Eric G. Wilson has some ideas on fostering the love of poetry in young people in Poetry Makes You Weird. He shares with his students what the poetry says to him, how it has opened his eyes.

But I now no longer unleash the literary giants. I simply tell my disgruntled students about the first time I read, as an undergraduate, these lines:

There's a certain Slant of light,

Winter Afternoons—

That oppresses, like the Heft

Of Cathedral Tunes—

I had often witnessed beams of dull December light with a melancholy I didn't understand. Dickinson's flash clarified my feelings: In the impoverished glow of the cold time were heavy reminders of brightness I desired but couldn't possess. But this affliction had fever, intimations of future heat that was luminous, like hymns.

Dickinson's verse spelled out the abstruse, made the strange familiar. In this new intimacy, however, was a novel astonishment: The chilly light from that day onward exposed the enigmas of longing, both tormenting and radiant. Her poetry left me amazed—caught in wonderment as well as labyrinth.

And that brings us back around to Sylvia Plath:  

"I took a deep breath and listened to the old bray of my heart. I am. I am. I am."

This Month's Poetry Project Prompt (See What I Did There) is Poetry Published Within the Past Year.

This year I decided to start reading more poetry periodicals. (the alliteration just keeps on coming) That means lots and lots of new poetry. I subscribe to a few and I found a couple at the local B&N. (Unfortunately, they're about the only place near me where you can find anything other than gun, guitar, and girly magazines)

I like the idea of supporting emergent poets as well as veterans, and poetry journals publish some of the best new poetry out there. Some journals publish both print and online versions, while others only publish online. Like everyone else these days, they're struggling and, sadly, more than a few have lost that struggle. Which is why it's more important than ever to support our favorites.

Some journals contain wonderful articles about writing and spotlight poets regularly. Others contain short stories, artwork, and book reviews. There is sure to be something out there for everyone.

Another benefit of subscribing to poetry journals (if you are absent minded like me) is the little surprises that show up in the mail periodically. Here are a few I enjoy:

                           Ampersand Review, The National Poetry Review, & Rosebud     

And . . . two I already reviewed:
                                                Modern Haiku, & Acorn     

This is from: Frogpond Journal:

shades of winter
my mother in the passage
between dreams

Lorin Ford
    Melbourne, Australia

 
Also . . . of possible interest:


Ms. blog posted a list detailing their choices for 2012's Best Poetry by Women. Sadly, I haven't read any of them yet. But I do intend to change that situation.

. . . & . . .

The Small Press Distribution website lists bestselling contemporary poetry.

February* is Known As the Most Depessing of Months, So I Guess it's the Right Month for This Topic.

Love and heartbreak are topics addressed by nearly every poet who ever drew breath, in some way or another, at some point in her writing career. For some, they are the only topics ever broached. (I'm talking to you, Romantic poets.)

But what of hate? Who writes of hatred? (aside from mournful, petulant adolescents, that is) And why might someone write of hatred when there are so many more palatable subjects to cover?

Let's be honest. Sometimes it just feels right. Like the action hero who gets the bad guy by contravening every one of his constitutional, civil, and human rights (and beating him to a bloody pulp). We don't really want it to happen, but damn, it feels good to vent. It gives us a way (venting, not beating) to deal with the frustrations we encounter in our own daily lives and our worries about the future.

In that spirit, I offer James Stephens' take on the subject.

Hate

My enemy came nigh,
And I
Stared fiercely in his face.
My lips went writhing back in a grimace,
And stern I watched him with a narrow eye.
Then, as I turned away, my enemy,
That bitter heart and savage, said to me:
"Some day, when this is past,
When all the arrows that we have are cast,
We may ask one another why we hate,
And fail to find a story to relate.
It may seem then to us a mystery
That we should hate each other."

Thus said he,
And did not turn away,
Waiting to hear what I might have to say,
But I fled quickly, fearing had I stayed
I might have kissed him as I would a maid.


*So is every other month. It just depends upon the source!

Let's Talk About Christina Rossetti

Many people know her better than I. Who am I kidding? Everyone knows her better than I. We studied her at Jr. College. We studied her at University. But in all honesty, I don't know her very well at all. I was resistant and kind of shut down when we studied her.

You see, all my professors had the same perspective. They fawned over her religious verse, her lyrical piety. Me? Not so much. The only poem of hers I ever really knew was - surprise! surprise! - Goblin Market.

As you might imagine, this month's prompt left me a bit cold. How could possibly I write about a poet I didn't even like? What to do? What to do?

What I did was pick up my anthology, settle in with a cup of tea, and read Christina Rossetti. Surprise! I found some things I liked. In fact, I found quite a lot I liked. I recognized a sensitivity and connection to nature that I'd overlooked before, an obvious love of language, and a broad emotional range I had completely missed.

It's amazing how much state of mind can affect our interpretations. I didn't expect to see anything I liked before, so I didn't.  But when I opened my mind her gifts seemed to multiply. I'm still not enamored with all her writing, but I found much to enjoy. And even those pieces that fail to thrill me still have much to teach me.

I've chosen three poems that I enjoyed, to share with you. The images are fairly simple, but with each succeeding poem the underlying themes are more complex.

If it hadn't been for the Poetry Project I would never have given Christina Rossetti a second chance, and I'm very grateful that I did.


Clouds

White sheep, white sheep,
On a blue hill,
When the wind stops,
You all stand still.
When the wind blows,
You walk away slow.
White sheep, white sheep,
Where do you go?

Who Has Seen the Wind?

Who has seen the wind?
Neither I nor you.
But when the leaves hang trembling,
The wind is passing through.
Who has seen the wind?
Neither you nor I.
But when the trees bow down their heads,
The wind is passing by.


A Birthday

My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a water'd shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart is gladder than all these,
Because my love is come to me.

Raise me a daïs of silk and down;
Hang it with vair and purple dyes;
Carve it in doves and pomegranates,
And peacocks with a hundred eyes;
Work it in gold and silver grapes,
In leaves and silver fleurs-de-lys;
Because the birthday of my life
Is come, my love is come to me.

Time to Take Stock

Lu at Regular Rumination gave us a few questions about The Poetry Project to consider.



1). What has been the most rewarding aspect of The Poetry Project so far?

This one is easy for me. The greatest reward of participating in the Poetry Project has been in becoming acquainted with all the other wonderful bloggers who have contributed as well. They've given me encouragement and inspiration, and I continue to grow and learn.

2). What is your favorite post from a fellow Poetry Project participant this year?

I'd have to say Lu's "How to Love a Poem." There have been books and articles galore written about writing poetry and analyzing poetry, but not much in the way of just plain loving it. Being that so many folks, even avid readers, say they dislike poetry, I think this is a wonderful thing. We need much more in this vein.

3). What is your favorite poem that you have read because of The Poetry Project?
I have a new current favorite, courtesy of Jeanne at Necromancy never pays. (which I have dutifully stolen)

Perhaps the World Ends Here
 - Joy Harjo

The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it.

It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

4). What are some poetry-related goals you’d like to set for the coming year?

My goals for last year were to write and edit more of my own poetry, and I have done so. But what I haven't done is research markets and submit. I never seem to find time. I'd hazard a guess that I am entertaining a bit of denial. Soooooooo . . . That would be my goal for the new year.

5). Do you have any suggestions for The Poetry Project in 2013? What would you like to see happen?

I like the structure now. There is support whether you are a free spirit or like a little extra inspiration. Because of the loose structure the contributions are wide ranging and offer so many wonderful surprises.

6). Share with us one line of poetry that you think we need to read.

I guess it's a sign of my age. For the longest time, I never really cared for J. Alfred Prufrock, but it seems to be growing on me. I grow old . . . I grow old . . . / I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.   

7). Is there a new poet that you have discovered through The Poetry Project?

There are many. Nancy Cudis over at Simple Clockwork has opened my eyes to some gifted poets that I'm saving my pennies to get a hold of, (I'm going to need a lot of pennies) Jaime An Lim being one, Cebuano poet E. Gadiana Cabras, for another. I believe each and every contributor to the Poetry Project has introduced me to a poet I've never read or a poem I've overlooked.

8). Anything else you would like to share?
I'm just grateful to everyone who has contributed to the Poetry Project. Some are self assured and courageous while others are timid and unsure, but all are wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

A Bit of a Reflection . . .

Let's talk poetry for a minute shall we - not in depth analysis, or relative merits, just poetry in general.

I love poetry. I have at least a shelf of anthologies (yay university), many of them chock full of the stuff. They join the several other shelves (and growing) of poetry already gracing my home.

So, you ask, "Is that a problem?"

Well, on the one hand I have a lot of poetry, but on the other hand, it's not nearly enough.

Hi. My name's Snowball, and I'm a poetry addict.

It fills so many spaces in my life (and my home) that I can't imagine living without it.

Fiction can transport me to different worlds, help me to escape and forget my own problems, if only for a time. Non-fiction can educate me, fill me with rage, fire my compassion, and compel me to action. It pulls me out of myself and into the world.

With poetry on the other hand, the movement is inward, toward my feelings. It helps me to connect with them, make sense of them, and deal with them.  Even though I share the enjoyment of poetry with many others, at its core it's a very private experience.

Poetry gives voice to things I didn't even know I wanted to say, and taps a deep, deep spring, allowing what is inside of me to flow out. Yes, I know that sounds pretentious and, seriously, I don't know how to talk about the way poetry touches me without sounding a bit demented. But it does, you know, touch me deeply.

Don't get me wrong. I don't like every poem I read. Some poetry just leaves me cold. But there is so much beautiful writing, from gifted poets, that I don't need to dwell on those I dislike.

How does poetry touch your life?

Now, how about a poem? This one speaks to the power of the unseen, whether absent or nonexistent.

On the Subject of Poetry

- W.S. Merwin

I do not understand the world, Father.
By the millpond at the end of the garden
There is a man who slouches listening
To the wheel revolving in the stream, only
There is no wheel there to revolve.

He sits in the end of March, but he sits also
In the end of the garden; his hands are in
His pockets. It is not expectation
On which he is intent, nor yesterday
To which he listens. It is a wheel turning.

When I speak, Father, it is the world
That I must mention. He does not move
His feet nor so much as raise his head
For fear he should disturb the sound he hears
Like a pain without a cry, where he listens.

I do not think I am fond, Father,
Of the way in which always before he listens
He prepares himself by listening. It is
Unequal, Father, like the reason
For which the wheel turns, though there is no wheel.

I speak of him, Father, because he is
There with his hands in his pockets, in the end
Of the garden listening to the turning
Wheel that is not there, but it is the world,
Father, that I do not understand

from: The First Four Books of Poems. Copyright 2000.

Lest We Forget

Has there been a generation in recent memory to grow up without war, (or police action) its build up, or aftermath? Perhaps one day we can answer that question with a resounding Yes!

But until that time, let us remember all those who answered the call of service . . .                        

For the Fallen
- Laurence Binyon

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children, 
England mourns for her dead across the sea. 
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit, 
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal 
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres. 
There is a music in the midst of desolation 
And a glory that shines upon our tears. 

They went with songs to the battle, they were young, 
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow. 
They were staunch to the end against odds uncountered: 
They fell with their faces to the foe. 

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn. 
At the going down of the sun and in the morning 
We will remember them. 

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again; 
They sit no more at familiar tables at home; 
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time; 
They sleep beyond England's foam. 

But where our desires are and our hopes profound, 
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight, 
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known 
As the stars are known to the Night; 

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust, 
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain; 
As the stars are starry in the time of our darkness, 
To the end, to the end they remain. 

First published in 1914.

Aren't We All Haunted . . .

No. No. No. Hear me out.

Haven't you ever walked into an old house and just felt the history, felt the presence of the people who lived there before? Haven't you ever touched an antique in a store, with its wear and scars, and sensed the hands that used it, sensed the lives lived in its presence?

My old house is full of antiques (some precious, most not) and on a lonely evening I can stand in my living room and smile because I am never really alone. Our little house is a crowded house, filled with many old friends. If you listen closely, you can hear their footsteps upstairs or in the next room.

We share space with other people from other times, and our lives are blessed. The graceful china cabinet with the curved glass, the well used old pine library table, the creaky straight back rocker, the beautiful pieces of china picked up here and there, all bring their own spirits. It makes for a full house.

                         How about some poetry:

Haunted Houses
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors.

We meet them at the door-way, on the stair,
Along the passages they come and go,
Impalpable impressions on the air,
A sense of something moving to and fro.

There are more guests at table than the hosts
Invited; the illuminated hall
Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts,
As silent as the pictures on the wall.

The stranger at my fireside cannot see
The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear;
He but perceives what is; while unto me
All that has been is visible and clear.

We have no title-deeds to house or lands;
Owners and occupants of earlier dates
From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands,
And hold in mortmain still their old estates.

The spirit-world around this world of sense
Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere
Wafts through these earthly mists and vapours dense
A vital breath of more ethereal air.

Our little lives are kept in equipoise
By opposite attractions and desires;
The struggle of the instinct that enjoys,
And the more noble instinct that aspires.

These perturbations, this perpetual jar
Of earthly wants and aspirations high,
Come from the influence of an unseen star
An undiscovered planet in our sky.

And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud
Throws o'er the sea a floating bridge of light,
Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd
Into the realm of mystery and night,—

So from the world of spirits there descends
A bridge of light, connecting it with this,
O'er whose unsteady floor, that sways and bends,
Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss.


Photo Source: All Things Halloween.

BOOK REVIEWS. Sort Of.

Leaving Yuba City - Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni     

I ran across this gem by accident, in our local used book store. (the only type of book store we have left)

Yuba City is a diverse community boasting the largest Indian population outside of India and its immigrant history mirrors that of the nation at large, a nation that has often been unkind to the very groups which helped to build it. (an unhappy reality)

Ms Divakaruni pulls no punches about the culture her subjects left or the one they found waiting for them. This book is about people, their pleasures and their pain. Powerful and passionate, it gives us a glimpse into a place we've never been.
 
The theme for this month is 'classics,' and it occured to me that what I had just read deserves to become a member of that society. After all, what makes a poem a classic? Does it evoke a feeling more profound than you expected? Does it illuminate a piece of history or society? Does it bring the entire world into its snapshot of a moment? This collection took me to a time and place very much outside my realm of experience and understanding and made me feel profoundly.

Did I mention I sort of liked it?

It's a powerful little book and I had a difficult time choosing a poem to share with you.

The Geography Lesson

Look, says Sister Seraphina, here is
the earth. And holds up, by its base, the metal globe
dented from that time when Ratna, not looking,
knocked it off its stand and was sent
to Mother Superior. And here

the axis on which it revolves, tilted
around the sun. Like this, the globe a blur now,
land and water sloshed
into one muddy grey with the thick jab
of her finger.

Ratna returned to class with weal-streaked
palms, the left one bleeding slightly. She held it curled

in her lap so it wouldn’t
stain her uniform as she wrote out,
one hundred times, I will not damage
school property again.

Now each girl sits with her silent laced shoes
flat on the classroom floor. I grip
my chair-edge. I know, were it not for the Grace
of the Holy Ghost, we would all

be swept off this madly spinning world
into perdition. Sometimes I feel it
at morning mass, six a.m. and the ground
under my knees sliding away, hot press
of air on the eardrum and the blue sleeves
of the Virgin opening
into tunnels.

Ratna didn’t cry, so Sister Seraphina

pinned to her chest a placard that said,
in large black letters, WICKED. She
was to wear it till she repented, and no one
could speak to her.

This is the way the moon
travels around the earth, Sister
says, her fist circling the globe, solid,

tight-knuckled, pink nails
clipped back to the skin. I know
the moon, dense stone
suspended in the sky’s chest,
which makes flood and madness happen and has
no light of its own. As our heathen souls
unless redeemed by Christ’s blood.

That night in the moon-flecked dormitory

we woke to Ratna thrashing around in bed,
calling for Sultan, her dog back home. She
would not quiet when told,
and when the night nun tried
to give her water, she knocked the glass
away with a swollen hand. All
over that floor, shards, glittering
like broken eyes, and against the bed-rail
the flailing sound of her bones. Until they took her

somewhere downstairs.

On this chart, points Sister, you see
the major planets of the Solar System.
Copy them carefully into your notebooks. Smudges,
and you’ll do them over. I outline
red Mars, ringed Saturn, the far cold gleam

of Uranus, their perfect, captive turning
around a blank center which flames out
like the face of God in dreams. I will my hand
not to shake. We never saw Ratna again, and knew
not to ask.
Tomorrow we will be tested
on the various properties of the heavenly bodies,
their distance, in light years, from the sun.

Guess Who I Ran Into. Sort Of.

Wedged in among all the classes I had to take in college (I'm sure you know how that goes) was one class I took because it was what I wanted - a class on poetry writing. Professor Jeanne E. Clark, a published poet herself, diligently filled our reading list with many wonderful contemporary poets and brought several of them to speak with us in class.

As I was wandering around the interwebs the other day, (a seeming non sequitur) I ran across the title to an article that rang a bell way in the back of my head. (Does that ever happen to you?) The article was entitled, The Solipsist in Purgatory: Jollimore’s AT LAKE SCUCOG, and it should have sounded familiar. I knew the poet (sort of) to whom it was referring.

Troy Jollimore (the poet at the core of the article and this post) was one of the poets we read in class that semester. Once I made the connection, memories came flooding back. He was also one of the poets who came to speak with us. And notice I said "with," not "to." The class was very much a fun, friendly discussion among people who loved poetry.

That day he read from his first book of poetry, Tom Thomson in Purgatory, which won the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award and was, of course, our assigned reading. I remember him as a pleasant man with an enjoyable sense of humor.

Currently he is a professor in the philosophy department at California State University, Chico, and has written books of both poetry and philosophy.

Here is a poem that caught my breath when I first read it. I truly recognize the feeling of regret at too much caution, and the desperate desire to undo that which cannot be undone.


Regret

I’d like to take back my not saying to you
those things that, out of politeness, or caution,
I kept to myself. And, if I may —
though this might perhaps stretch the rules —I’d like
to take back your not saying some of the things
that you never said, like “I love you” and “Won’t you
come home with me,” or telling me, which
you in fact never did, perhaps in the newly
refurbished café at the Vancouver Art
Gallery as fresh drops of the downpour from which
we’d sought shelter glinted in your hair like jewels,
or windshields of cars as seen from a plane
that has just taken off or is just coming in
for a landing, when the sun is at just the right angle,
that try as you might, you could not imagine
a life without me. The passionate spark
that would have flared up in your eye as you said this —
if you had said this —I dream of it often.
I won’t take those back, those dreams, though I would,
if I could, take back your not kissing me, openly,
extravagantly, not caring who saw,
or those looks of anonymous animal longing
you’d throw everyone else in the room. I’d like
to retract my retracting, just before I grabbed you,
my grabbing you on the steps of the New York
Public Library (our failure to visit
which I would also like to recall)
and shouting for all to hear, “You, you
and only you!” Yes, I’d like to take back
my not frightening the pigeons that day with my wild
protestations of uncontrolled love, my not scaring
them off into orbit, frantic and mad,
even as I now sit alone, frantic and mad,
racing to unread the book of our love
before you can finish unwriting it.

from: the December 2008 magazine The Walrus.
 
BOOKS

Poetry:
     Chapbook, The Solipsist. 2008.
     His second book, At Lake Scugog. 2011.

Philosophy:  
     Friendship and Agent-Relative Morality. Garland Publishing. 2001.
     Love's Vision. Princeton University Press. 2011.

A Classic Poem

Falling leaves. A slight nip in the air. Well, in my imagination anyway. Around this time of year I begin to feel the imminent change of seasons (9/22/12) even as the summer weather lingers.

Autumn in our house has always revolved around preparations for Halloween, our favorite holiday. When the kids were home it was an all out assault on the senses. Now it's more of an artistic exercise in imagination and creativity. The neighbors still look forward to the surprise each year though.

 

Oh, sorry. 

Poetry. Right?

When you think of writers and Halloween, what is the first name that comes to mind?    Stephen King. 

OK, the second?   Right, Edgar Allen Poe.

He made me shiver while reading him as an adolescent - and he still haunts me today. His poetry has a subtlety that stays with me long after I've read it, kind of like a phantom breath on my neck in the dark. This poem has always been one of my favorites and it reminds me of a question that comes up repeatedly in Philip K. Dick's work, "what is really real." I've questioned reality, myself, a few times over the years.

How about you? Have you ever asked yourself that question?

 A Dream Within A Dream 

 
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

Illustration: A Dream Within a Dream, Barry Howard Studio.

Poetry, Good For What Ails you . . .

I ran across an intriguing article the other day, called Poetry Changed the World, by Elaine Scarry. In the article, Scarry connects the development of civilization to the ability of literature to take us out of ourselves to "see something bigger, a different perspective," tracing the development of poetry and concurrent societal evolution, and speaking of poetry's "invitation to empathy, its reliance on deliberative thought, and its beauty."

I then found the article, A poem a day by William Sieghart, about a talk he gave promoting a new anthology, Winning Words, Inspiring Poems for Everyday Life. Actually, it was about what he did after the talk to illustrate his point. The short article is quite interesting. Here are a few excerpts:

... I’ve been battling with the challenge of making poetry appear more relevant to people in their everyday lives. Battling because there is no doubt that most people find poetry intimidating. ... 

Where have I heard that before?

... Following the talk I sat in the book tent with a couch beside me, offering to listen to people’s problems for ten minutes at a time and then prescribe them with the appropriate poem or poems for them to take away and inwardly digest or commit to memory as an alternative to a cocktail of pills or any other form of therapy currently in vogue.

... Nearly forty people had availed themselves of my poetry pharmacy. About a quarter of them had burst into tears with a complete stranger either in recounting their troubles or when I managed to prescribe appropriately and they found a poetic complicity for their troubles and at last felt understood.

... Suffice it to say it saddened me how, in a world of so much communication, supposedly made even easier by developments in technology, people seem as lonely and unsupported as ever.  But and it’s a big but, the right poem at the right time could provide immeasurable sustenance. The emails I have had since prove it.

... Poetry in the right time and place can be a far better mantra for that tricky business of living than many more expensive or fashionable alternatives. I urge you to spread the word and look out for my future poetry surgeries. The Doctor is in.

  

So see . . .

as we embrace poetry, allow it to enrich our own lives, and share our insights with others, we are also bringing badly needed medicine to an ailing world.

The Poetry Project - August

The prompt for this month was a "poem by a Pulitzer Prize Winner." Now, it didn't exactly specify that the Pulitzer had to be in the area of poetry. (No, I am not a lawyer.)

So I'm squeezing through that loophole for this post.

One of my hobbies is to seek out poetry by folks who are not really poets. It can be surprising, entertaining, cringe inducing, or all those things at once. This poetry often reveals unfathomed depths and facets of its writer. . . .

In 1953 Ernest Hemingway won a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The Old Man and the Sea. (See . . . a Pulitzer Prize!) But he also wrote poetry throughout most of his life. It was often published in publications like the New York Times and journals at home and abroad. He also published two collections: Three Stories and Ten Poems, and 88 Poems. 

Alright, I guess that does make him a poet. But seriously, how often in your life have you heard, "The poet Ernest Hemingway . . . "? Seriously.

I'll admit that I'm not really a Hemingway fan. He wrote some powerful stories, but on the whole I find that the testosterone dripping from the book pages leaves nasty stains on my clothes that are hard to get out. When I discovered that he wrote poetry, however, I jumped at the chance to read it. Would I discover a new Hemingway to which I could more readily relate?

Hold that thought.





The book I chose was:

 Complete Poems: Ernest Hemingway. 

Was I surprised? Well . . . Yes. But not in the way I had hoped.

Many of the poems contained in the book I wouldn't post on my blog. It's not that I'm a prude mind you. I just don't enjoy crudeness for its own sake.

Fortunately, the book has more to offer. There are also many poems about the costs of war - it was that time (1920s). One example:

Champs d’Honneur

Soldiers never do die well;

         Crosses mark the places—

Wooden crosses where they fell,

         Stuck above their faces.

Soldiers pitch and cough and twitch—

         All the world roars red and black;

Soldiers smother in a ditch,

         Choking through the whole attack.

This small volume has some very powerful pieces and is full of pain, anger, and disillusionment. But a sense of humor manages to manifest itself from within the pain and anger. Hemingway also directed a few words toward critics that were, let's say, less than positive. The book gave a strong emotional sense of the driven, larger than life man whose spectacular life was ended by his own hand. 

Although this book will never rank with Lucille Clifton, Billy Collins, or any of the others who grace my shelves, I am glad that I read it. A lobster bib helped catch the drips and minimized the staining. Most importantly, it has in a way I never expected, left me with a bit more empathy for Mr. Hemingway.

I'll leave you with my favorite poem in the entire book. I burst out laughing when I turned the page and I'm sure my husband thought I'd lost it. He says he'd never lock me away, but you never know . . .

[Blank Verse]

 “                         “

       !             :                  ,                 .

              ,            ,            ,                 .

      ,              ;                              !

                     ,

Everything Old is New Again

I ran across some fun poetry that puts a modern twist on an old poetry form, the Cento.

Cento hails from the Latin word for 'patchwork,' and has been around since at least the 4th century. It is basically a poem made up of lines from poems by other poets. Each line must be taken from a different poem. and when the lines are put together, they must make sense. The poem doesn’t have to rhyme, but rhyming adds a nice touch. And always give credit to the poets you use.

One of my professors insisted we write these as a way of proving that we were familiar with a broad array of poetry. At first I hated it but it became a fun challenge and as an added benefit I found myself immersed in poetry I might have otherwise overlooked. (I'm sure that was entirely unintentional)

Here is a great example by Simone Muench called:

 Wolf Cento  

Very quick. Very intense, like a wolf at a live heart, the sun breaks down.  What is important is to avoid the time allotted for disavowels as the livid wound  leaves a trace      leaves an abscess  takes its contraction for those clouds that dip thunder & vanish like rose leaves in closed jars. Age approaches, slowly. But it cannot  crystal bone into thin air. The small hours open their wounds for me.  This is a woman’s confession:  I keep this wolf because the wilderness gave it to me.

Sources: [Anne Sexton, Dylan Thomas,  Larry Levis, Ingeborg Bachmann,

 Octavio Paz,  Henri Michaux, Agnes Nemes Nagy, Joyce Mansour,

 William Burroughs, Meret Oppenheim, Mary Low, Adrienne Rich, Carl Sandburg]

The twist   is "Book spine poetry."

It has been around for a few years and if you google it you can find tons of examples by a wide range of people: students, teachers, children, adults. It's as easy as you want to make it.
 

This one is by Travis at 100 Scope Notes.


Look Who's There!
The Watcher
What Do You See?
More
People





Lorne Daniel at Writing:Place created his book spine poetry from poetry books.


What Goes On
Here and Now
A Long Continual Argument
The Poet in the World
Writing Down the Bones
Refusing Heaven

 Many others have tried their hand at book spine poetry here, here, here, here, 

I made my own book spine poem, but technical difficulties have kept me from uploading the picture. (lost cabely thing)

It was fun playing with the books in my own library to create a poem. I think kids would really enjoy this and I can see it as a way to jump start creativity in a dry spell.

I'll admit though, it would have been more fun if I had someone to clean up the mess I made.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep
Reading Lolita in Tehran

A Passionate Apprentice
Wicked
Insecure At Last

East Wind Melts the Ice

[Sources: Philip K. Dick, Azar Nafisi,

 Virginia Woolf, Gregory Maguire, Eve Ensler, Liza Dalby]

How to:

 

Create a Cento

1). Take the time to look through a few poetry books. Enjoy the poems.
2). Find a line you especially like, and make that the first line of your patchwork poem. Write the poet’s last name in parentheses at the end of the line.
3). Repeat #2. Choose your lines carefully—your poem must make sense.

Some things to consider: 
Try to make your poem rhyme. 
Make sure the beats sound right. 
Tenses should agree.  
Person should agree. In other words, pick lines that have all been written in either first or third person. 

4). And remember, at the end, list each poet’s full name. Include the name of the poem in quotes.

Create a Book Spine Cento
1). Find a place with plenty of books: a library, home collection, or even a book store (if they'll let you).
2). Find titles that strike you and write them down – you can refer back to them later.
3). Arrange and rearrange them (in your head or on paper).
4). The Library card catalog can help you find titles with specific words or phrases that fit.