Poems for July 20

I Am Waiting BY LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI
Experience by Carl Sandburg, 1878 - 1967
BLEECKER STREET By Philip Schultz
A Script BY ULADZIMIR NIAKLIAEU
TRANSLATED BY VALZHYNA MORT


How do you phrase the question, "What are you waiting for?" How do you answer it? What kind of map do you consider? What choices come up in the archeology of your emotions? What beckons us to read someone else's script?
These poems should get some discussion on these matters, started.

Discussion points:
Ferlinghetti: Oh to be able to write in such a lucid, engaging manner! Strong points made without sounding academic; repetitions of first and final lines of each segment spooling indeed, a sense of constant "re-birth". His points are serious, but the style so much fun, with such original and creative juxtapositions. Although the poem was written in the 50's, it is as fresh and universal now (and pertinent to our current climate) as then. To paraphrase Bernie, reading him is like listening to colored beads tell a story as they run effortlessly through the fingers. We spent some time discussing "what America did to Tom Sawyer -- Judith brought up how Tom is not such an amusing character in Huckleberry Finn but on the road to becoming a "slimy politician". Perhaps the spirit of an insouciant boy, curious, conniving has disappeared in America... or perhaps Tom is representative of what happens to young people in America...

In contrast, the Sandburg was lacking in sonic enjoyment, and seemed old-fashioned and stiff. The conceit of relying on maps, not understood/created through one's own experience, is good, but to paraphrase Judith, "Sandburg "settled too complacently into prairie philosopher prophet – all marshmallowy."

The third poem, I was intrigued if the specificity of Bleecker Street was necessary for understanding the poem -- and certainly, it is enriching to hear more about it from people who know NYC. The weaving of contemporary with historical details, had a dissonant feel peppered with questions, quite opposite from Ferlinghetti's easy-going style. The Unamuno quote “self-love widens into love of all that lives.” re-appearing as the final line allowed a discussion of the "equilibrium" between these two poles. To cite example: "perhaps" introduced into long questions:
"Perhaps everyone secretly admires
something momentous about himself,
with the mass and “inner life” of a cathedral,
who cherished the bliss of infinite sacrifice?
Perhaps this street remembers the loneliness
of war widows, the roll calls of absent names,
its first kisses on the corner of West Tenth Street,
the swooning confetti heat of victory,
the scalding springs of defeat?

The final poem entitled Script captures the arbitrary doom that could happen to anyone -- and worse, not just an anonymous selection but kin could become agent to murder kin. A very Kafka-esque nightmare. The final word, "alone" resonates with a clang of iron I imagine the gates of hell could produce when slammed shut.



Perhaps it is good that Bernie reminded us last week that the end, is not final... ( interview between Leath Tonino and Craig Childs, whose last book is Your last book was titled Apocalyptic Planet: Field Guide to the Everending Earth.
https://thesunmagazine.org/issues/486/the_skeleton_gets_up_and_walks

just as Ferlinghetti says -- I'm waiting... and another re-birth appears...

Bernie’s reference from last week’s discussion…
Since that last poem was rather depressing and we finished by 1:10 or so, I shared today’s writer’s almanac poem — as a more uplifting send-off.
Here In The Psalm, by Sally Fisher

Poems for July 13

John wanted to share this link of Richard Blanco — there’s a nice introduction and he reads his poem “America” starting at 6:06 to 9:44.
http://youtu.be/iab4PwyYIeQ

We started with
Roadside Attractions with the Dogs of America by Ada Limón
skipped Poem to my Litter by Max Ritvo

For the Perillo poem, some of you might want to reference with Auden’s poem “Musée des Beaux Arts” with Breughel’s painting: http://english.emory.edu/classes/paintings&poems/auden.html

Rebuttal by Lucia Perillo (review Auden: Musee des Beaux Arts)
“Dona”[1]by Lucia Perillo
God and Me (continued) by Edward Hirsch
Ode to Some Lyric Poets -- Gregory Orr
... certain poems in an uncertain world
(this one, we read all the parts around in a circle to get the idea of a long lyric Ode.)

Good Bones BY MAGGIE SMITH

**
Discussion:
The first poem by Ada Limón has the ease of a Neruda Ode along with a pleasurable sense of sound that captures not just "dogness" but what it means to live in America and how to imagine three very different slices of pies.
The first sentence, 8 lines "angel-footing" on borrowed houses holds as much promise as the world's "nicest pie". Do you recognize yourself as one of the wayward and word-weary?
and the word-weary.
Perhaps its a sense of "By-bye Miss American Pie" and snap shots of good ol' boys and the sense of marvel that we keep on going without slipping out of the "national net of “longing for joy.” A sense of old-fashioned aprons worn at church suppers slips in,with the next pie -- of birds, ocean water and grief I’d like to wear an apron for you
whose ingredients don't seem possible to make the "prettiest pie".

Indeed, in these times, "of everyone wanting to make their own kind
of America, but still be America, too.", there's a hint of danger -- a hint of wanting to belong, to have the happy-go-lucky freedom of a dog with ears in the wind, but recognized as the best dog of the lot...

The first of the two Perillo poems left a few confused about what the quarrel is. Certainly there is a sense of the rebellious-- why paint things this way, old masters? Auden's satire of pre-WW2 attitudes perhaps is too intellectual -- the rebuttal says, make the suffering big, unmistakeable, instead of minute and tiny, even the "content-with-being-tiny" -- instead of people avoiding confrontation.

The second brought up a few memories of girl scouts-- as Judith put it her "involuntary servitude as a brownie"
Martin brought up the point that if a poem makes him think of something he wouldn’t otherwise have thought about.... then it's a good thing.
The language, pacing, parsing and rephrasing of the minimal choice presented by the Baez song
feels urgent,where a deathly word like "abattoir" becomes an irresistible image of a French kiss. Mockery, a bit of self-mockery and acceptance of a certain amount of passivity which carries a certain danger. The power of a group... both good and bad...


I wish I had thought of the title of the Hirsch poem -- how brilliant to have a conversation with God as an ongoing saga -- with the permission of "continued" -- it has been going on for a while and will continue!
The humor of a line like this:
"Every plant is holy every leaf etc."
every leaf (implied is) etc. no need to go on.
Yes, the world unpredictable... tragedy everywhere, but life goes on...
cataclysm, everything ending all the time, beginning all the time...
how immense the drowning when you’re the one who’s drowning... and yet, it's all right and told with just the right conversational tone...

The Gregory Orr poem was difficult as I would have had to do a lot of typing to share it.
Why did APR decide to have a long section like this? The group saw the "first part" and we passed the paper around to read each subsequent part. Orr has written wonderful books and perhaps this is part of the bones of yet another one to come.
Poetry as Survival...River inside the River...
It is an ambitious undertaking to speak about lyric poets -- which ones would you include in your ode? How do you understand the world? through whose words
what is beloved.
how to understand the references... ?

poets uncover same truths from different angles...


we closed with Maggie Smith -- I love that my daughter liked this -- the play of "what we keep from our children" because, we are trying to sell them the world... it could be a beautiful place, right?

poems for July 6

I don’t know if any of you struggle with long poems that go on for pages and pages, but the newest issue of the American Poetry Review is full of them.
The last poem by Gregory Orr has 17 parts, and goes on for 2 pages of the Review. I only include part I.
One idea I had was to read this long poem out loud, passing the APR in which it appears from person to person and see how it works. Otherwise,
I would have to type it all up, to share via email, so perhaps you can let me know if you feel it is worth it.
What advantages like in the length of a poem? I have included a few short ones. I look forward to your comments as we share them!
I have gathered poems for the next two weeks… maybe they’ll even take us to three weeks… It starts with a tribute to July 4th…

As ever thank you all for the fun, the wit and savvy in the sharing.

POEMS
América by Richard Blanco (John proposes this link: http://youtu.be/iab4PwyYIeQ
he reads the poem starting at 6:06, but the introduction is worthwhile.)

The World Has Need of You by Ellen Bass
Prairie Dawn by Willa Cather
Like Any Good American Brynn Saito
Roadside Attractions with the Dogs of America by Ada Limón,
Poem to my Litter by Max Ritvo


Although I was not there, I believe the following report sums up the session July 6:
It was, as usual, a fun time and the depth and breadth of insights and understanding sometimes dazzling. I am sending you my take on the proceedings as in a view by an outside observer. There will be no William Blake visions, just a few lines that I have not touched up to further clarify the short tale, or, in this case, tail.
The scene is a nearly stagnant pond ringed in algae. There are 17 old rowboats, some sunken, all abandoned, each attached to a long, narrow , protruding dock.
A sudden wind from my left stirred both the water and the boats enough so that many pulled loose from their rotting ropes and they began to drift to the east, some continuing to settle lower in the brackish water. Three bullfrogs were bellowing and even lesser croaks came up sharp , carrying raspy tones like personal jibes.
Most of the scows drifted on to the dam above the falls: a few now gave only their upturned sterns to view.
It was sights and sounds to bring forth thoughts of poems in free verse, the reading of which muddied further the nearly opaque water of the shallow Lethe Pond.
It was a hot and sunny day , an atmosphere unlike the usual, different from any I can remember. It was, in the mind of a quiet little field mouse, something merveilleux.
Yours, in mousy, quiet, un-assumption,