Today, When I Could Do Nothing by Jane Hirshfield
The Check In by Nandi Comer
To be of use by Marge Piercy
Boarding a Bus by Steve Huff
Dying Towns by Joshua Martin
Of the Surface of Things by Wallace Steven
Today, When I could do nothing: thank you Marna for suggesting this poem.
It was clear from the wealth of angles brought up, that this is one of those “good poems”, that happily increases possibilities of meanings— as David S. put it so poetically, “its palette of possibilities”. Written at the beginning of the pandemic, (this first day when I could do nothing), the title and juxtaposition of the 4 words “I saved an ant”, could also be about any day, as well as the first day of some major change that forces one to re-think what can be done.
It appeared in an article in Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/one-true-thing/202004/poet-jane-hirshfield-today-when-i-could-do-nothing
The poem is filled with small twists of humor, such as the ant as "the loosened ink taking the shape of the ant). A small chuckle at the sentence arises (or a small glub) reading “I am not an essential service”… also invites us to think about what is… (all the while enabling us to face fear our diminishment more easily…) The “silence enough to fill cisterns” takes me to a Cistercian abby (for Trappist monks… more rigorous in practice than Benedictines)-- back in (unspoken) time, and a chance for deep meditation. The details, observations, seem offered with gratitude, an appreciation of and compassion for the ordinary;
To quote Hirschfield https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-seekers-forum/202006/the-perfection-things-they-are
"What a reader finds in a poem is often a mirror, both of the person who is looking and listening and of the particular weather of that particular moment of listening."
Ants are fascinating to observe… fast climbers, intrepid… To elaborate on the question, “what good does it do”, Bernie shared the Starfish Story: https://www.countryschool.net/news-detail?pk=1250796 (the link includes a few words of advice about “catching kindness from the headmistress).
The final line, “I did this” is both self-referential, “I wrote this”, as well as referring to “saving the ant”. You do not need to be convinced that the ant might have been able to survive without her help, or readily finds comrades… the idea of a small act of kind attention… the comparison of ant to human, lends to meditating on the worth of all life…
The question, “What then did I save” can easily extend to saving perhaps a part of herself—ah…but I see many more paragraphs ensuing and will stop here.
The Check-In:
We remarked on the form which reflects different modes of anger. The last two sentences deal a real punch. The “helplessness” in the flimsy “I am so so sorry”, (akin to the uselessness of changing anything by saying I’ll pray for you) seizes the “so”…hurls it to so white… and three times, so late.
Nandi Comer writes in “about this poem”: “I wrote ‘The Check In’ as a response to a strange phenomenon I was noticing during the pandemic. After the murder of George Floyd and the uprisings that followed, I and other Black friends began receiving calls, texts, and emails from white people that weren’t necessarily close friends. Their attempts to connect with me really felt as if they were seeking an explanation or comfort for their own anxieties. Isn’t it always the case that Black people end up caring for white fragility? For me these messages felt like another kind of violence to endure. They made me anxious. I could not answer them, so I wrote this reply.”
To be of Use by Marge Piercy
This is a wonderful poem to discuss “what work is”, what kinds of work bring out desire to “jump in head first”, “do what has to be done to move things forward”, do those things “worth doing well.” Her metaphors for meaningful work can be used for all types of “work” — whether chasing a sunset, and recording it in music or painting, writing, teaching, as a way to increase a student’s confidence, develop clarity in thinking; Preaching as ministry like speakers, hoping to inspire, participate in work for social justice. Elaine brought up Levine’s poem as contrast— https://ariegr1.edublogs.org/2009/03/19/poem-analysis-what-work-is-by-philip-levine/
The ending two lines are memorable — and invite us to continue the possibilities of the circumstances— The pitcher cries for water to carry/and a person for work that is real”. what do we make… and how can it be used? Yes, we cry for work like the pitcher, the work without which leaves us feeling empty.
Boarding a Bus: It is wonderful to hear Steve’s voice reading his poem. What is it we can’t afford NOT to do? David quoted Cesare Pavese, “Every luxury must be paid for, and everything is a luxury, starting with being in the world.”
Dying Towns: The 14 couplets deliver a fabulous word painting of the disappearance of towns… and then, the kapow of the last line — "nobody asking, who the hell I was, where the hell I was going.” Clever line breaks, the play of “where the living went” as both the way to make a living, as well as living people; the poetic names of towns (with possible undertones of puns on bluff, ash, popular, may), which contrasts with the harsh fact of bulldozer and inconceivable idea of a father forgetting the color of his daughter’s eyes.
What are the towns we carry with us from childhood? Who were we?
On the Surface of Things: it was wonderful to have a personable account of Wallace Stevens, and his daughter “ready to get out of this daughter business” of handling his posthumous work and affairs.
Estranged from his family, going upstairs after dinner to his study, his observations understand that our perception can invite the imagination. Carolyn quoted from The Great Modern Poets in their own words edited by Michael Schmidt.
“It is possible to read Stevens for years with intense pleasure and never to care what the poems means because the sense of sense is so strong and the movement of feeling so assured. If we do question his meanings and try to tie the poems in to them, we may displace the poetry itself. The subtlety of his thought is less compelling than the magic of his effects on the ear and eye, his ability to rouse the ‘intellectual emotions.”
The three stanzas have a sense of “Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is” (last line of The Snow Man). His imagination creates worlds for us… and I love that he tucks in what seems to be “a looking out” to reveal he is actually “looking in”, reading what he has written — both act and the words describing “The spring is like a belle undressing” .
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