Seen from Above by Jennifer K. Sweeney
Music at My Mother's Funeral by Faith Shearin
You're the Top by Tony Hoagland
They Sit Together on the Porch by Wendell Berry
No by Mark Doty
potpourri of poems
Seen from above, blends a repetition of “steady” applied to trains, “missives” from other-where, dislocation ... and you think you might be entering an idea about winter’s reach as “steady” connects to icicles, leaves, people with their clocksongs and deaths.
At this point the tone changes; maybe the poem could end there—“keep the fire lit/
things are not as they seem.” But the poem insists on an enigmatic instruction about bell-ringing, with both feet off the ground. What has this to do with the title?
What do we look for in poems? Intrigue, mystery but yet, which invites in spite of not being able to put our finger on it, that leaves us feeling satisfied.
The tercets allow the eye to tumble from “other-where—
from “clocksongs” through white space, “and filled-up lives” .
The next poem, Music at My Mother’s Funeral, in one unbroken stanza, starts in media res, where the mother is part of planning the music, but leads to “the soundtrack of her life”. The humorous details, including the music of the seat belt reminder she ignored
paints a delightful picture of a woman who knew her own mind.
How different from the memory of a Grandmother in Hoagland’s poem, also written in triplets, but with the unwarranted enjambement of un-/ politically correct. Diction, word choice is pleasing and captures the age of Cole Porter – whose lyric is bright, beautiful and useless – the ending words of the poem, which at first comes as a shock, as if it is the grandmother’s life, caught in her ignorance about the world, or her red high-heel kicked into the chandelier. It led us into a discussion of how we remember grandparents, as opposed to our own parents. Jim went on a tangent about what’s broken in society
the juxtaposition of Ghandi and Napoleon brandy, the suspension of “just” and prohibition (shelter of a dry martini). The speaker of the poem establishes an adolescent view of the flavors of this woman compared to trivial rhymes, that transitions to how she saw herself – which surprisingly seems no different, and sad.
The Wendell Berry portrait could be played in d minor, a sad end of life snapshot,
with the word “dark” used in 3 different ways: night, without light; and death as the dark doorway.
Doty’s “No”
With all the hard “c” and “cl” sounds, the vivid adjectives (alien lacquer, ruined wall paper, smell unopened) the turtle, like God, is the one in charge, at the center of everything. A delightful poem in both conceit and manner. As I mentioned in the August discussion of this poem, Doty captures the world of the child, and layers in this line, "I think the children smell unopened," both their own "unsmelled" lives, as well as understanding the unopened secret of the turtle they hold to each adult face. The verb “heft”, the slant rhyme of “unlit”, with “single” reinforce the sense of possible which they love, that “he might poke out his old, old face”.
Because we had some time left over, we also read Lisel Mueller’s poem “Things and Naomi Shihab Nye’s, “The Art of Disappearing” and Mike noted how we could end many of the poems sooner –
Seen from above: “things are not as they seem”
Music: but it did not seem to matter.
You’re the top: suspended in a lyric by Cole Porter
No –the single word of the shell
Wendell Berry was the only one where such a cut would not be good.
Jess had the idea of saying just the last line. Applied to Seen from Above
Seen from above
from other-where
bandwidth
last leave winnowing
with their clocksongs
like chaff from a scythe
keep the fire lit.
(end there.)
Applied to the Doty:
Because they want us to feel
in their own hands, want us to feel
he’s the color of ruined wallpaper
nothing but the plummy leather.
They know he makes night
as they do. His age
from which they are excluded,
building anywhere. They love
unopened
the single word of the shell.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Social Media... and poetry: fear of obliteration and alienation
How does social media and internet enter the picture? Robert Pinsky believes poetry destabilizes mass culture (source of tremendous collective anxiety), but the poet also is afraid of obliteration and alienation...becoming like everyone else /and losing connection if we are fluently different.
Wendy Willis,in her article, “A Million People on One String: Big Data and the Poetic Imagination” published in Poetry Northwest helped me to think again about the meaning of "art" in the context of poets and writers as citizens of “modernity” as producers of content. She compares Internet to a chocolate factory, churning out specially designed confections to satisfy our deepest and most compulsive cravings, play to our weaknesses.
For poets these are existential... clattering craving for recognition... desire to be seen... Facebook, twitter for all (or none) to admire...
I wonder what Cummings might have thought about this? A nuisance? something that could perk his imagination?
Willis reminds us of Wallace Stevens, "Man with the Blue Guitar". Even though the artist may not play things as the reader sees them, the job is to see how the artist is playing..
"The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."
And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,
A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."
We will start the discussion with a look at the Stevens' poem and a short look at Cummings' spirit... the relevance and acceptability of the lyric was certainly called into question in their times.
In 1969, John Ashbury's "Soonest Mended" where long sentences are broken into lines to look like a poem, seems to make the poem a vehicle for ruminations and musings.
45 years later, we read efforts such as Mathias Svalina: Dream Delivery Service: “I will write the dreams without consultation with the dreamer,& deliver them daily.”
Champions of social mediated poetics sometimes sound gleefully dystopian: “We’ve all been flattened to virtual handles and data” they say, “so literature should be similarly flattened...
Flatness of unqualified exuberance; rote positivity; flatness of pious conceptualism; wry deflection; language authentic when simplistic, but wallowing in inability for nuanced response...
But the fantasy makes it ours, a kind of fence-sitting
Raised to the level of an esthetic ideal. These were moments, years,
Solid with reality, faces, namable events, kisses, heroic acts,
But like the friendly beginning of a geometrical progression
Not too reassuring, as though meaning could be cast aside some day
When it had been outgrown. Better, you said, to stay cowering
Like this in the early lessons, since the promise of learning
Is a delusion, and I agreed, adding that
Tomorrow would alter the sense of what had already been learned,
That the learning process is extended in this way, so that from this standpoint
None of us ever graduates from college,
For time is an emulsion, and probably thinking not to grow up
Is the brightest kind of maturity for us, right now at any rate.
And you see, both of us were right, though nothing
Has somehow come to nothing: the avatars
Of our conforming to the rules and living
Around the home have made—well, in a sense, “good citizens” of us,
Brushing the teeth and all that, and learning to accept
The charity of the hard moments as they are doled out,
For this is action, this not being sure, this careless
Preparing, sowing the seeds crooked in the furrow,
Making ready to forget, and always coming back
To the mooring of starting out, that day so long ago.
The Paris Review, 1969
Wendy Willis,in her article, “A Million People on One String: Big Data and the Poetic Imagination” published in Poetry Northwest helped me to think again about the meaning of "art" in the context of poets and writers as citizens of “modernity” as producers of content. She compares Internet to a chocolate factory, churning out specially designed confections to satisfy our deepest and most compulsive cravings, play to our weaknesses.
For poets these are existential... clattering craving for recognition... desire to be seen... Facebook, twitter for all (or none) to admire...
I wonder what Cummings might have thought about this? A nuisance? something that could perk his imagination?
Willis reminds us of Wallace Stevens, "Man with the Blue Guitar". Even though the artist may not play things as the reader sees them, the job is to see how the artist is playing..
"The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."
And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,
A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."
We will start the discussion with a look at the Stevens' poem and a short look at Cummings' spirit... the relevance and acceptability of the lyric was certainly called into question in their times.
In 1969, John Ashbury's "Soonest Mended" where long sentences are broken into lines to look like a poem, seems to make the poem a vehicle for ruminations and musings.
45 years later, we read efforts such as Mathias Svalina: Dream Delivery Service: “I will write the dreams without consultation with the dreamer,& deliver them daily.”
Champions of social mediated poetics sometimes sound gleefully dystopian: “We’ve all been flattened to virtual handles and data” they say, “so literature should be similarly flattened...
Flatness of unqualified exuberance; rote positivity; flatness of pious conceptualism; wry deflection; language authentic when simplistic, but wallowing in inability for nuanced response...
But the fantasy makes it ours, a kind of fence-sitting
Raised to the level of an esthetic ideal. These were moments, years,
Solid with reality, faces, namable events, kisses, heroic acts,
But like the friendly beginning of a geometrical progression
Not too reassuring, as though meaning could be cast aside some day
When it had been outgrown. Better, you said, to stay cowering
Like this in the early lessons, since the promise of learning
Is a delusion, and I agreed, adding that
Tomorrow would alter the sense of what had already been learned,
That the learning process is extended in this way, so that from this standpoint
None of us ever graduates from college,
For time is an emulsion, and probably thinking not to grow up
Is the brightest kind of maturity for us, right now at any rate.
And you see, both of us were right, though nothing
Has somehow come to nothing: the avatars
Of our conforming to the rules and living
Around the home have made—well, in a sense, “good citizens” of us,
Brushing the teeth and all that, and learning to accept
The charity of the hard moments as they are doled out,
For this is action, this not being sure, this careless
Preparing, sowing the seeds crooked in the furrow,
Making ready to forget, and always coming back
To the mooring of starting out, that day so long ago.
The Paris Review, 1969
Poems for Sept. 21
Love poem with ecological concerns -- Bob Hicok
Briefly Accept Events as They Occur by Sharon Dolin
-- Epictetus
Pay No Attention to Things That Don’t Concern You by Sharon Dolin
-- Epictetus
Times the Whole World By Zero by Ben Purkert
sweeping psalm by Christopher Janke
Blink by Sid Miller
The poems this week take a peek at some of the contemporary poetry selected from Summer/Fall 2014 Poetry Northwest and one poem from the Boston Review.
In 1969, John Ashbury's "Soonest Mended" starts this way:
“Barely tolerated, living on the margin
In our technological society, we were always having to be rescued
On the brink of destruction, like heroines in Orlando Furioso
Before it was time to start all over again.”
45 years later, we read efforts such as Mathias Svalina: Dream Delivery Service: “I will write the dreams without consultation with the dreamer,& deliver them daily.”
What has changed in our poetry regarding our attitudes towards technology?
What makes us glad to read a poem as vehicle for ruminations and musings on the nature of being human?
Comments from Summer/Fall 2014 Poetry Northwest articles by Zach Savich and Wendy Willis:
“In social media, a work often seems inseparable from how we talk about it... Champions of social mediated poetics say, “we’ve all been flattened to virtual handles and data... so literature should be similarly flattened.”
“the poem as selfie is the aesthetic criterion of contemporary verse”. Geoffrey Hill
Does anyone have a memorized copy of Ashbery’s “Soonest Mended”?
The internet is the island of the lotus eaters, it is the house of mirrors, it is brothel and donut shop wrapped into one.
Poet as disruptor, world-creator and conjurer, guardian and spokesperson for the unconcious. As Wallace Stevens spells out in the Man with the Blue Guitar:
“The Man with the Blue Guitar” (excerpts.) by Wallace Stevens:
I
The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.
They said, "You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as they are."
The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."
And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,
A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."
**
commentary:
The Man with the Blue guitar...
and suddenly, we think Green Eggs and Ham... and Sam I am, and Picasso and the sounds – two syllables for the instrument, one for the plural 2nd person of the verb to be,
searching for the key “A tune beyond us, yet ourselves”.
Carmin shared a quote from Miles Davis: Sometimes it takes a long time for you to sound like yourself. David brought up the theatrical set up that asks “who is talking” – on the stage of a world where each player is filled with his/her inevitable subjectivity.
We noted the complaint of color, the insistence that the player get out of the way—and the insistence that there is one way the is real, and Martin offered the idea that reality really only exists in relationship. Perception, measurement, scientists imply are a probability...
Bob Hicok; I also read from the Summer issue of Poetry Northwest his other two poems:
Amen; Oops which capture life in a digital world. What intrigued me about the poem
Love poem with ecological concerns was what kind of expectations we have of a love poem – and how ecological concerns enter in. We read it twice, first sentence by sentence, then line by line, which allowed for a rich layering. ex.
along the course of time to an end
that is really an entering
of forgetting? While those
are three thousand pound questions
I can’t answer, I can change
my ring tone to the dying words ...
so, intimation of death, preceded by a sense of kinship...
And how do I take my skin off
to show the river I know we are family
and in this struggle to have form
together, have duration and wear a name
Emily felt he captured an E.E. Cummings spirit, exploring evanescence and miracle of being alive...even though of limited duration... the “you” at the end of the poem is mysterious – this “you” who would call... hear the ring tone of the dying river... reminded by it that this “you” whose inner water, like the speaker’s inner water, is not here to stay.
The next two poems reflected stoic philosophy – the second one in particular, don’t
pay attention to things that don’t concern you” left a disjointed feel –which Paul compared to reading the dictionary – rarely end up with the word you were looking for.
We also discussed the word “slurring” – whether slurring only to drop to the next line to land on pain, or to take a Stoic view of pain... dismissing it without acknowledging its qualities... which led into a discussion about pain.
The next two poems left us hanging – and we tried to piece together some sense, but abandoned them in hopes maybe someone next week might have an idea.
The final poem “blink” opened up many directions of perception—remembering the “staring game” where the one who blinks first loses; the psychology of blinking to throw someone off; the idiomatic use of things happening “in a blink”. Paul suggested that the speaker of the poem is using the metaphor for whatever small gesture (encompassed by a blink) on which love hinges. Whether we blink because we can’t take in anymore; or in order to take in more... everything has the ability to speed by in blinks whether you count them or not.
Briefly Accept Events as They Occur by Sharon Dolin
-- Epictetus
Pay No Attention to Things That Don’t Concern You by Sharon Dolin
-- Epictetus
Times the Whole World By Zero by Ben Purkert
sweeping psalm by Christopher Janke
Blink by Sid Miller
The poems this week take a peek at some of the contemporary poetry selected from Summer/Fall 2014 Poetry Northwest and one poem from the Boston Review.
In 1969, John Ashbury's "Soonest Mended" starts this way:
“Barely tolerated, living on the margin
In our technological society, we were always having to be rescued
On the brink of destruction, like heroines in Orlando Furioso
Before it was time to start all over again.”
45 years later, we read efforts such as Mathias Svalina: Dream Delivery Service: “I will write the dreams without consultation with the dreamer,& deliver them daily.”
What has changed in our poetry regarding our attitudes towards technology?
What makes us glad to read a poem as vehicle for ruminations and musings on the nature of being human?
Comments from Summer/Fall 2014 Poetry Northwest articles by Zach Savich and Wendy Willis:
“In social media, a work often seems inseparable from how we talk about it... Champions of social mediated poetics say, “we’ve all been flattened to virtual handles and data... so literature should be similarly flattened.”
“the poem as selfie is the aesthetic criterion of contemporary verse”. Geoffrey Hill
Does anyone have a memorized copy of Ashbery’s “Soonest Mended”?
The internet is the island of the lotus eaters, it is the house of mirrors, it is brothel and donut shop wrapped into one.
Poet as disruptor, world-creator and conjurer, guardian and spokesperson for the unconcious. As Wallace Stevens spells out in the Man with the Blue Guitar:
“The Man with the Blue Guitar” (excerpts.) by Wallace Stevens:
I
The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts. The day was green.
They said, "You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as they are."
The man replied, "Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar."
And they said then, "But play, you must,
A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,
A tune upon the blue guitar
Of things exactly as they are."
**
commentary:
The Man with the Blue guitar...
and suddenly, we think Green Eggs and Ham... and Sam I am, and Picasso and the sounds – two syllables for the instrument, one for the plural 2nd person of the verb to be,
searching for the key “A tune beyond us, yet ourselves”.
Carmin shared a quote from Miles Davis: Sometimes it takes a long time for you to sound like yourself. David brought up the theatrical set up that asks “who is talking” – on the stage of a world where each player is filled with his/her inevitable subjectivity.
We noted the complaint of color, the insistence that the player get out of the way—and the insistence that there is one way the is real, and Martin offered the idea that reality really only exists in relationship. Perception, measurement, scientists imply are a probability...
Bob Hicok; I also read from the Summer issue of Poetry Northwest his other two poems:
Amen; Oops which capture life in a digital world. What intrigued me about the poem
Love poem with ecological concerns was what kind of expectations we have of a love poem – and how ecological concerns enter in. We read it twice, first sentence by sentence, then line by line, which allowed for a rich layering. ex.
along the course of time to an end
that is really an entering
of forgetting? While those
are three thousand pound questions
I can’t answer, I can change
my ring tone to the dying words ...
so, intimation of death, preceded by a sense of kinship...
And how do I take my skin off
to show the river I know we are family
and in this struggle to have form
together, have duration and wear a name
Emily felt he captured an E.E. Cummings spirit, exploring evanescence and miracle of being alive...even though of limited duration... the “you” at the end of the poem is mysterious – this “you” who would call... hear the ring tone of the dying river... reminded by it that this “you” whose inner water, like the speaker’s inner water, is not here to stay.
The next two poems reflected stoic philosophy – the second one in particular, don’t
pay attention to things that don’t concern you” left a disjointed feel –which Paul compared to reading the dictionary – rarely end up with the word you were looking for.
We also discussed the word “slurring” – whether slurring only to drop to the next line to land on pain, or to take a Stoic view of pain... dismissing it without acknowledging its qualities... which led into a discussion about pain.
The next two poems left us hanging – and we tried to piece together some sense, but abandoned them in hopes maybe someone next week might have an idea.
The final poem “blink” opened up many directions of perception—remembering the “staring game” where the one who blinks first loses; the psychology of blinking to throw someone off; the idiomatic use of things happening “in a blink”. Paul suggested that the speaker of the poem is using the metaphor for whatever small gesture (encompassed by a blink) on which love hinges. Whether we blink because we can’t take in anymore; or in order to take in more... everything has the ability to speed by in blinks whether you count them or not.
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Poems for September 15
With the Fringe coming up, this week, we discussed a few Cummings poems, which you will be able hear set to to contemporary music -- a different way of "making things new".
There are many different types of poems that Cummings writes... which is a reminder that it is not fair to judge a poet by just a handful of poems. The larger question,
is how others can approach a poem, enjoy it, feel they have seen a piece of the poet, a piece of themselves in a larger part of art.
Flaubert: “Anything becomes interesting if you look at it long enough.”
Poetry isn’t about “getting it” for art is not something to “achieve” succeed in
or fail at, but rather invites us to have a conversation and relationship with it.
I look forward to our conversations!
Poems by Cummings
1. who are you,little i
2. may my heart always be open to little (New Poems, #19; 1938
3. supposing i dreamed this (is 5: 1926; IX from FOUR)
4. Song (but we've the may)
5. your little voice (Tulips, 1925, Amores, I)
6. imagine i'm/ from XAIPE (Greek word for “rejoice”)
(dedicated to Hildegarde Lasell Watson), 1950
7. in the rain- (Tulips, 1925, Amores II)
I find it interesting to compare the comments of the Thursday group with the Monday on the first poem -- "little" seems to be one of those key words for Cummings -- and in addition to looking at the parentheses, the peering of a smaller i, Martin noted that "five or six years old" could also refer to the passage of time--- not necessarily confined to a child, but a feeling which may have happened five or six years ago... Elaine noted the colon after "feeling:" which accentuates the importance of it. Marcie was reminded of the style of A.A. Milne who captured the magical tone of childhood... and Jan shared an anecdote of her 5 year old grandson, who didn't want his mother to grow old. Judith reminded us that English is the only language that capitalizes "I" in the nominative case.
We tried reading the poem aloud in different ways, as we did on Thursday -- a male voice, a female voice, a voice for what is inside and outside the parentheses... each voice finding a unique cadence as the poem unfolded in multiple understandings.
**
May my heart always be open to little / is a perfect poem to read line by line, pausing to allow each line to carry its own meaning, before attaching it to the next line. The slant rhymes are rich -- fail/smile; eye-rhymes of wrong/young; the juxtapositions of old/stroll; separating of hungry and thirsty with fearless and supple (echoes of "pull" in usefully, truly). Cummings weaves a rich texture with simultaneous sounds and possibilities. We discussed as well the missing "much", which would have ruined the rhythm and not allowed "love yourself so" to stand on its own next to "more than truly". I asked if people felt "pulling the sky over w/ a smile" was a little too sentimental, still thinking about the critique of Cummings as a minor poet, stuck in adolescence. What word other than smile would foil the "fail"?
Supposing i dream this... we noted how the wind does wrap -- words are pulled closer together separated by commas without spaces, and no one swells to noone'echoing the double "o" of fool...and latter "poor".
The 'f" wonderful/flower/laughing juxtaposes with dark jealousy -- and one senses a
complex view of a couple... We commented also on how Cummings, even when embracing a serious theme, still seems to have fun-- not to say that there is a playful tone here, but(one senses even with the darkness, the roaming, unhinged wind)he is enjoying the way he is crafting the feeling. 2nd Stanza, "since the best he can do/ is to peer through windows,unobserved -- the "he" seems to be self-observing...
Just as Thursday's group noted, everyone concurs how a Cummings' poem keeps growing in breadth and scope the more you decipher in it.
"But we’ve the may" as a first line, introduces syntax as an entity unto itself... what does "may" mean as subjunctive (will, possibility, uncertainty, desire, doubt) or as month, when one dances around the may pole? Must, when, now, until follow suit --
saying, doing, growing -- "without until". Marcie pinpointed how we use "until" --
da-da-da-da-da of life goes on until... and something ruins it, or changes it...
There was a typo -- 4th stanza -- it is "dim" not drim -- although we enjoyed the neologism.
Your little voice: Elaine noted the sense of witnessing whirling dervishes with the dizzy spacing and how the tone rises to an ecstatic otherness... We all enjoyed the sense of random capitalizations (and how they are NOT random! ex. up/Up which connects the alliterative "delicious dancing"(up) "Up" to the contradictory "pale important" //
how Humorous makes you think of medicinal humors and humerus bones
This is such a contrast from the first poem, where "little" is important to his emotional interior. Martin wondered about his poems as dreams where reality is a dreamscape where disparate things merge...)
imagine i'm ... we discussed at length the shape -- a breast with a nipple, pregnant lady, half a spinning top, a French soldier's helmet, a diamond cut in half… crosses of Calvary… drawn back bow or arrowhead. We tried reading it in different ways to capture the sense of interruptions...
i’m asking you dear to…
what else could a…
no but it doesn’t…
of course but you don’t seem to realize /i can’t make
it OR..
i can't make it clearer…
war just isn’t what we imagine …
but please for god’s…
O what the hell/ yes it’s true…
(it's true that was me)
That was me but that me isn’t me…
can’t you see now…
no not any — christ (swearing) but you
(but you) must understand
why
because
i am
dead
Yes, I made a typo with yell... which works pretty well, but it is what the hell.
What is the O... god's O... omega, fullness, and the only capitalized letter in the poem? Kathy summarized it as "inner thoughts about war" -- the turmoil of it...
We ended on in the rain --
and spent some time on "rarely-beloved" rare as unusual… what is coined in sunset...
Back to little i... and the wonder of day linked by sunset to night... and the morning starts again, thinking of one's lover... how rare and precious...
So much more to say. I have tried to point out possibilities that lie in our very rich, very marvellous discussion.
There are many different types of poems that Cummings writes... which is a reminder that it is not fair to judge a poet by just a handful of poems. The larger question,
is how others can approach a poem, enjoy it, feel they have seen a piece of the poet, a piece of themselves in a larger part of art.
Flaubert: “Anything becomes interesting if you look at it long enough.”
Poetry isn’t about “getting it” for art is not something to “achieve” succeed in
or fail at, but rather invites us to have a conversation and relationship with it.
I look forward to our conversations!
Poems by Cummings
1. who are you,little i
2. may my heart always be open to little (New Poems, #19; 1938
3. supposing i dreamed this (is 5: 1926; IX from FOUR)
4. Song (but we've the may)
5. your little voice (Tulips, 1925, Amores, I)
6. imagine i'm/ from XAIPE (Greek word for “rejoice”)
(dedicated to Hildegarde Lasell Watson), 1950
7. in the rain- (Tulips, 1925, Amores II)
I find it interesting to compare the comments of the Thursday group with the Monday on the first poem -- "little" seems to be one of those key words for Cummings -- and in addition to looking at the parentheses, the peering of a smaller i, Martin noted that "five or six years old" could also refer to the passage of time--- not necessarily confined to a child, but a feeling which may have happened five or six years ago... Elaine noted the colon after "feeling:" which accentuates the importance of it. Marcie was reminded of the style of A.A. Milne who captured the magical tone of childhood... and Jan shared an anecdote of her 5 year old grandson, who didn't want his mother to grow old. Judith reminded us that English is the only language that capitalizes "I" in the nominative case.
We tried reading the poem aloud in different ways, as we did on Thursday -- a male voice, a female voice, a voice for what is inside and outside the parentheses... each voice finding a unique cadence as the poem unfolded in multiple understandings.
**
May my heart always be open to little / is a perfect poem to read line by line, pausing to allow each line to carry its own meaning, before attaching it to the next line. The slant rhymes are rich -- fail/smile; eye-rhymes of wrong/young; the juxtapositions of old/stroll; separating of hungry and thirsty with fearless and supple (echoes of "pull" in usefully, truly). Cummings weaves a rich texture with simultaneous sounds and possibilities. We discussed as well the missing "much", which would have ruined the rhythm and not allowed "love yourself so" to stand on its own next to "more than truly". I asked if people felt "pulling the sky over w/ a smile" was a little too sentimental, still thinking about the critique of Cummings as a minor poet, stuck in adolescence. What word other than smile would foil the "fail"?
Supposing i dream this... we noted how the wind does wrap -- words are pulled closer together separated by commas without spaces, and no one swells to noone'echoing the double "o" of fool...and latter "poor".
The 'f" wonderful/flower/laughing juxtaposes with dark jealousy -- and one senses a
complex view of a couple... We commented also on how Cummings, even when embracing a serious theme, still seems to have fun-- not to say that there is a playful tone here, but(one senses even with the darkness, the roaming, unhinged wind)he is enjoying the way he is crafting the feeling. 2nd Stanza, "since the best he can do/ is to peer through windows,unobserved -- the "he" seems to be self-observing...
Just as Thursday's group noted, everyone concurs how a Cummings' poem keeps growing in breadth and scope the more you decipher in it.
"But we’ve the may" as a first line, introduces syntax as an entity unto itself... what does "may" mean as subjunctive (will, possibility, uncertainty, desire, doubt) or as month, when one dances around the may pole? Must, when, now, until follow suit --
saying, doing, growing -- "without until". Marcie pinpointed how we use "until" --
da-da-da-da-da of life goes on until... and something ruins it, or changes it...
There was a typo -- 4th stanza -- it is "dim" not drim -- although we enjoyed the neologism.
Your little voice: Elaine noted the sense of witnessing whirling dervishes with the dizzy spacing and how the tone rises to an ecstatic otherness... We all enjoyed the sense of random capitalizations (and how they are NOT random! ex. up/Up which connects the alliterative "delicious dancing"(up) "Up" to the contradictory "pale important" //
how Humorous makes you think of medicinal humors and humerus bones
This is such a contrast from the first poem, where "little" is important to his emotional interior. Martin wondered about his poems as dreams where reality is a dreamscape where disparate things merge...)
imagine i'm ... we discussed at length the shape -- a breast with a nipple, pregnant lady, half a spinning top, a French soldier's helmet, a diamond cut in half… crosses of Calvary… drawn back bow or arrowhead. We tried reading it in different ways to capture the sense of interruptions...
i’m asking you dear to…
what else could a…
no but it doesn’t…
of course but you don’t seem to realize /i can’t make
it OR..
i can't make it clearer…
war just isn’t what we imagine …
but please for god’s…
O what the hell/ yes it’s true…
(it's true that was me)
That was me but that me isn’t me…
can’t you see now…
no not any — christ (swearing) but you
(but you) must understand
why
because
i am
dead
Yes, I made a typo with yell... which works pretty well, but it is what the hell.
What is the O... god's O... omega, fullness, and the only capitalized letter in the poem? Kathy summarized it as "inner thoughts about war" -- the turmoil of it...
We ended on in the rain --
and spent some time on "rarely-beloved" rare as unusual… what is coined in sunset...
Back to little i... and the wonder of day linked by sunset to night... and the morning starts again, thinking of one's lover... how rare and precious...
So much more to say. I have tried to point out possibilities that lie in our very rich, very marvellous discussion.
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Poems for September 11 -- CUMMINGS
E.E. Cummings ! and one poem by Pablo Neruda
by Cummings (first lines)
Unto Thee I
who are you,little i
may my heart always be open to little
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
one//t //his
(a// le
If you forget me — by Pablo Neruda
To prepare for the upcoming Fringe and special performance of Cummings in musical settings, I showed the loop that will be given before the performance. The first four Cummings poems are part of the CD. It is interesting to me to hear two different composers write different versions: for instance, both Joyce Hagen and Regina Baiocchi have written versions of "i carry your heart" and "i like my body". Baiocchi likes to give her own title, as Cummings usually doesn't have one. In the case of "i like my body" Hagan also gave her title, "so quite new" , whereas Baiocchi chose "love crumbs". Knowing that composers are interpreting the poems with their personal idea of lyrics is yet another step beyond discussing the poems in our group.
Both Christine Donkin and Hilary Tann wrote versions of "who are you little i"
which are quite different. I do hope you will come hear the music at the Fringe in the Sproull Atrium, Sat. Sept. 20 at 6 pm.
unto thee i : from Tulips published in 1922 in the section called Orientales
we noted the formal “Thee” and “thou” – sacred implications; the I and Thee could be inseparable. The poems feels bathed in softness with heavy alliteration of /f/s/l –
like a prayer rising as the poem trickles down the page. We noted line breaks
such as 3rd stanza, “...inhale the”
and the eye must travel before arriving on the word
“slow”
Ending on the foreign word, as if landing in a mysterious land.
who are you little i – published 1963, in 73 poems, year after his death
Juxtapose the sound of long and short I:
I: i / night / high
i: six / window/ if
Elaine noted the cleverness of five (long I) or six (short I) – where the important first person as a child has nothing to do with the adult world. Mike noted how “i” is a pair of eyes peering .– Inside (in parentheses) the child knows a wonderful way of feeling not just what a sunset is, but an acceptance of day/having to become night – with so many more implications.
The bigness of little is held in a parenthesis!
may my heart always be open to little - published in 1938
Each line can be read alone by itself and then read again with the next line – so two simultaneous thoughts.
then slow down further.
May my heart always be open
to little
birds
and suddenly the heart is addressing (the birds who are) the secrets of living.
Note how hungry and thirsty are separated by the positive, “fearless” and “supple”.
2nd line of last stanza: note how “much” is implied after so – if you have a break as you read the line it changes the meaning.
and love yourself so more than truly.
I don’t know if the 3rd stanza is zen – having the courage to let go to do nothing –
what is do nothing usefully?
i carry your heart with me - published in 1958
We read both stanza by stanza and with 2 voices – one within and one outside the parentheses. The doubling gives a strong feeling tone – almost possessive –
and the marvelous capacity of love that lies inside, and yet allows the stars the freedom to follow their own path in this interconnectedness.
The two vertical poems.
one//t is from Xaipe (which means rejoice in Greek) published in 1950.
The first and last word: one
the light in alighting, is lightened by floating, so both not heavy, but also a source of light. One this / is not a usual combination. One. This snowflake is upon a gravestone.
Where are the other snowflakes. Addresses the unicity of one. Preserves the unicity of the one under the grave. The gravest one. The more you decipher, the deeper it becomes.
l(a : published in 1958 – I apologize – the “l” was missing in the handout.
l (a leaf fall s) one l ness.
The two l’s, like I’s or ones, are separated by what’s in parentheses. one is followed by l,
which is not the same (1 is numeric, one is spelled). The loneliness heightened.
if you forget me:
I don’t know who the translator is, but it would be important, as Jim pointed out, to know.
We spoke of the psychological steeling one can do, so that if you are not longer with your loved one, (your beloved country, your beloved profession), it will be easier to accept the loss. Neruda cautions himself, anticipates, yet warns, giving a sense of both imminent separation, and hope.
by Cummings (first lines)
Unto Thee I
who are you,little i
may my heart always be open to little
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
one//t //his
(a// le
If you forget me — by Pablo Neruda
To prepare for the upcoming Fringe and special performance of Cummings in musical settings, I showed the loop that will be given before the performance. The first four Cummings poems are part of the CD. It is interesting to me to hear two different composers write different versions: for instance, both Joyce Hagen and Regina Baiocchi have written versions of "i carry your heart" and "i like my body". Baiocchi likes to give her own title, as Cummings usually doesn't have one. In the case of "i like my body" Hagan also gave her title, "so quite new" , whereas Baiocchi chose "love crumbs". Knowing that composers are interpreting the poems with their personal idea of lyrics is yet another step beyond discussing the poems in our group.
Both Christine Donkin and Hilary Tann wrote versions of "who are you little i"
which are quite different. I do hope you will come hear the music at the Fringe in the Sproull Atrium, Sat. Sept. 20 at 6 pm.
unto thee i : from Tulips published in 1922 in the section called Orientales
we noted the formal “Thee” and “thou” – sacred implications; the I and Thee could be inseparable. The poems feels bathed in softness with heavy alliteration of /f/s/l –
like a prayer rising as the poem trickles down the page. We noted line breaks
such as 3rd stanza, “...inhale the”
and the eye must travel before arriving on the word
“slow”
Ending on the foreign word, as if landing in a mysterious land.
who are you little i – published 1963, in 73 poems, year after his death
Juxtapose the sound of long and short I:
I: i / night / high
i: six / window/ if
Elaine noted the cleverness of five (long I) or six (short I) – where the important first person as a child has nothing to do with the adult world. Mike noted how “i” is a pair of eyes peering .– Inside (in parentheses) the child knows a wonderful way of feeling not just what a sunset is, but an acceptance of day/having to become night – with so many more implications.
The bigness of little is held in a parenthesis!
may my heart always be open to little - published in 1938
Each line can be read alone by itself and then read again with the next line – so two simultaneous thoughts.
then slow down further.
May my heart always be open
to little
birds
and suddenly the heart is addressing (the birds who are) the secrets of living.
Note how hungry and thirsty are separated by the positive, “fearless” and “supple”.
2nd line of last stanza: note how “much” is implied after so – if you have a break as you read the line it changes the meaning.
and love yourself so more than truly.
I don’t know if the 3rd stanza is zen – having the courage to let go to do nothing –
what is do nothing usefully?
i carry your heart with me - published in 1958
We read both stanza by stanza and with 2 voices – one within and one outside the parentheses. The doubling gives a strong feeling tone – almost possessive –
and the marvelous capacity of love that lies inside, and yet allows the stars the freedom to follow their own path in this interconnectedness.
The two vertical poems.
one//t is from Xaipe (which means rejoice in Greek) published in 1950.
The first and last word: one
the light in alighting, is lightened by floating, so both not heavy, but also a source of light. One this / is not a usual combination. One. This snowflake is upon a gravestone.
Where are the other snowflakes. Addresses the unicity of one. Preserves the unicity of the one under the grave. The gravest one. The more you decipher, the deeper it becomes.
l(a : published in 1958 – I apologize – the “l” was missing in the handout.
l (a leaf fall s) one l ness.
The two l’s, like I’s or ones, are separated by what’s in parentheses. one is followed by l,
which is not the same (1 is numeric, one is spelled). The loneliness heightened.
if you forget me:
I don’t know who the translator is, but it would be important, as Jim pointed out, to know.
We spoke of the psychological steeling one can do, so that if you are not longer with your loved one, (your beloved country, your beloved profession), it will be easier to accept the loss. Neruda cautions himself, anticipates, yet warns, giving a sense of both imminent separation, and hope.
Tuesday, September 9, 2014
poems for September 8
How do poems reflect time periods political and social slants? If someone wrote a baseball poem in 2014 would it have anything in common with Thayer's late 19th century favorite, or Williams' approach?
In contrast, what are the satisfying characteristics of Kenyon's "songs", Ryan's pithy wit and Siken's self-absorbed man?
Casey at the Bat by Ernest Lawrence Thayer (published in the Examiner, 6-3-1888 – for fun see http://www.baseball-almanac.com/poetry/po_case.shtml)
The crowd at the ball game by William Carlos Williams (1938)
Three Songs at the End of Summer by Jane Kenyon (in Otherwise, published by Graywolf Press in 1996)
In Case of Complete Reversal -- Kay Ryan (in Poetry, September 2014)
Landscape With a Blur of Conquerors by Richard Siken (2014)
I wonder, like Auden about influences -- who has read whom, and can we tell?
“When reading a poet who found his own voice after 1922, I often come across a cadence or a trick of diction which makes me say “Oh, he’s read Hardy, or Yeats, or Rilke” but seldom, if ever can I detect an immediate, direct influence from Eliot. His indirect influence has, of course, been immense, but I should be hard put to it to say exactly what it is.” – W.H. Auden
This heads an article about Eliot and oral performance of poetry.
Would we change our opinion of The Waste Land if reading "He Do the Police in Different Voices"? How differently will we read Casey, the crowd, the sounds of summer and the sobs, Ryan's clipped almost cryptic short lines... the meditative verse of the poet talking to himself -- or maybe to nobody...
*
Monday's discussion started and ended with poems that hook the audience -- diction, sounds, images wrap us into a baseball came, and a painter's world of choices, making us feel part of the process -- and arriving at more universal considerations.
Whether written in 1988 or 2014, written as a joke or as a serious writer, the point remains, that we poems that touch us, give us a piece of ourselves to think about in the larger context of humanity.
Casey at the Bat, written in 1888 is "The Night Before Christmas" has lively sounds that bring alive a gripping baseball game, the hopes pinned on a hero, his arrogance and his downfall. The anti-climatic stroke is the failure of the bat to meet the ball,but more than "air" is shattered by the blow -- we as readers are, and know the spectators in Mudville. The poem doesn't tell us this, or try to hammer us with a lesson, and we in our discussion, we enjoyed bringing in examples of politicians and iconic figures who are built up as answers, but whose arrogance interferes.
Williams delivers a more cerebral poem about crowd mentality, where the baseball game is quite incidental. Written in 1923, a quick review of history will reveal changes in Europe, the return of the last US troops from Germany, the rising price of bread, fall of the German mark, rise of power of Hitler. Also, some KKK action, and in Italy, all non-fascist parties are dissolved. George Bernard Shaw's "St. Joan" is performed. All of these events have an impact on crowds...
Williams captures in clattering couplets what is.... parallel to what the crowd is...
Kenyon's "Three Songs at the End of Summer" started a discussion about depression, happiness, the difficulty of being so when someone is screaming at you, "Relax, relax", and how she blends different aspects of time. The crescendo of feeling from crows and midwives, to the "right now" of the sounds of the camp, breaks into the 6 lines of wrenching sobbing that wracks her entire body, before entering a
childhood memory... as if the tears were her entry way to the deep interior part of her, knowing, she is about to die...
The Kay Ryan poem, elicited a discussion about accessibility, and what makes a poem, feel like a poem: how do we sense that each word is carefully chosen... how does the non-linear arrangement of two sentences reveal a depth of thought over time?
Martin reminded us that built into an event is the opposite. Hearing “your son fell off the horse...” might sound bad, without knowing this is the thing that will save him from going to war.
How strange to talk about a thing that isn’t, a direction that could be!
mutation...
how to understand this... the age of miracles...
how we find ways to cope.
vs. Kenyon's “this is the only life I have...”
Many felt Ryan reinforced the resilience of life to adapt...
Is a stack of minuses thus, not negative, but rather a storehouse that will provide an out?
Judith reminded us that the way to paint bamboo is to paint bamboo until you don’t know you’re painting it.
John brought us the point that as a species, we are programmed to multiply... but have ability to commit suicide... abort...
The final poem, Landscape With a Blur of Conquerors by Richard Siken feels as if it is on the way to being abstract... but is recognizable... How do we create, and what how do we wield power? We go with Siken to explore what this means in the poem.
One of his comments about the poem was this: "I’m uncomfortable with the way I contaminate the world with myself, with my greed and hungers and multiplicities. What’s the answer? That’s a good question.”
He allows us as readers to look at our greed, hungers and multiplicities.
Saturday, September 6, 2014
Rundel September 4
Among the Elements in a Time of War by Eamon Grennan
First Song by Joseph Stroud
The Juggler by Richard Wilbur
Realism by Czeslaw Milosz (written in his 80’s)
Of The Work of Love and Why She Has This Book Made by Doreen Gildroy
In Dead Poets Society, Williams plays unorthodox professor John Keating, who rejects the conservative culture of the elite Welton Academy and implores his students to strive for meaning in their lives. In the film’s pivotal scene, Williams tells his students, “we don't read and write poetry because it’s cute, we read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for...”
He goes on to quote Walt Whitman’s “O Me! O Life!,” a poem that ends by speaking directly to its readers: “You are you, and life goes on... the powerful play goes on and you will contribute a verse. What will your verse be?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_zsMwCOoEs&feature=youtu.be
The poems last week reflected elements, such as fire, air, sky, water, earth, but juxtaposed with war; the transformation of blossom to hummingbird wing; a poem which juggled form and rhyme as it described a juggler and how it is that we defy gravity, turn the table on ordinary things; a meditation on Dutch painting and life; a description of what can happen by taking five minutes to oneself.
**
For the first poem, directions were to read, until you wanted to stop!
For some, that meant pausing at the end of a line; for others, at the end of a phrase, others to read a long line followed by an indented line...
So how does line inform an innate feeling tone? We noted the anthropomorphic fog, face of earth, the sounds that enveloped each element. Such great brokenness in one uninterrupted (aside from the lines) stanza with indents... silence of the present moment. This poem develops a sense of waiting, the way it is in war, someone pointed out, where 99% of the time one waits, and then the 1% of unimaginable destruction comes. Here the last line is the earth itself-- its indifference for a moment broken
could not stop sobbing... Powerful.
Joseph Stroud, born in 1943 in California, has an odd use of punctuation.We read up to each period to feel how the sentence (or lack of one) pulls against the line. It starts with a fragment, 3rd line ending with a period followed by "I thought" which does thread a sentence on the next two lines. Wonderful use of enjambement with 7th line,
heads/disappeared; and 5th line up from the bottom, "bloodstone/turned".
The poem ends with two mysterious fragments, allowing us to ponder "all these gone years". The group had varying ideas of the horses at the end, as well as the moon-crossing blackness, some feeling a sense of dread, others a sense of reassurance.
Wilbur has done it again -- wit, masterful form, still providing poems in his 90's!
The Juggler appeared in the May/June 2014 issue of American Poetry Review.
We read this one also up to a period, to see how the chaotic first stanza smooths into a more regular 6 line stanza with both rhyme and slant end rhyme. The explosion of exuberance, the crash in the penultimate stanza is following by three "if's"
in a quiet afterthought which made some feel "zen at work, clearing out the cobwebs, breathing in and out our energies." The props lie still, but we would clap for someone who can defy the ordinary, the weight of the world -- for once.
Milosz takes a different perspective of the ordinary. We again read up to a period to draw attention to the variety of line length and sentence. Yet more fragments.
Recognizable still lives. A spot of light in the stark and cloudy landscapes leads to the thought that all this was painted, here eternally, because once, it was. The next word is "Splendor (certainly incomprehensible)/touches... and then we have a series of paradoxical surprises -- cracked wall, refuse heap, jerkins of rustics, a broom and two fish bleeding.
But the surprise is not finished! A sudden duo of imperatives appear -- Rejoice! Give Thanks. At the end it is OUR song -- rising like smoke from a censer -- as if purified...
The final poem was an arrangement of one sentence in a couplet, two singletons; a couplet, one singleton; two couplets, one singleton a couplet.
Having a line stand by itself with white space of a stanza still hangs on to what precedes it, yet allow both to be independent. I love this kind of collage, and Gildroy does it well.
and made myself : could mean, compose oneself
think about : could be a command, as if another person is there under the tree.
and made myself think about, is a whole different story.
The creation of a voice grabbing her heart from this 5 minute pause feels as savage as an excavation in a mine. Great contrasts of tone...
First Song by Joseph Stroud
The Juggler by Richard Wilbur
Realism by Czeslaw Milosz (written in his 80’s)
Of The Work of Love and Why She Has This Book Made by Doreen Gildroy
In Dead Poets Society, Williams plays unorthodox professor John Keating, who rejects the conservative culture of the elite Welton Academy and implores his students to strive for meaning in their lives. In the film’s pivotal scene, Williams tells his students, “we don't read and write poetry because it’s cute, we read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for...”
He goes on to quote Walt Whitman’s “O Me! O Life!,” a poem that ends by speaking directly to its readers: “You are you, and life goes on... the powerful play goes on and you will contribute a verse. What will your verse be?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_zsMwCOoEs&feature=youtu.be
The poems last week reflected elements, such as fire, air, sky, water, earth, but juxtaposed with war; the transformation of blossom to hummingbird wing; a poem which juggled form and rhyme as it described a juggler and how it is that we defy gravity, turn the table on ordinary things; a meditation on Dutch painting and life; a description of what can happen by taking five minutes to oneself.
**
For the first poem, directions were to read, until you wanted to stop!
For some, that meant pausing at the end of a line; for others, at the end of a phrase, others to read a long line followed by an indented line...
So how does line inform an innate feeling tone? We noted the anthropomorphic fog, face of earth, the sounds that enveloped each element. Such great brokenness in one uninterrupted (aside from the lines) stanza with indents... silence of the present moment. This poem develops a sense of waiting, the way it is in war, someone pointed out, where 99% of the time one waits, and then the 1% of unimaginable destruction comes. Here the last line is the earth itself-- its indifference for a moment broken
could not stop sobbing... Powerful.
Joseph Stroud, born in 1943 in California, has an odd use of punctuation.We read up to each period to feel how the sentence (or lack of one) pulls against the line. It starts with a fragment, 3rd line ending with a period followed by "I thought" which does thread a sentence on the next two lines. Wonderful use of enjambement with 7th line,
heads/disappeared; and 5th line up from the bottom, "bloodstone/turned".
The poem ends with two mysterious fragments, allowing us to ponder "all these gone years". The group had varying ideas of the horses at the end, as well as the moon-crossing blackness, some feeling a sense of dread, others a sense of reassurance.
Wilbur has done it again -- wit, masterful form, still providing poems in his 90's!
The Juggler appeared in the May/June 2014 issue of American Poetry Review.
We read this one also up to a period, to see how the chaotic first stanza smooths into a more regular 6 line stanza with both rhyme and slant end rhyme. The explosion of exuberance, the crash in the penultimate stanza is following by three "if's"
in a quiet afterthought which made some feel "zen at work, clearing out the cobwebs, breathing in and out our energies." The props lie still, but we would clap for someone who can defy the ordinary, the weight of the world -- for once.
Milosz takes a different perspective of the ordinary. We again read up to a period to draw attention to the variety of line length and sentence. Yet more fragments.
Recognizable still lives. A spot of light in the stark and cloudy landscapes leads to the thought that all this was painted, here eternally, because once, it was. The next word is "Splendor (certainly incomprehensible)/touches... and then we have a series of paradoxical surprises -- cracked wall, refuse heap, jerkins of rustics, a broom and two fish bleeding.
But the surprise is not finished! A sudden duo of imperatives appear -- Rejoice! Give Thanks. At the end it is OUR song -- rising like smoke from a censer -- as if purified...
The final poem was an arrangement of one sentence in a couplet, two singletons; a couplet, one singleton; two couplets, one singleton a couplet.
Having a line stand by itself with white space of a stanza still hangs on to what precedes it, yet allow both to be independent. I love this kind of collage, and Gildroy does it well.
and made myself : could mean, compose oneself
think about : could be a command, as if another person is there under the tree.
and made myself think about, is a whole different story.
The creation of a voice grabbing her heart from this 5 minute pause feels as savage as an excavation in a mine. Great contrasts of tone...
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