poems for January 30-31

American Sonnet for the New Year by Terrance Hayes

Eunomia- Poem by Solon

snow by Patty Crane
Hummingbird Abecedarianby Aimee Nezhukumatathil

From the Book of Time (excerpt)

When Death Comes  by Mary Oliver

Breakage by Mary Oliver 

The American Sonnet, published in a recent issue of The New Yorker, has the audio recording of Terrance Hayes reading, which makes for an interesting contrast of how a reader might interpret this 14 liner,

filled with repeating words, ingenious adverbs, and absolutely no advice from the traditional use of

line endings or punctuation, and how the poet does.  We discussed at length the choices a poet makes

by giving such information or not, and how that influences the message of the poem.  Perhaps it is

an insidious method, to allow an emotional layer of rage with overtones of what makes an "ugly American", not just the ugly "things" .  Our eyes lined up "things" as the un-capitalized subject of unpunctuated sentences; noted the placement of ugly, present in each line, except the penultimate one (regularly truly quickly things got really incredibly/// saving "ugly" as first word as the beginning of the last line).

The possibilities for contradictory meanings are amazing.

The next poem, by Solon, (638-558BC) one of the seven wise men of Greece were well-known, both to each other and to the general public reflects his law-making background and rhetorical skill. When Anacharsis, one of these wise men, came to visit Solon in Athens, saw Athenian democracy at work, he remarked that it was strange that in Athens wise men spoke and fools decided.  Our current

New Year in America would be characterized by Dysnomia, named in the poem for bringing 

"countless evils for the city".  I love the rich discussion that ensues from each person’s observations as we discuss poems.  What makes a poem a “successful poem” varies for each. After reading Solon (in translation,) How does this response to the one above strike you?  https://thepoetryprojectsite.wordpress.com/2017/03/05/eunomia-by-solon/  

 Both poems point to the role of poetry to address politics and the common good.

Snow, a poem found on Verse Daily, speaks as well to the structure of poetry to address the tendency to lump a noun into one term.  The first stanza arranges the rhythm -- repetition of snow, the 

breathiness of flakes fallen, each labelled snow, 

                   " Not a single flake alike
but all of them       spoken for                   
                and we think nothing of it"

the breath before the "naming" and the "thinking nothing of it" applying to the nuanced layering of both. naming, individuality.  The second stanza with its measured mention of three birds,

followed by                 "Think bird is bird is bird is" has the same nuance -- is it the three birds

who think this, or is it a command to the reader to apply "bird" to the different names, or both

and more?  Like the Hayes sonnet, how do you emphasize the words:  Think bird.... is bird... 

is bird... is... or Think.... Bird is... bird is... bird is... or perhaps bird is bird.... is bird... is

Oh the power of words!  We delighted in the lineation of the final stanza where the bird

is set free from "word cages"!  

The Abecedarian met with less success.  More like a clever exercise applied to understanding the rhythm of her father's language... but did not move the heart. 

The three Mary Oliver poems contrasted her style.  Most know her from "Wild Geese", "The Journey",  and poems like "Mr. Death", or in this case, "When Death Comes" which also mentions

each life as common/singular flower... each with a "comfortable music in the mouth", "precious to the Earth".  She first wraps the reader in a sense of acceptance, belonging, value, hen invites the reader

to contemplate how the gift of life is used... Her lines "I was a bride married to amazement./

I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms." have been often quoted.    She sets up

the formula, "When it's over... I don't want" -- but beyond this anaphor, variation.. twice, when it's over,

and twice positives... but  "I don't want" comes three times... as if our power to choose will ensure

the last line, "I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world."

Indeed, her poems show us how to live so we won't feel this way. One of the group felt so discouraged...

as if indeed she hadn't gotten beyond "sighing, feeling frightened, judging whether she had  made of my life something particular, and real."  And so I quoted Wild Geese -- "You do not have to be good...."

"From the Book of Time" is the title of  Part Three in the book-long poem, "The Leaf and the Cloud".

The book is masterfully arranged in 7 poems, and Part 3 also has 7 parts.  I only used the first two,

which are positive.  Here we have the "philosophical" and spiritual Mary Oliver, inviting us to 

consider the particular leaf, the cloud, so often treated "cloud is cloud is cloud".  I love that the nouns

"leaves" and "clouds" are also verbs in both singular and plural -- not the only pronoun in English

that makes them sound singular, is 3rd person singular.

I chose "Breakage" as an example of Oliver's fine craftsmanship. She hints at "the whole story" in the title, the mention of gulls, creates a coherence of images of particular shells resonant with voice.  It convinced

the more professorial in the group that  Mary Oliver is not "just a sentimental poet,  good for people who read poems for healing."  And what is wrong with that?  Her poems are memorable, accessible... 

and well-crafted, imbued with a generosity that acts like a salve on the soul.