Poems for January 27

 Because of the Inauguration,  no meeting of poetry, however we had the gift of a national youth poet laureate, in addition to the inaugural address!

Amanda Gorman's poem, We Climb the Hill: https://www.nationalmemo.com/amanda-gorman-

Much is in the press about her: poemhttps://www.npr.org/sections/biden-transition-updates/2021/01/19/958077401/history-has-its-eyes-on-us-poet-amanda-gorman-seeks-right-words-for-inauguration?fbclid=IwAR2cjEvAfM3dGEZ51x7-K0mPukhQr7eZJitNZPmBw2wRIfcxUbKirTRhyW8

Her poem for Thanksgiving  https://www.allamericanspeakers.com/speakers/438889/Amanda-Gorman?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=1581483563&utm_content=492911472127&utm_term=amanda%20gorman&gclid=Cj0KCQiAjKqABhDLARIsABbJrGmBYD8Jmx7Dij_EBxCw83XkOAlDzyQX_vy7lS0A74ZwF7J33csqCdMaArxtEALw_wcB

Back to poetry... 

Roman Poem Number Thirteen  by June Jordan

The Admission by Marvin Bell  (1963)

The Alphabet  by Marvin Bell 

Yes  by Marvin Bell

Song on Porcelain by Czeslaw Milosz

Dutchman’s Breeches by Mary Swander

Yellowjackets by Yusef Komunyakaa

What do you think June Jordan means by a "roman poem" ?  How are the poems from Marvin Bell  still pertinent to today, (although The Admission was written almost 60 years ago)? The Milosz poem was suggested by Judith, having heard a lecture offered through the Frick on Messien porcelain. In view of the storming of the capital the week prior to the inauguration, it seemed a fitting "scant on the destruction of war" to adopt her expression about Milosz referring to the violent destruction of the 1000 piece Swan collection made for a Germano-Polish magnate of the early 18th c.  There are only 100 pieces left of this ornate original (exhorbitantly expensive) set after the Soviet army came through Messien and not only used it for target practice but deliberately ran over it with tanks.  

Reminders of spring come with Swander poem... and in the final poem, a fine portrait of the hard life of a worker—and through metaphor, the terrible, clumsy beauty of his final moments.

Nutshell: 

June Jordan: We puzzled about the title -- are there other "Roman Poems" (I only saw #5) -- is Thirteen a symbolic XIII in some way?  Who is Eddie? Although we didn't discuss the last line... Perhaps he is "my love".

This is a more complex poem than perhaps we had time to understand.  What is choice?  What kinds of choices are no choice at all? The second line reminded us of a CNN screen... or current zoom rooms.

The line breaks with "last" and "past" accentuate what seems like a choice between a rock and a hard place, i.e. neither desirable.  The opening is haunting -- "Only our hearts will argue hard  against - the news and it looks at first to be a choice between "the small lights letting in the news" and those who choose between the worst possibility and death; the [temporary] winners of a war and the war that kills us all.  But she goes on-- and twice the question is posed "who can choose".  She is not shy to give answer:  There/is no choice in these.  

 If you have any doubt that killing and war are horrific and leave no winners, this poem will be sure to extinguish that thought.  

We thought "dry gas" domination a metaphor for the extra "umph" in cold weather when the car doesn't start and a little dry gas does the trick.    Poems of Exile, published in 1974.  I'm not sure when this poem was written. 

Marvin Bell:  

These three poems are from a marvelous interview with Marvin at age 83 -- https://decembermag.org/an-interview-with-marvin-bell-and-three-poems/

The first, written when he was 33; the second at age 39, the last at age 78. 

1) The Admission.  Another poem that is challenging, and yet, filled with recognizable themes and familiar words.  To start with the title... why The Admission?  Some of the thoughts: an admission is an acknowledgement,  and in the case of being admitted to something,  allows/permits a potentially life-changing experience. It would seem the poem is addressing a couple from the angles of  both in time and space, with the implied past of bridges burn behind... the "landscape"... We discussed at length the mysterious "it" after the beginning of the second sentence:  "The surroundings affect us;/it is a cause /for love/that you call it/something logical,/taking pleasure in/our finding/ ourselves here/

Why do words matter when our actions speak louder? and yet it is the affirmation, confirmation of words that lead us to understanding.  David S. brought up  Henry James and the plight of the man who never declares himself.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beast_in_the_Jungle

There is very little punctuation, only a few semi-colons... and one senses the poet is not trying for a poem that "has a terminal pleasure" but rather painting a sense of time passing... an imbedded stumbling  "I have not turned towards you" leading to "before I forget... /openings I had not thought of /turning toward" -- 

to tell you, and to tell you/to tell me.  After reading it for the 20th time, I'm still not sure "I've got it"... What does it mean to say to someone, "I love you"... how would you say what it means to you?  For sure, one agrees, "words have meaning... no gift will do".  Admission is not a gift. 

2) The Alphabet. Ah! what happens when you make 26 letters your own?  I love that the reader is given the enigmatic hint: "lines between birthdays"... three parts:  how "people" use words (commonalities, but how differently we all manage); the importance of developing your own voice... individuation of a proper name...

Bernie brought up the idea -- that one's name [i.e. one's life live up to it] be a blessing. In the third part,

facing the common road, like everyone... the as yet unvoiced expression that his job will be to find his way.

We spoke a bit about encouragement as well:  to earn encourage requires courage to be willing and able to try out your own voice.

3) Yes . We live differently if we see ourselves as part of the whole of life.  What will our ashes contribute?

Almost 40 years later, we see an echo of "The Alphabet" -- everything interconnected -- and imagine the possibilities of that!  You think we're goners?   There is a satisfying lyricism in the first 10 lines, describing the sensual world; the final 4 that  "intangible reach of our being"-- a sonnet-sized confirmation of positivity.

Czeslaw Milosz:  for an accompaniment to the Frick Lecture on Porcelain ("cocktails with a curator"

For a link to MEISSEN PORCELAIN: https://www.frick.org/tags/meissen-porcelain) this article from the New Yorker: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-european-obsession-with-porcelain

To appreciate the Meissen swans swimming in the bullrushes, all in relief: https://www.lyonandturnbull.com/news/article/the-meissen-swan-service/

In three stanzas, Milosz paints a vision of the end of WW2, "Of all things broken and lost/The porcelain troubles me most". The present tense of the verb in the opening and closing stanzas, the flashback in second stanza with the haunting scene at dawn "the earth wakes up, and moans..."... the addition of

"Sir" -- as if talking to one of the soldiers in the  column marching by the destruction...

"In sorrow and pain and cost/Sir, porcelain troubles me most.".

David recalled "Is Paris Burning" -- and we all commented on how higher artistry is destroyed in war as symbolic vanquishing of the "enemy".

Imagine, 4 years to created 2,200 pieces... and in one day, destroyed, used as target practice, crushed by tanks...  as Judith put it, "a descant on the destruction of war."

Mary Swander:  June brought up that she is involved with  healthy food systems and gave this lnk.  https://www.agarts.org/ We enjoyed the rich references, how the difficulty of getting through winter eases with thought of the double bloom of names and flowers--  their hard work of waking up... the hard work of survival... I love the 5th line, "breeches hang on the line" -- both referring to the six blossoms... and faith, hope restored perhaps. We didn't go into the Dutch names van (of): dry, wilt, sickle, patter, water, glen.  The sounds were enough... skimming the slough -- I love that slough, if pronounced as "stuff" means shedding skins, like snakes... "slooo/slou rhyming with cow" means wet, swampy ground.

The same with "rout" -- to root about, or rout out... 

Yusef Komunyakaa:  For a title, "Yellowjackets", it is only the cause of the scene... where the poem actually seems to be about the horse at the end of a work day.  Wonderful sounds and images... and Marne informed us that yellowjackets do not sting at night... Taken from "American Life in Poetry", Kooser says, the poems" shows us a fine portrait of the hard life of a worker—in this case, a horse—and, through metaphor, the terrible, clumsy beauty of his final moments.  What an incredible last image... the whole/Beautiful, blue-black sky/Fell on his back.  

Not sure why he choose "goofy" for calmness... perhaps to create that sense of "clumsiness"?  

the text I read at the end of the session.

https://perugiapress.org/2021/01/emerging-biwoc-poet-spotlight-5/

Destiny Birdsong 

Just in case you  haven’t seen other inaugural poems and want to keep the spirit of last Wednesday:

https://poets.org/inaugural-poems-history?mc_cid=a80d7b45b3&mc_eid=248758c95e

---

[1] Dutchman's Breeches: the flower ressembles a pair of pantaloons hung upside down. https://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=dicu

 

Poems for January 13

As if to Demonstrate an Eclipse by Billy Collins

Of The Empire by Mary Oliver

Darkness of the Subjunctive by Paul Hoover

Elegy for the Disappeared  by Forrest Gander

let it go – the  by e.e. cummings

Mobile  by Sarah Strong

It was difficult to choose poems this week, given the tumultuous chaos in the capital on Epiphany... a very dark day for America on the day traditionally celebrating the return of light.  Note sent out with the poems:

Dear All,

 I am grateful for these groups, O Pen and Poetry Oasis that celebrate the power of words to bring understanding and healing and poems that allow us to study the care with which they are made.

When I choose poems, I am looking those which reflect a poet’s love of words, the care of crafting sentences, a message which reflects the hand of someone who is paying attention to the world in an multi-faceted and empathetic manner.  In turn, by discussing, we share reflections on how these poems help us navigate this complex world mindfully and with compassion.

 I hope the line-up for next Wednesday will not disappoint in this regard. 

I am pleased to share that this month’s curator of a poem-a-day is  by Fatimah Asghar. In this spirit of continuing to learn, and foster better understanding of others, especially those we don’t know, I encourage you to read her poem chosen by the American Academy 

as introduction to her and her work: : “Ghareeb”

 https://poets.org/poem/ghareeb?mc_cid=daed18edde&mc_eid=248758c95e

I was pleased to read her choice for today which felt like a gentle introduction both to Sudan, but also Arabic customs, and that “cocktail” shaken together of old and new, Sudanese and American.

You might enjoy this link as well!

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/153217/modern-sudanese-poetry

from Poetry (May 2020)

In last week’s discussion, we were reminded of the solar system model (see my notes in the blog under Dorianne Laux: http://kdjospe.blogspot.com)… so in this same spirit of “learning” it seemed fitting to start with Billy Collins’ As if to Demonstrate an Eclipse.

Nutshell: 

Collins: 

 We shared many different versions of appreciation for  the delight Collins provides by taking the ordinary, gently transforming it into an object of wonder, all while  infusing it with some self-irony without sentimentality.  Note the title is as if to demonstrate an eclipse which by the end of the poem might be the greater metaphor of an eclipse in our mind where, in the dark, we lose the light of seeing all that prompts gratitude...  After another glass of wine from that bottle,  (from the echoing set up of 3 things, 2nd stanza) no longer comparing himself to a benevolent god "presiding over a  establishment of a miniature creation myth... singing a homemade canticle of thanks..."  but  "singing the room full of shadows..." imagining the eclipse, with his usual mock-humility,", we too can join him, if not "cockeyed" with gratitude, at least convinced that it can be sincere without being schmaltzy. 

Laux: How to link all the metaphors of wound as flower,  (which in turn dies on its descent to earth, and is a bag of scent filled with war, forest, torches, trouble) and fire sinking into itself? Lori was reminded of Rumi, "When your thoughts are rose-like, you would be a rose garden; when your thoughts are thorn like, you would be firewood in a furnace"--   The poem deals with healing... and David recalled Robert Frost's distinction between grief and grievance... the first can be addressed by "sewing back together", the second only causes more harm.  Ken underlined this wisdom, mentioning he had been reading about the backgrounds of the people who assaulted the capital last Wednesday:  all very different and all with their own grief.  Bernie brought up the power of listening to the body for healing... and Lori showed  the icebag on her hand, a live enactment of calming a burn on her skin while she was making tea..

Oliver:  Not the usual style of Mary Oliver, more like a thoughtful essay than a poem.   Published in 2008, whether it was regarding the LA riots and Rodney King (1991) or happening right now, this address saying how we will be known, is a frighteningly true prophecy.

One thought was that starting with "we" and moving to what "they" say, the surprising repeat of the heart which is defined on the last line,

moves us back to the we... and how to address hearts that are "small, hard, full of meanness."  

Hoover: Quite a biography, part of which includes publishing an anthology of Vietnamese poetry in 2008 which he hoped would change the US view of Vietnamese poetry, and bring awareness to the range of expression practiced since the "Nhan Van" development of the 1950's when members of the Writers Association demanded freedom of expression, for which they were punished with loss of their jobs, loss of publication privileges and in some cases, prison.  The subjunctive mood, expressing layers of doubt, desire, uncertainty, and the "if" clauses that deal with the imperfect tense followed by the conditional allows expression of what is possible.  Elaine told us the vietnamese language does not have this  verbal mood.  This is not a breezy poem with facile explanations... how to understand "the world is possible meaning"... 

Jan demonstrated that the I in the poem is the poet, using the subjunctive to explore what could have, might have happened.  How do you retire to your future? Who is this we that might have existed... and what small light as person, by a 60 watt bulb in such an endless, unmeasurable darkness....

Gander: It's best to see the artwork to understand the poem.  The art asks us to fill in the blank... just as the poem does... the letter p, when combined with h makes an f sound, a fantom p... just as the b in limb, does not pronounce the b. 

"I will need to listen well so I hear what is not"-- Emily I believe, quoting the difficulty of "listening between the lines" the way we need to read.  The opening calls for looking carefully... what is mirrored?  What is really there?

Cummings: Let it go... and the word play... the broken/open... length/wise.. the paradox of "truthful liars"... "false fair friends"-- calling as nouns "both" and "neither"... the "the" hanging on the first line has indeed lost its noun... the (you fill in the blank, you are the one who knows)... the endearing personal touch of "dear"... the making room... a gem of a poem.  

Strong:  She reads well (Mary was delighted -- the enunciation allows her to hear every word!)... There is a chronology from the spin of images,  from birth when all is a blur, to growing up as things adopt meaning... to the complexity of memory.  However, so many layers..

there is the processing and grappling with the world as it works... then with the same waltz in the mobile played by the real Danube, a reference to its passage through history... and the anecdotal authenticity of hearing the waltz played by it on guitar accompanied by the sweeping sound of the river, dancing fett  (no squishy plastic smell, associations with asthma attacks, factory workers in China, Barbie dolls)

the threading of "shiny things" again, as distraction, but then a shiny cellphone (put down, the person holding it weeping), the magpie's  love shiny objects... back to the "plastic" in ourselves... and by naming it... aware... of what we really want... 

"green breath of those first fields,/blown towards us by the moving shapes of horses." 

\

January 6, 2021

A Donation of Shoes by Ted Kooser

The Big Picture by Ellen Bass  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_081dDhyXU

Third Rock from the Sun by  Dorianne Laux 

A Winter Twilight by Angelina Weld Grimké 

Emmonsail's Heath in Winter by John Clare

Gravitational by Alfred Corn https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/30/gravitational

 

Nutshell: 

Ted Kooser: Thank you Ted for your goodbye poem.  We'll look forward to Kwame Dawes taking over  the stewardship of "American Life in Poetry".  Now... for your poem...  We loved the liquid l’s, how not only shoes are recycled but also lines of poetry such as Thomas Gray’s Elegy (… left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,/ Nor cast one longing lingering look behind?

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44299/elegy-written-in-a-country-churchyard

We discussed the Capitalization of Goodwill and Destiny.  Although no conclusion reached, indeed, it feels the “old cardboard carton” could be our future coffin.  Lovely personification of shoes and a way to address the inevitability of the end of a life, whether it be “wingtip, slip-on, workboot, sneaker”.  Just the mention of those names enhances both shoe and metaphor!

Ellen Bass:  Hearing her read in a live reading, and the laugh of the audience in the 4th stanza, called our attention to "the bad day at the slots".  The gentleness of her voice cradled the assonance and slant rhymes, such as sun/tongue/cub, in the beginning, the spondee "burnt ferns" the "home/grown" at the end.

We appreciated the juxtapositions, the play between universal and quite personal, the witty insertion of the song title, "They Can't Take That Away from Me"... the tongue-twistingly difficult "excruciatingly insignificant" where we are helped by the enjambment, which only accentuates the "insignificant"...

Everything is transitory... the things we associate with "treasure" may well be a moment on a lumpy couch, and matching cardinals of sweater and bra-strap may lead us to appreciate what is at risk. 

We noted lines that stuck out further in the stanzas, like the 4th stanza from the end... Perhaps it is that longing she describes for endangered  animals that keeps her in the same "room" (stanza) about the bears.

"when I get home /// line and stanza break... and she becomes animal herself, warbling.  Much to admire about this poem which we didn't get to.  Thank you Vicki for bringing up the Wordsworth 

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45549/she-dwelt-among-the-untrodden-ways, and how we attach ourselves 

to those we love.

Dorianne Laux: Vicki shared her story of teaching her 2nd graders about the solar system by making a model with the sun and planets.  The Earth, the size of a pingpong ball seemed indeed tiny compared to the sun.  (1,3,00,000 planet Earths could fit inside the sun!). From "rock" in the title to the final word of the poem, "stone", the poem rocks from amazement of what this planet bears, to our inability to pay attention to one of the billions of miracles.  Rich with images, and condemnatory description of humans as "evolved image-making brains" unable to pluck up an orange maple leaf in fall to admire in the palm of our similarly shaped hand... humans who "invented week-ends to have time to spare, (time another idea devised like an "epilogue").  We are not forever... not pronounced from any pulpit, merely, the idea that we are not in control of birth and death in this universe (which made us from its "shattering and dust").  The question of whether we are reprimanded and might be better off if we were ignorant came up, countered by the thought, that the word "ignorance" be substituted by "innocent".  "When was the sun enough?" brought up the idea of sun worshippers, primitive ideas of its birth and death, or incomplete comprehension that indeed, our planet is not part of a heliocentric vision.  As for this warmth "we've yet to name", it would be hard not to think of the important abstractions that guide our behavior.   

The book Sapiens by Noah Harari came up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapiens:_A_Brief_History_of_Humankind

Angelina Weld Grimke:  a beautiful poem whose 8 lines wrap us in subtle rhymes and music to contemplate mystery.

Lori gave a beautiful description of why it is a perfect "grief poem".  Winter, as the month, when we long for younger, brighter days; twilight, the mysterious time before dark and death of a day, the star, perhaps our life-giving sun.  Like Marna, she sees the poem reflecting on nature in winter, but goes further. This small portrait on "Life expanded to the universal, where the metaphor circles back to the Universal in life"  We were also sensitive to the contrast of opne group of trees contrasting with one lonely fir, apart.  Perhaps a Christmas Tree, and the star the star of Bethlehem, although that didn't come up.  Rose was reminded of John Cage's 4'33

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4′33″ where the musicians sit for three movements in silence... the opening word of the poem.  

  

John Clare:  The  now oft-sited Emmonsail's Heath in Winter resembles a Shakespearean sonnet with the odd unrhymed 10th line (abab/bcdcd/e?  /ff/gg) and old English words, filled with delightful words for birds, (bouncing woodcock, idling crow, fieldfares, bumbarrels) bracken, shrubs (furze and ling).  We agreed, that for this sort of poem we do not care what it means!  

Keats may have chided Clare (1793-1864) https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/10/27/the-natural-5 for emphasizing descriptive nature over any sentiment... but we were left with great appreciation for the arrangement of syllables, and celebration of old words.  

For more of his poems: https://interestingliterature.com/2019/01/10-of-the-best-john-clare-poems-everyone-should-read/

Alfred Corn:  Delightfully humorous exploration of gravity, choreographed through the life cycle, male and female from birth to death.  We remarked the thread of horse, (horses threw riders... when you let the reins go (and have a nap!), cradled (breech birth) 6 feet under, where "that horsepower meant to haul our bones..."-- Indeed we enjoyed the ride through the inventive levity!

Fun to hear him read the pleasing slant rhymes, amusing images (Terra's a magnet, we its iron filings; the solar kingpin... dread of the mere 1 g rising from a squat).  Although he uses enjambement, he doesn't pause to indicate it as her performs the poem which increases the playful mood.  

David was reminded of Frost's poem, After Apple Picking-- https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44259/after-apple-picking on the subject of gravitas...