New year!
What are the poems you love and can’t imagine the world doing without?
Poems discussed 1/5:
This World Is Not Conclusion -- Emily Dickinson
Taking Down the Tree --Jane Kenyon
Won't you celebrate with me-- Lucille Clifton
Looking West from Laguna Beach at Night by Charles Wright
Let Evening Come by Jane Kenyon
Big Clock by Li-Young Lee
Beloved Father by Jen Case
Olden Begonia by Barbara Murphy
Ship's Manifest by Amanda Gorman -- link to her poems from "What we Carry" published in December in the New Yorker:
“Looking West from Laguna Beach at Night,” by Charles Wright, “Let Evening Come,” by Jane Kenyon, and “won’t you celebrate with me,” by Lucille Clifton were suggested by (Juniper Magazine).
Here are more from Elaine Richane: https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/22225378/poetry-poems-saeed-jones-richard-blanco-jane-hirshfield
I'm not sure we addressed how the world is better with these poem but hope you will continue to share poems that do so.
NUTSHELL:
Epigram: People can lose their lives in libraries. They ought to be warned. -- Saul Bellow.
Perhaps I chose that quote because this world of poetry offered to us through multiple daily sites is quite similar to a forest of books offering so many voices, worlds, visions... Soon O pen will be celebrating its 15th year... Poetry Oasis its 9th... and I thank all you have participated. Poems come alive with your voices, understandings.
Dickenson: Written in 1859, shortly before the start of the Civil War, we wondered what was going through her mind. This world... and look at the verbs it works! beckons, baffles, puzzles... how wisdom goes through riddles, faith slips (and laughs and rallies... blushes if any see) -- do we not still in 2022 pluck at a twig of evidence... as we feel that tooth that will not be stilled as it nibbles at our soul? What species stands beyond-- and is that what exerts these verbs?
Paul helped with these thoughts about human nature: "Give up study and you will be spared much vexation". Martin offered the idea of thanking "the other" -- especially one who is enigmatic giving a hint of something we otherwise might not have thought about. What is conclusion? It may well be false, as Paul demonstrated with this example of the square of opposition: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/square/
All Fords are black. My Buick is Black. Therefore the Buick is a Ford.
Does Emily try to be puzzling? If there are no conclusions, one starts to think about beginnings and endings and if there is something beyond this life... And yet... even though I do not pretend to understand this poem, I am glad for it, glad to return again and again to it. Parsing the poem only with end rhymes makes a partial sense: Beyond sound... know must go...(the "o" in) borne/shown... (the lack of end-rhyme in 4th stanza,) rallies, see... roll soul
Kenyon: two poems: Taking down the Tree: Light! (and the Hamlet reference reminds me of men disguised as trees). December is dark, and Jane provides us with memories, and powerful scent while packing away not just ornaments, but her life as she faces her leukemia. Scent remains as a trigger after the fact. The closing line is an extraordinary prompt for a poem-- how do you imagine darkness as extravagant?
Let Evening Come with its repetitions of Let building from one imperative to two, to four, to none back to a final Let it come as it will and don't be afraid. The unfinished business, the uncomfortable, the everyday, all painted in beautiful shades of feeling through the vowels. Incantatory, and like the song Taps, when day is done... Fiat Lux... and comfort of this unknown called God, however we understand that indeed, we are never alone. Five times we hear, Let Evening Come starting with title and ending line, and all the "lets" it brings.
Clifton: for sure listen to her read it here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/50974/wont-you-celebrate-with-me Born in Depew, NY in 1936, not Babylon ( place of exile)... her electrifying voice lifts us up, reminds of the survival is indeed cause for celebration-- being oneself with all the fullness of who you are... and calling others to join. No better message could be delivered from any pulpit.
Wright. We remarked the visual beginning, a sense of being anchored... the easy-going second stanza, observing people having a good time, and the "later"... my favorite stanza with its sounds of "mythic history... pinpricked and clued through the zodiac... and wouldn't you love to "curry the physics of metamorphosis" just to find out what that is, and arrive at its endgame? The end line begs the question of all of us, how we have lived our life -- and do you have any regrets as you reach the end? Mysterious and although inexplicable, a sense of calm conveyed in the final "knowing nothing" as if at peace.
You might enjoy this look at the poem from this site: https://www.kencraftauthor.com/tag/looking-west-from-laguna-beach-at-night-charles-wright/. Indeed, the metaphors in stanza 1 are well-described and the synopsis closes with a reminder of the James Wright poem about Lying in a Hammock, that ends, "I have wasted my life". We didn't discuss the enigmatic "I'd like to be able to name them" -- where "them" implies the constellations. I like that Charles' response to the immensity of the cosmos is not about how he is spending his life. Instead, he invites us to take a peek at "what's what and how who got where".
Lee: Clock stopped... and what goes on-- a perfect metaphor... moving from one time zone to another; sleep to waking and back; repeat of "back" as if never leaving war zone (to safe zone and back).Enigmatic poem about coming, going... moving, perhaps biographical references to his life, born in Indonesia, of Chinese parents who fled China, arrival in the US at the age of 7. Who's in charge of the clock-- what's behind its face? Intriguing to think what primary colors you might assign to staying, leaving, returning. I'd love to eavesdrop on Li-Young Lee sitting with Emily Dickinson as they discuss their poems in this week's selection together. What might they say to each other?
Case: The recitation of grief here is also a celebration of love—a lesson for life. (Think of the abrasion needed for the tire repair.) The poem’s use of sound and metaphor also warrant admiration. Marna who knows Jen from Writers and Books offered that she is a memoirist. Skillful capture of a young girl's voice for a father who died too young.
Murphy: Delightful sharing of what to do with annuals... Great to have Joyce's daughter, Chrissie share her gardening input. We have many gardeners in O Pen, and this one touched not just their hearts, but all of us.
Gorman: What does the title evoke? Slave ship? Metaphor for what moves us from one place to another? What is it we're supposed to be doing? what exactly are we supposed to be doing?
The opening line, "Allegedly"... who knows what is the worst? If you wrote a book about last year... how would it be "awake", or would it be "a wake"? Her play on words, record/reckoning; capsule/captured; ark/articulated and her careful elocution insists that the reader/listener pay attention.
from Paul about the 1/5 session:
Past tense-a few different meanings ?
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