selections from Ted Kooser: Winter Morning Walks 100 postcards
George Bizet by George Denham
Voicemail Villanelle by Dan Skwire
On the Grasshopper and Cricket by John Keats (1816)
Lapis Lazuli by William Butler Yeats
The Approaches by Harry Clifton
Nutshell:
Kooser: What a refreshing read each poem provided, filled with unusual imaginative images~. Let us all be "choosers of Koosers"!
March 18: Gusty and Warm: Paul noted, this would be the day after St. Patrick's day... but that aside... it is one thing to recognize the gift of life as multiple poets do, exercising the art of praising all that throbs and pulses on our earth, but here, in a succinct, understated few lines, we learn of the arrival of the first bluebird of the season, on the day of a cancer appointment. He is a master of twisting the circumstances to a deeper, unexpected thought: "Lucky I am, to go off to my appointment/having been given a bluebird, and for a lifetime, having been given this world."
Rainy and Cold: Not only the image (sky hanging thin and wet on its clothesline!), but the sounds, where the short i of thin
(first line) is repeated in dripping, and last line, in tin. He creates in impressionistic painting. "a deer of gray vapor" could
be the way the foggy wetness moves, or the deer moving through it in the rhythm of lichen-rusted trees. One line,
two lines, and three lines -- from thin sky, to foreground on earth, to metaphysical thought of distance as future, sealed up
in tin like an old barn.
Note... I am only repeating the poem which crafts so masterfully the observation of a moment given a full and rich treatment.
Chilly and Clear: Such a perfect portrait... Not a morality lecture about those smoking, drinking days, tossed with careless laughter with the perfect association of topcoat, homburg and paisley scarf. You can read "look at me now" in both as a negative or positive result of such behavior. Perhaps both? It reminded Judith of Tamara de Lempicka, the art deco painter. https://www.delempicka.org/
The Vernal Equinox: perfect juxtaposition of concrete to abstract... daredevil squirrel // worry; (question mark tail); tin cone, greased pipe (to protect seed in birdfeeder from said squirrel)// baffles
How to understand the title and the last line? We discussed how the equinox implies balance, and the one in spring marks
a shift from end of winter to new beginning of the spring season. What generous acceptance of the squirrel -- thanks to meditation and positive thought... ending on the thought that the baffles aren't needed: if it wants sunflower seeds, everyone of them is his.
Which of course, will get you thinking about your own squirrels and just what it is that we are after! Kooser paints a perfect picture where we know exactly how that squirrel arrives... in the metaphorical vernal equinox when, all seems in balance.. such lively language to describe how he springs into action! leaps... swings, clambers, twitches that question mark tail. The baffles, meant to protect us from such confusion, perhaps will lead us to see an alternative view of the situation!
Windy and at the freezing point: Instead of clothes, imagine the world struggling to keep its clouds on and grass in place! Skirts of cedars, where tumbleweeds are huddling; and dawn -- no lyric aubade here... no, the blocky colors of the comics section--
and quickly, the way of sunrise and sunset, fluttering away "leaving a Sunday the color of news." Interesting -- one could read a Saturday, or any day... but the Sunday paper is usually more chock full of "news."
Four Below Zero: Judith was reminded of the Nordic myth of the world tree -- atop, is the evil bird, sending malicious messages, at bottom, the snake eating its roots... see illustration by chapt. 16 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil
We think we know apples. Kooser takes us beyond to how an apple is taken to work by his wife... but creates something extraordinary of the invisible presence and suspended image of what might seem indeed quite ordinary.
George Bizet: What fun! and a cleverly disguised rhymed sonnet, as one is so captivated by the telling, it is easy to discount the form. I had trouble finding out anything about the poet.
Voicemail Villanelle: perfect capture of the frustration of being put on hold, the repeating robot telling you niceties about "being right with you" which usually means a frustratingly long amount of time. My favorite line is 4th stanza with the sibilant onomatopoeia involved with press 6, with the ironic result of speaking with someone snide. The choice of form is perfect for the repeating "we're grateful that you've called today./We will be with you right away."
Dan Skwire seems to be a multi-talented man who works as an actuary. It is refreshing to see others like him, published in https://lightpoetrymagazine.com/back-issues/
Keats: Judith reminded us of his death at such a young age, indeed "forever young."(immortalized: died at 25 of tuberculosis, not like famous rockers of drug overdoses. Forever young is also on line 27 of Keats, "Ode to a Grecian Urn". ) In this delightful sonnet by a city dweller, a hint of the bucolic John Clare.
The imitation of running with the 3rd line enjambment, the echo of "never done" (from opening line and its repeat line 9)
A perfect contrast of the octave of the grasshopper's activity, passing to the sestet of the cricket's song.
Wilbur: To start a poem with "But"!!!! But for a brief... and we're off in a charmingly bouncy capture of movement in quatrains, one moment, cleverly elongated in one long sentence! The word in the final stanza "gay" release prompted the next poem which uses "gay" four times. And what a clever final word
about the pause of purported peace, "busily hid".
Lapis Lazuli:
Thanks to Paul, we had a history lesson to explain "King Billy" i.e. William of Orange and the history of Protestants in Northern Ireland. It is important to know as well that this poem was written in 1936, with rumbles of war. It is not only "hysterical women" who shrug at art (palette, fiddle-bow and poets) in such times. Paul also informed us the in stanza 2, Gaiety may well be referring to the theatre in Dublin.
Three stanzas in, the reader is provided with a backdrop of how "gaiety" works to transfigure dread, whether in tragedy or history of "old civilisations put to the sword" and miracle of miracles; indeed, rebuilders, and perhaps by implication, imagination, allows a lightening of spirit, a restoration of faith in humans in spite of the catastrophes they wreak.
Then come the two stanzas about the carving made of lapis lazuli given to him on his 70th birthday by Harry Clifton. In letters, he had mentioned the sculpture resembled a mountain with a temple, trees, paths and an ascetic with his pupil about to climb the mountain.
In this meditation, we see how the sculpture mirrors the times, the times the sculpture, as music he imagines is played to respond to tragedy. Whether it plays mournful melodies, whatever it is that is played brings alive "their ancient, glittering eyes" -- that enduring and restorative power of art.
The Approaches: We did not have much time to discuss this poem. Although not the same Harry Clifton as the one in 1936, a response I imagine him making to Yeats' poem. "Only the approaches are terrible... " and we are left with an enigmatic "coming home" after all the "might-have-beens, wanderers".
Bernie promised to send the link to the Stafford he mentioned.
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