IX by Wendell Berry : my notes: Perhaps you are intrigued, wondering what the 8 thoughts before IX are… or what would be the 10th. Words with hard c’s, tell the story of cutting, and how Berry comes to welcome back what once he cleared… I love the “w” sound of “once”… how it whispers in “own”, launches “wasted” and “work” giving them new sense in welcome. He uses the word “joy” — and as I work with his words, reading, savoring, feel a sense of joy — this feeling no one can take away, no matter if it is not understood.
Goods by Wendell Berry For the Wendell Berry poems, the Rundel group enjoyed the surprise of the juxtaposition of “waste/failure” with joy, and the sense of the personal sense of place with greater universals on Earth. Goods is a wonderful “loaded” title both for what we carry, the team of mares, the feelings…
My Luck by Joyce Sutphen
We loved the Sutphen poem — the fabulous enjambments and the “linked trail” of 4 stanzas of mishaps; her positive attitude towards life, and accidents.
Indeed, most of life is tempered by luck.
The Atom No.. 18 by Sarah Mangold
Why do we never talk about Argon? I looked it up and was amazed at all the uses…
It’s a wonderfully curious set up with the split italics and “ball” of words, with two hyphenated (trans/lation; indicat/ing). The conclusion we had: atoms make all other things…held together . What humans define can come apart. Loved the “recital of uncertainties”; wondered about the adverb “lastly” with light nestling (light as wave and particle?). Enigmatic idea of “translation of space”…
After by Andrea Cohen
After: too much word play took away the pleasure, but we saw “Stars” in Aster… which added a flavor of a God to the someone. The symbol of Aster
means love, wisdom, faith.
Hotel Earth by James Longenbach
We felt we were witnessing someone’s dream. Fabulous title.
This poem came from his sixth book,, Forever, published in 2021. The poem appeared posthumously in the Atlantic in September (he passed away after July 29, 2022 )
From the description of Forever: These luminous, lyrical poems pose a question: Why did this poet once live as if he would live forever? And what does it mean to know that we will not?
Forever explores the meaning of love, from its discovery in the first poem, Two People, to its maintenance in the last, Forever. In between, the volume explores the precariously imminent demise of all that we love?the finite lives of other people, the mortal beauty of Venice--all thrown into urgent relief by the poet's own cancer diagnosis.
Evoking the vivid dailiness of domestic life...and the specificity and poignance of memories, these lyrics are intimately personal, achingly autobiographical (Langdon Hammer, American Scholar). Forthright, moving, and wry, the poems in Forever look back gratefully--excitedly--on a lifetime of self-making and self-shattering events.
Lovely tribute to him here:
https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/remembering-james-longenbach-poet-critic-530072/
Change of Maps by Carolyne Wright
Only relying on Wright’s words, without Elizabeth Bishop’s entire poem, Geography, (last line of which quoted as epigram)
invites a contemporary view of how we navigates, understand out world. Interesting to reference the Bishop and her ideas of geography, and how we "map". https://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet-books/2012/09/elizabeth-bishops-geography
We discussed briefly the final stanza, and meaning of “true/colors of our going” — how we are remembered.
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