“Each one of us is alone in the world. It takes great courage to meet the full force of your aloneness. Most of the activity in society is subconsciously designed to quell the voice crying in the wilderness within you. The mystic Thomas a Kempis said that when you go out into the world, you return having lost some of yourself. Until you learn to inhabit your aloneness, the lonely distraction and noise of society will seduce you into false belonging, with which you will only become empty and weary. When you face your aloneness, something begins to happen. Gradually, the sense of bleakness changes into a sense of true belonging. This is a slow and open-ended transition but it is utterly vital in order to come into rhythm with your own individuality. In a sense this is the endless task of finding your true home within your life. It is not narcissistic, for as soon as you rest in the house of your own heart, doors and windows begin to open outwards to the world. No longer on the run from your aloneness, your connections with others become real and creative. You no longer need to covertly scrape affirmation from others or from projects outside yourself. This is slow work; it takes years to bring your mind home.”
- John O’Donohue,
excerpt from Eternal Echoes, 1998
The above provided by Bernie! It is a perfect summary of the poems discussed on 1/12 which indeed show the courage of meeting "aloneness" full force.
Evening by Dorianne Laux
Ghosting by Andrea Cohen
If I should Come Upon Your House Lonely in the West Texas Desert by Natalie Diaz
This Morning I Pray for my Enemies by Joy Harjo
For the in-person group, Judith shared Xmas Over by Ursula LeGuin.
and listened to A Short Story of Falling by Alice Oswald. The zoom group ran out of time for this most excellent poem.
For the zoom group, last week, we had run out of time for the Jen Case poem, Beloved Father.
Where to begin?
I start with a deep gratitude to the people who participate in these weekly sessions and share often diverse angles which enrich the understanding of the poems collected. What a gift and opportunity to hear so many "takes" on a poem!
Because each group had a different starting point, the kind of discussion on the poems shared in common was quite different.
What follows in my "nutshell" of the discussion, is my attempt to capture the variety. As we approach year 2 of COVID and the changes it has made in our life, I wonder if indeed, without the ability to
"go out into the world", or have a limited ability to do so, the fact of "returning" and facing the impact
of what one faces is different. It's a different flavor of aloneness that seems more needy to be heard.
I had the impression in the zoom discussion, that indeed, everyone was "reaching out" -- and what was shared often sounded like a similar "something" as in the last line of the Nathalie Diaz poem.
Allow me to start with the LeGuin:
Xmas Over – Ursula LeGuin
The young fir in the back of the car
was silent, didn’t admire the scenery,
took up residence without comment
in the high field near the old apple,
trading a two-foot pot for the Columbia Gorge.
When the wind came up, the branches
said Ssshhh to it, but the truck and roots
were taciturn, and will be
a hundred years from now, perhaps.
Where the glass bubbles and colored lights
Were, will be rain, and owls.
It won’t hear carols sung again.
But then, it never listened.
**
Nature has the last word. As a lead in to the poem Evening, the LeGuin perhaps tempers a thought about our human relationship to the world about us. If I say the word, moonlight, what isolated associations appear?
We brought up our attachment to the word light, as illumination, and how foreign a concept of
moonlight as pitiless seems to be. Looking at the opening stanza of Evening, the moon "pours down"
and in the final stanza, is hidden. The words, "no matter" repeated twice reinforce a sense of human
doings, whether lynchings, hangings, surviving hurricanes on the top of rooftops (implied in the opening of the poem). Indeed, the river rolls on and the swans drift on. Judith offered the helpful insights of Robert Graves about the poem being smarter than the poet, in guiding direction, providing a certain rhythm. [Her anecdote of Walter de la Mare, and Graves' criticism of his word choice "Rove" vs. "Rose" --was not a problem of quality of sound, but the way used. "Sometimes its best to go to bed and wait for the right word to emerge", remains good advice. Certainly pouring over every word in the encyclopedia didn't solve anything! The two gentlemen agreed there was no solution. ]
Any refrain idea of river rolling, swan drifting didn't seem to be the point... if anything perhaps "the pebbles grow smaller" might work to address extinctions in the long arc of time.
There was disagreement about sorrow, pain ending. In the poem, the moonlight changes, and no matter how "doomed", still, "the light reaches us, falls/on our shoulders even now//
even here... This seems paradoxical to "everything ends". As for pain, "even sorrow" ending, most disagreed.
Here, a segue to the poem Beloved Father might be useful. Although sorrow is of a more general nature than the particulars of grief, the mark and impact remain in spite of possible transformation. David gave a beautiful reading of Jen's poem, explaining he had been in a workshop with her, and writing about grief of losing his own father. Many in the group were moved to tears by the poem thinking of their grief of losing a loved one. As David put it, the point is facing the humanizing impact of grief... the where and how we hold it. The possibility of the transformation of accepting the cease of breath, or life, accepting a sense of a person reduced to a slab of granite, to a celebration of the life lived and the love that keeps it alive is vital to us. The "unconscious metaphor" of patching the bicycle tire becomes our emotional repair kit, allows an embrace of love as celebration.
Ghosting: Valerie filled us in on "on-line dating" and Marna found more terms such as "bread crumbing"!
We discussed the tone established by the word choice cavalier with its courtly associations and how ironically the meaning changed to mean a discourteous condescension. The dismissal of silence can be as cruel as language. One person thought of The Hound of Heaven https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hound_of_Heaven
I'm not sure we arrived at a conclusion about the last sentence, "Any ghost will/ tell you--
the last thing/we mean
to do/
is leave you.
No one "means" to die! We didn't bring up the antiquated meaning of "dying" as love making... but that pun seems appropriate.
If I should Come.... There is a 51 page study guide that will guide you through her book "Post Colonial Love Poems" http://www.bookrags.com/studyguide-postcolonial-love-poem/ - gsc.tab=0
Hearing Natalie read her poem allows a greater appreciation of the depth of it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4t3yX1gGlc
What a lively discussion! Emily had the idea that the speaker of the poem was a man, which many concurred made sense. She thought of the song, "You were always on my mind". ((https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7f189Z0v0Y)
Rose Marie was reminded of Mme. Bovary and her longing. What is it we so yearn for? This longing, this desire not to hurt... Judith noted the pronunciation of "address" -- with the accent on the second syllable, as in a way to address someone by title, not street address.
A timely poem.
This morning I Pray for My Enemies
Paul mentioned attending an evening at Writers and Books and showed his copy of Joy Harjo's poems,
How We Became Human (poems from 1973-2001). Publishers Weekly says, "shows the remarkable progression of a writer determined to reconnect with her past and make sense of present, drawing together the brutalities of contemporary reservation life with the beauty and sensibility of Native American culture and mythology.
The zoom discussion was detailed, trying to milk every possibility of understanding the enigmatic idea of "praying for ones enemies". How do we define an enemy? What does it mean for someone to be
"worthy of engagement" ? Is this different if an enemy? if addressing an enemy? What is this danger of "becoming a friend".
The understanding of mind, so easily prey to judgement, to anger, and quite a bit of irrational thinking, needs the tempering of the heart... that smaller cousin of the sun... again, this hope in "the light of understanding" and the importance of listening carefully, establishing trust.
I brought up Shawn Dunwoody's inspiring talk and work at the Memorial Art Gallery. How do we make a change? (f/b share and photo below)
A Short Story of Falling: In the recording, Alice Oswald explains in her clipped British accent, how water finds the lowest place... then lies there awake... The opening and closing stanzas confirms the importance of nature repeating its lessons.
How do we balance the "weight of hope" against the "light of patience" ?
Her long pauses allow each couplet space and time. The end rhymes are not obtrusive, but rather satisfying. I know the zoom group did not have time to discuss -- so I will look forward to re-scheduling this in the spring.
Today, docents at the MAG had the privilege of hearing Shawn Dunwoody talk about his 2021 work, “Unfinished Business” which has recently been installed in the Cameros Gallery at the MAG. Shawn is an inspiring speaker as well as artist. Look carefully at this piece — a documentary on racism — and recognizable elements here in Rochester, home of Frederick Douglass… Like Picasso’s Guernica, it is in black and white — the “underpainting” of a painting that was left unfinished, just as the title implies of the business of equal rights and fair treatment. Look to the left at the older man looking out the window… think of yourself, seeing what he is seeing… will you join the young man to the far right, raise your fist to stop fighting, help those who don’t understand BLM, ignore signs of protest that say “we are unarmed” as police in their shields and guns surge in… What will the young man see in 30 years? Will it be the same view?
I hope you will come see this in person, and spend some concentrated time with it. Next to the painting is a QR code for a playlist. As Shawn says, songs reflect the stories of our times.
Unfinished Business, Shawn Dunwoody
Unfinished Business in background. Foreground, "Swing Low", maquette of the statue of Harriet Tubman (in NYC) by Alison Saar
