Because it is important…

This poem arrived in my email box this morning:

September Elegies
by Randall Mann

in memory of Seth Walsh, Justin Aaberg, Billy Lucas, and Tyler Clementi

There are those who suffer in plain sight,
there are those who suffer in private.
Nothing but secondhand details:
a last shower, a request for a pen, a tall red oak.

There are those who suffer in private.
The one in Tehachapi, aged 13.
A last shower, a request for a pen, a tall red oak:
he had had enough torment, so he hanged himself.

The one in Tehachapi, aged 13;
the one in Cooks Head, aged 15:
he had had enough torment, so he hanged himself.
He was found by his mother.

The one in Cooks Head, aged 15.
The one in Greensburg, aged 15:
he was found by his mother.
“I love my horses, my club lambs. They are the world to me,”

the one in Greensburg, aged 15,
posted on his profile.
“I love my horses, my club lambs. They are the world to me.”
The words turn and turn on themselves.

Posted on his profile,
“Jumping off the gw bridge sorry”:
the words turn, and turn on themselves,
like the one in New Brunswick, aged 18.

Jumping off the gw bridge sorry.
There are those who suffer in plain sight
like the one in New Brunswick, aged 18.
Nothing but secondhand details.

Memory & Experience

Generic Disclaimer: to say that I was a complete failure this past fall in terms of reading, writing and working on my own projects would be a huge understatement. I’m only mentioning this to explain why it is just today that I read the December 2010 issue of Poetry.

This particular issue of Poetry was dubbed “Q & A,” so you had poets writing poems and then answering questions about those poems. Some of my favorite work in this issue included poems or quotes from Michael Robbins, Paula Bohince, Tom Pickard, Charles Baxter, and Jane Hirshfeld.

It was what Jane Hirshfield said in her two Q & A sessions that gave me the most food for thought. She made this comment after her poem “Sentencing:”

“We’ve all had the experience of lifting some fantastic stone out of a streambed or off a wet beach, and then finding it later, dry on the shelf, quite plain and dull. ‘Why is this here?’ you wonder, when it catches your eye at all. Some experiences are like that. Their full inhabitance requires the moment in which it lived.” (215)

She made these two comments regarding her poem “Sonoma Fire:”

“Real beauty, for me, is never a distraction. If it were, the its not beauty-it’s prettiness or decor.” (217)

“…if we find fire, or tragedy, beautiful, it is because we ourselves have been, fore the moment, spared.” (218).

I like the first quote because I write a lot of poetry from my experience or from the experiences of those close to me. However, I’m constantly grappling with the question of whether or not I can adequately convey that experience. Can I do it justice? Do I have the right to write about experiences that are not mine? I may think of a memory or moment in time that would make a terrific poem, at least in my mind, but then when I try to commit it to paper it jut doesn’t work. It turns into that dull stone.

As far as Beauty (with a capital “B”) goes, I also struggle with that definition and what it means to my work now as opposed to what it meant 5 years ago. When I was working on my manuscripts for both my MA and MFA, I feel like I had a somewhat warped sense of the world. I don’t mean to say that what I observed wasn’t valid but I think it was too limited. Actually, I don’t think, I know. The poems I’ve written over the past two years or so are broader in their subject matter and as a poet (still feel off saying that) I’m less afraid to tackle topics or ideas that are not “beautiful.” I’m trying to write a poem right now that kind of addresses that transition from on phase of writing to another. It’s tentatively called “Out of the Woods” because I feel like for awhile my poetry has literally been stuck in the natural world, and while I will always go back to that subject matter because it is beautiful and, I believe, there are still important things to say about it, I also know it’s time to move on.

New Year, New Space

Finally, a place to work…

You may be able to tell by the slant of the walls and the overall odd shape of the space, that this not your typical “office.” Yes. It is a closet. Our guest room closet to be exact, which is way too big to be a closet, so it has become my office.

I’ve written two poems up here so far and this is my first blog post, so let’s hope the productivity continues.

Baking, bouquets, and the beginning of term…

This week marked the beginning of the summer semester at school. I am teaching four courses this semester but only two of them meet face to face, the other two are online. This allows me to only have class twice a week, which is a welcome change from last summer when I was teaching six hours a day four days a week.

So far my students seem friendly and energetic. My classes have already shrunk from their original twenty two. There are always students who don’t show the first week, but for the most part everyone seems to be on target, so let’s hope it stays that way.

I am teaching a section of creative writing online this semester, so I’m sure I’ll be posting on that as the semester goes on. I’ve never taught the course online before, so it should be interesting.
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RJ and I pledged money to out local PBS/NPR affiliate this year. We watch PBS regularly and all I listen to in the car is NPR, so it’s a cause I don’t mind supporting. Our gift for our pledge was the cookbook All Cakes Considered, and I think it’s going to successfully make me a baking addict. I already love to cook and now that it’s summer and we’re getting our regular CSA box, I’m back to cooking with fresh produce, which is awesome. I’ve made two cakes so far out of this cookbook. Last night RJ casually dropped the hint “when are you going to make another cake?” The result was the chocolate pound cake shown below:

I’m going to slowly make my way through the cookbook, so I’m sure more pictures will soon follow.

I also made almond crusted talapia last week and made a fresh salad with our CSA bounty.

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The rejection letters from my last round of submissions are coming in, so it’s time to get going on the next round. I’ve put that on the agenda for next week. I always dedicate the first week back at school to school because there is usually little time for anything else. However, next week it’s back to the submissions and the regular writing.

I’ve also finished two books in the past couple of weeks, The Historian and Love in The Time of Cholera. I’ll post more about these books later, but I enjoyed both of them immensely and I hope to keep up my momentum with my reading throughout the summer.

Wind

Our porch swing is doing pirouettes outside our living room window, so I think it’s safe to say that a storm may be blowing in. Spring in Indiana is much more “spring like” then what I grew up with in northwestern Pennsylvania which was basically mud. However, we do get a lot of rain and I think we’re at the beginning of that phase now.
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This is a picture of the bookshelf I painted and brought upstairs last weekend. The paint color is Mark Twain’s House Red. I think that’s fitting…

These are my wildflower seeds that I planted in my basil pot when I realized that the basil seeds weren’t going to do anything. Nothing says spring like sprouts…

Finally, I took this picture of Kwe because I think it pretty much sums up Sundays at our house…

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I’ve put together about fifty submissions over the past month to various poetry journals. As per usual, whenever I spend a large quantity of time putting together and submitting my own work, I start to get a little punchy. Needless to say, I was a bit incredulous when I discovered that some journals are charging writers to submit online. The consistent number seems to be $3. Now don’t get me wrong. I have no problem supporting literary journals. I buy them regularly. I pay the contest and reading fees willingly, but paying to submit online? Really? Needless to say, I didn’t pay the $3. Why? Well, because I don’t have to. While I admire the journals who are charging, I have other options. Actually, I have a lot of other options and because I’m still an nameless poet lost in the oblivion that is called submitting, the cranky part of me said “screw this.”

Of course, when I’m feeling really cranky (this usually comes after I’ve read about ten descriptions of journals looking for “surprising poems that wow them”) I feel like throwing in the towel completely. The good thing about this feeling is it is usually fleeting and replaced with an idea for a poem, which is more fun and a lot more constructive.

How to write a poem for Haiti part 2…

Last night I watched some of telethon Hope for Haiti which featured a variety of high profile actors and musicians. Morgan Freeman read a excerpt from this poem by New Orleans poet Kalamu ya Salaam. The poem in it’s entirety is listed below. The bolded section is what Freeman read. A link to Freeman’s reading can be seen here.

Tomorrow’s Toussaints

this is Haiti, a state
slaves snatched from surprised masters,
its high lands, home of this
world’s sole successful
slave revolt. Haiti, where
freedom has flowered and flown
fascinating like long necked
flamingoes gracefully feeding
on snails in small pinkish
sunset colored sequestered ponds.

despite the meanness
and meagerness of life
eked out of eroding soil
and from exploited urban toil, there
is still so much beauty here in this
land where the sea sings roaring a shore
and fecund fertile hills lull and roll
quasi human in form

there is beauty here
in the unyielding way
our people,
colored charcoal, and
banana beige, and
shifting subtle shades
of ripe mango, or strongly
brown-black, sweet
as the such from
sun scorched staffs
of sugar cane,
have decided
we shall survive
we will live on

a peasant pauses
clear black eyes
searching far out over the horizon
the hoe motionless, suspended
in the midst
of all this shit and suffering
forced to bend low
still we stop and stand
and dream and believe

we shall be released
we shall be released
for what slaves
have done
slaves can do

and that begets
the beauty

slaves can do

Reading Musings for the New Year

I think accomplished a fair amount of reading in 2009, however I’m sure more committed folks would disagree. However, I read a lot of books that I wanted to read and managed to keep up with Poetry. I fell woefully behind in the New Yorker and even brought several of the issues on vacation with me in a half-hearted attempt to read them cover to cover. However, at this point I’ll probably just throw in the towel and begin again after the first of the year when I return to Indiana.

I’m returning to Indiana with the following books: The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Lit, and Moby Dick. I think the last entry on the list will probably hold me for awhile. I heard a piece about it on NPR and decided that I’d reached a point in my reading life where I probably have the patience and the attention span for it. So I plan to start on it shortly after the first of the year.

Tuesday Musings

I’m going to be on a panel this Friday with two other folks from LAS. I have to talk about astronomy and poetry as this panel is spin off of our bigger project here at school, The Year of Galileo. I’ve been playing around with topics for the last few weeks, but yesterday I finally had a breakthrough, which is good because I have to talk for about 15 minutes or so. I’m going to lead off talking a little about Galileo as a poet (he wrote a few poems in an obscure Italian form and also a few sonnets) and use a riddle that he starts with at the beginning of his poem “Enigma.” The riddle is about a comet, so I figure it segues nicely into Stanley Kunitz’s poem “Halley’s Comet” and then we’ll move in “Bright Star by” John Keats. I have a small Whitman poem if we have time, but I also have “I Remember Galileo” by Gerald Stern, so I think I’m covered in terms of material.

I’m going to put a brief power point presentation together and ask for audience participation. Here’s hoping it goes off well, or that I can at least take up my 15 minutes.
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I sent a few more submissions out this week, but my eight week class is coming to a close, so the next week is going to be a bit chaotic. Thankfully, once that class is over, my schedule improves significantly.

We’re conducting the inspection on the house we’re looking to purchase today, so here’s hoping that goes smoothly. This whole process has been a bit of a roller coaster, and I will continue to keep quiet about it (blogwise) until we close on October 30th.
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Autumn

The music of the autumn wind sings low,
Down by the ruins of the painted hills,
Where death lies flaming with a marvellous glow,
Upon the ash of rose and daffodils.
But I can find no melancholoy here
To see the naked rocks and thinning trees;
Earth strips to grapple with the winter year—
I see her gnarled hills plan for victories!

I love the earth who goes to battle now,
To struggle with the wintry whipping storm
ANd brings the glorious spring out from the night,
I see earth’s muscles bared, her battle brow,
And am not sad, but feel her marvelous charm
As splendidly she plunges in the fight.

Edwin Curran

The Sirens

I never knew the road
From which the whole earth didn’t call away,
With wild birds rounding the hill crowns,
Haling out of the heart and old dismay,
Or the shore somewhere pounding its slow code,
Or low-lighted towns
Seeming to tell me, stay.

Lands I have never seen
And shall not see, loves I will not forget,
All I have missed, or slighted, or foregone
Call to me now. And weaken me. And yet
I would not walk a road without a scene.
I listen going on,
The richer for regret.

Richard Wilbur

Thursday (A Precious 30 minutes to Update…) Musings

These are photos from Eagle Creek Park and Anderson Orchard. We went to both places last weekend and it was great. I love fall.

This week is proving to be just as busy as last week. I’m sure there is something I’m supposed to be doing right now besides updating my blog, but I think my brain is starting to give in to all the information I’m trying to cram in to it.

Here are a few poems that are collecting dust on my desk:

Wild Peaches

When the world turns completely upside down
You say we’ll emigrate to the Eastern Shore
Aboard a river-boat from Baltimore;
We’ll live among the wild peach trees, miles from town.
You’ll never wear a coonskin cap, and I a gown
Homespun, dyed butternut’s dark gold color.
Lost, like your lotus-eating ancestor,
We’ll swim in milk and honey till we drown.

The winter will be short, the summer long,
The autumn amber hued, sunny and hot,
Tasting of cider and scuppernog;
All seasons sweet, but autumn best of all.

Elinor Wylie

Devotion: Hawk

I know spring by the hawk pinning down songbirds
in my neighbor’s yard,
the little Ophelias crying in their blown-away silks
that the sky
has lied, a hedge has lied.
Then the pool
of chaos — the hawk in clench and drill and
thresh.
How quickly the song goes out of them. The
aftermath, soft,
circular. A labyrinth in ruins
I let the wind blow through
for days.
And then the rain, its soaking drench. Sun.
On the back porch slab the arterial runs of worms
dried
to a beaten silver even the stars might envy.
The trails a Silk Road crawled
body and spice
to the far cities, moist domains. And so now I stand
and the moon hangs as bold
as talon.
The black teeth whisper — narrow seeds — as the column
fills. The dead are not my worry,
slave to song.
Finch: come back. Cardinal, wren.
That one bird on that one branch
like Coltrane
on a cylinder of smack.
From high in the stacks of the power plant
where it nests,
the hawk banks
the pollen-heroined air of the neighborhood, sifts for
sparrow, muscle and throat.
Dennis Hinrichsen

Tuesday (Autumnal Equinox) Musings

According to the calendar, this morning marks the end of summer. I wrote a poem this morning that’s tentatively titled “Autumnal Equinox,” so it seems appropriate to send summer on its way. Fall is my favorite season and I’m always glad when the air cools and I start seeing apples and pumpkins popping up all over the place.

Fall in Connecticut

Leaves fall from the trees
but words multiply on people.
Small red fruits prepare
to stay under the snow and stay red.
The wild games of children
have been domesticated.
On the wall, pictures of winners and losers,
you can’t tell them apart.
They rhythmical strokes of the swimmers
have gone back into the stopwatches.
On the deserted shore, folded beach chairs
chained to each other, the slaves of summer.
The suntanned lifeguard will grow pale inside his house
like a prophet of wrath in peacetime.

Yehuda Amichai