Set Apart

Isolate me, if Thou must
Train my heart to love and trust
By the arrow's inward thrust
I am reminded Thou art mine

I'll cleave to Thee, I'll not let go
For Thou alone, my heart doth know,
Hath sent this wound to bid me grow
And remind me I am Thine

—Vicki Baird

The Shortest Poem

Do long poems make you yawn? Here is one that you can read in a jiffy:

lighght

 by Aram Saroyan, 1965

You read that right! It qualifies for the "minimal poetry" category, sure enough. Not meant to be pronounced, its impact lies in the seeing. By manipulating the spelling of the word "light," Saroyan created something which seems to radiate forth in the same manner as light waves. Do you see it?

This poem not only emits light waves, it also created waves of controversy back in the 1960s because the poet was awarded $500 from the National Endowment of Arts when it was selected to be a part of a published anthology of poetry. An Iowa congressman thought it wasteful and reckless on the part of the government to be paying out good money for one word, and a misspelled word at that! He tried to get the chairwoman of the NEA removed. George Plimpton, the one responsible for selecting the poem for inclusion in the anthology, reportedly said, "You are from the Midwest. You are culturally deprived, so you would not understand it anyway." [OUCH! says this midwestern girl.]

The "it" to be understood was the style of poetry called "concrete poetry," in vogue in the 1950s and 1960s. Concrete poetry was structured in a way to create a visual impact. Since George Herbert employed this device in his poetry back in the 17th century (see "Easter Wings" here), it could hardly be called avant-garde. Lewis Carroll, ee cummings, and Ezra Pound also played with the visual sculpting of words on paper. Why then, a firestorm over this little one word poem?

Timing. Our nation was experiencing deep division during the 1960s over Vietnam. The older generation didn't understand the shaggy haired hippies. There was cultural upheaval brewing, and "lighght" brought to light the differences in thinking: traditional vs. outside-the-box thinking, government support of art vs. private support, status quo vs. "flower power."

I think it fascinating that one little word--if it can even be called a word--could stir up such strong feelings! Lines were drawn over whether this word symbolized the degrading of culture or the expansion of culture. What do you think?

One thing I think we can all agree on : words are powerful. Language is the gift that sets us apart from all other creatures, and wielding words wisely calls forth a maturity that few can claim to possess. As the ancient writer James declared, " For in many things we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body."

Consider the Lilies

 

John Singer Sargent, Study of the Vickers Children

On Easter Day the lilies bloom,
Triumphant, risen from their tomb;
Their bulbs have undergone rebirth,
Born from the silence of the earth
Symbolically, to tell all men
That Christ, the Savior, lives again.
The angels, pure and white as they,
Have come and rolled the stone away
And with the lifting of the stone,
The shadow of the cross is gone!
~ June Masters Bacher ~

Poem on a Plate

Musings Plate

The Farmer Takes a Wife: The Poetry of Love and War

  

The fictional Clovis Fossey, a farmer from the pages of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, does not want to attend any book meetings. "My farm is a lot of work, and I did not want to spend my time reading about people who never was, doing things they never did." He's not much interested in poetry, either, but thinks that it might give him an edge in wooing an eligible widow. Mr. Fossey's exploration of poetry leads him to Wordsworth on behalf of the widow and then to Wilfred Owen for his own edification. Owens' WWI poems struck a chord in Fossey's heart because he, too had served in the trenches.

A friend put The Oxford Book of Verse- 1892 to 1935 into Fossey's hands. The revered William Butler Yeats chose the verses in this anthology, and Clovis Fossey has a strong opinion about his selections:

"They let a man named Yeats make the choosings. They shouldn't have. Who is he and what does he know about verse? I hunted all through the book for poems by Wilfred Owen or Siegfried Sasson. There weren't any--nary a one. And do you know why not? Because Mr Yeats said--he said 'I deliberately chose not to include any poems from WWI. I have distaste for them. Passive suffering is not a theme for poetry.'


Passive suffering? ...I nearly seized up. What ailed the man? Lieutenant Owens, he wrote a line,

 'What passing bells for those who die like cattle? 

Only the monstrous anger of the guns.' 

What is passive about that, I'd like to know. That is exactly how they do die. I saw it with my own eyes, and I say to hell with Mr. Yeats."

I love Mr. Fossey, the literate farmer. He imbibes poetry that embrace the great themes love and war--classic fodder for the poets' pen. Some folks think poetry is for dreamy-eyed visionaries, but  this war veteran-cum-farmer finds it of great benefit. The Wordsworth poems roll off his tongue and he snags the charming widow. The war poems of Owens and Sasson are healing salve, helping him make sense of the horrors he witnessed.

Most of all, I love how poetry makes Clovis Fossey a man of confident opinion. He has a view of the world, and he isn't afraid to defy even the great William Butler Yeats.

It was Wordsworth who noted that  "poet is man speaking to man".  The Clovis Fossey vignette is a perfect illustration of this lovely truth.

     

On Teaching Poetry

"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm," according to Ralph Waldo Emerson. Do you agree?
As a teacher, I greatly desire for my students to "catch" my enthusiasm for poetry. It can be disappointing when they look bored or stare blankly at my best efforts to share a literary favorite. I know better than to take it too personally; I just keep on reading a poem everyday and have confidence that as I sow beautiful words, some are bound to take root.

 The wait is worth it. When I witness that "spark" from page to pupil, I inwardly rejoice! The late John Ciardi, whom some knew as "Mr. Poet", expresses it perfectly: 

"I don't think it is possible to teach anything until the teacher has elicited some enthusiasm. That is where teaching begins. As far as poetry is concerned, the job is not simple, but it reduces to one thing. Somehow the student has to be led to read a poem, to put it down, and to say, "Wow!"  From that point on he is teachable, but until that excitement has been elicited, until that response has been there, no teaching is possible. You may train, you may discipline, you may cause poems to be memorized by unexcited people, but only the excited can learn." ~ Ciardi himself: fifteen essays in the reading, writing, and teaching of poetry

Enthusiasm. Now that is a God word.  The archaic en + theos means inspired by God.  The second member of the trinity is called "The Word" in the gospel of John. And that whoosh! of enthusiasm that transpires between written word and student is an evidence that we humans bear His image. How mysterious this transfer, and what a privilege I have as a teacher to witness the edges of His ways.

 

                                                                     

maggie and milly and molly and may by ee cummings

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles: and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea

*********************************
~biographer Sawyer-Lauçanno on ee cummings:

 "He consistently celebrated the ordinary, reviled pretentiousness, scourged conformity, ardently championed the individual (and nature) against the machine."

"an American original"

Cummings unique style included his signature uncapitalized "i", jamming words together, the creation of adverbs (example: "sayingly"), unorthodox use of punctuation and parentheses.

Malignant Beauty: The Cancer Cells

 Cancer Cells Image: GE Healthcare http://tiny.cc/1xndj

I often read a poetry book at night before dropping off to sleep: John Ciardi's How Does a Poem Mean?  I came across this most unusual poem at about the same time a dear friend was diagnosed with incurable cancer. I've been musing on it ever since.  It is strange that something so murderous--cancer cells--could have such an outward appearance of beauty.

 The Cancer Cells

Today I saw a picture of the cancer cells,
Sinister shapes with menacing attitudes.
They had outgrown their test-tube and advanced,
Sinister shapes with menacing attitudes.
Into a world beyond, a virulent laughing gang.
They looked like art itself, like the artist's mind,
Powerful shaker, and taker of new forms.
Some are revulsed to see these spiky shapes;
It is the world of the future too come to.
Nothing could be more vivid than their language,
Lethal, sparkling and irregular stars,
The murderous design of the universe,
The hectic dance of the passionate cancer cells.
O just phenomena to the calculating eye,
originals of imagination. I flew
With them in a piled exuberance of time,
My own malignance in their racy, beautiful gestures
Quick and lean: and in their riot too
I saw the stance of the artist's make,
The fixed form in the massive fluxion.

I think Leonardo would have in his disinterest
Enjoyed them precisely with a sharp pencil.

~Poem by Richard Eberhart

My thoughts on the poem:

• Eberhart mentions "sinister shapes with menacing attitudes" twice, personifying the cancer cells.
• The cells are seen as a gang causing a riot.
• The author recognizes "my own malignance" in the image of the death cells.
• "The future too come to" is not a misspelling.  The future is coming too fast, accelerating b/c of the cancer cells.
• The last 2 lines stand alone and were puzzling to me, until I remembered that Leonardo did autopsies on cadavers in order to improve his ability to render the human body accurately in his art. Perhaps his interest in art made him disinterested in the deceased.
• "Precisely with a sharp pencil" was/is equally enigmatic. Was he saying that Leonardo would have enjoyed the new scientific knowledge and incorporated it dispassionately into his understanding of the human body?

John Ciardi contributes a bit of insight on the last 2 lines of the poem:

"....note how the last two lines are thrust against the first passage. That is the essence of the poem. I want to argue that a poem consists of one thing thrust against another across a silence. It is like music, in that you set up a passage, you pause, and against it you set up a counter passage. That is not a statement; that is an experience, a shape, a thing made. It is like a statue, like a painting." from his book Ciardi Himself: fifteen essays

How To Be a Poet

By Wendell Berry

(to remind myself)

 "Quiet Time" painting by V...Vaughan

i   

Make a place to sit down.   

Sit down. Be quiet.   

You must depend upon   

affection, reading, knowledge,   

skill—more of each   

than you have—inspiration,   

work, growing older, patience,   

for patience joins time   

to eternity. Any readers   

who like your poems,   

doubt their judgment.   

ii   

Breathe with unconditional breath   

the unconditioned air.   

Shun electric wire.   

Communicate slowly. Live   

a three-dimensioned life;   

stay away from screens.   

Stay away from anything   

that obscures the place it is in.   

There are no unsacred places;   

there are only sacred places   

and desecrated places.   

iii   

Accept what comes from silence.   

Make the best you can of it.   

Of the little words that come   

out of the silence, like prayers   

prayed back to the one who prays,   

make a poem that does not disturb   

the silence from which it came.

Source: Poetry (January 2001).

National Poetry Month: Poetry on the Big Screen

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain. ~T.S. Eliot

If April is the cruellest month, the fact that it is National Poetry Month softens the cruelties considerably. I love reading the poems that other bloggers post during this month; invariably these offerings give me the pleasure of revisiting old favorites and discovering new voices.

When reading great poetry, I find myself musing and carrying on an inner conversation. It's very satisfying to the soul, but HEARING great poetry adds another layer of gratification.

Here are three movies that have contributed to my enjoyment of poetry:

Bright Star (2008)- A biographical memoir of John Keats. It is a voluptuous visual feast, with outstanding period costumes and piercing renditions of the romanticist's poems. Although it borders on being sentimental, there was a fair amount of tension successfully portrayed as Keats spent the final years of his short life feverishly "gleaning his teeming brain" but constantly distracted by the captivating Fanny Brawne. A nice review of the movie can be found here.

Wit (2001)--a poignant cancer story, interlaced with John Donne's poetry.The most memorable line was from "Death Be Not Proud" : 

'And death shall be no more' comma 'death, thou shalt die.'

 Nothing but a breath, a comma separates life from life everlasting.

The Dead Poets Society (1989)--one of my all time favorite movies. John Keating is the inspiring and very unconventional teacher in a conservative, stringent boys' school. His own joy of living is contagious and sparks a love of poetry in these boys that is heartwarming to behold. Tinged with a bit of tragedy, but overall a bracing, thrilling, tonic for the soul. I periodically go to YouTube and watch segments such as "O CAPTAIN! my Captain!" and "Carpe Diem".  Memorable and timeless.

Poem: The H. Scriptures I by George Herbert

George Herbert at Bemerton by William Dyce

Oh Book! infinite sweetness! let my heart
Suck ev'ry letter, and a honey gain,
Precious for any grief in any part;
To clear the breast, to mollify all pain.
Thou art all health, health thriving, till it make
A full eternity: thou art a mass
Of strange delights, where we may wish and take.
Ladies, look here; this is the thankfull glass,
That mends the looker's eyes: this is the well
That washes what it shows. Who can endear
Thy praise too much? thou art heav'n's Lidger here,
Working against the states of death and hell.
Thou art joy's handsel: heav'n lies flat in thee,
Subject to ev'ry mounter's bended knee. 

The Dying Christian to His Soul by Alexander Pope

From zaazaa777

Vital spark of heav’nly flame!
Quit, O quit this mortal frame:
Trembling, hoping, ling’ring, flying,
O the pain, the bliss of dying!
Cease, fond Nature, cease thy strife,
And let me languish into life.

Hark! they whisper; angels say,
Sister Spirit, come away!
What is this absorbs me quite?
Steals my senses, shuts my sight,
Drowns my spirits, draws my breath?
Tell me, my soul, can this be death?

The world recedes; it disappears!
Heav’n opens on my eyes! my ears
With sounds seraphic ring!
Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly!
O Grave! where is thy victory?
O Death! where is thy sting?

****************************************************************************
After laying a dear friend to rest yesterday, I found this poem to be a comfort. 
I'm reflecting this morning on the funeral and the importance it plays in our grieving. This funeral was held at our church rather than in a funeral home, something that is becoming increasingly rare. When I was a little girl, nearly all the funerals I remember were held in a church. What blessed me about yesterday's church funeral was the personal touches:  familiar hymns sung by familiar voices, home grown roses, a bountiful luncheon prepared by loving hands. I've often experienced a pang of regret for families who are making final arrangements for a loved one without ever having forged a place in a community of faith. It leaves a hollow spot to hire people to take care of the details.  A church family provides a huge network of support at life's extremity and I'm so grateful for the cords of love that bind us together.

Johnny Do-It-All

by gedtee

When asked about his future plans, my 16 year old son makes no bones about wanting to be a "renaissance man," someone who has broad range of interests and knowledge. I muse on our conversation and smile.

There was a time when I might have been anxious about the fact that he doesn't have anything definite pinned down, hasn't charted a specific course for his future. I've relaxed considerably the past few years as I have seen the fruits of letting go, of easing up on the reins of my control inch-by- inch in favor of letting him make choices.

Homeschool Moms love to direct. They love to make lists of books to read and they enjoy designing projects and field trips and learning experiences for their children. The problem is, Moms tend to enjoy it just a little too much. Controlling and directing can become toxic and addictive. I see this in myself and yes, I see this as a weakness in homeschooling Moms in general. When our careful input bears fruit and we see them mature at an early age---we are loathe to let them take flight. They have thrived under our tutelage and it's difficult for us to see that these sturdy saplings no longer need our moment by moment tending.

I remember a poem that my Mom stitched for me after I left home. Because it has hung on my wall for many years, it is etched in the fabric of my heart as well:

I remember when you were my little girl.
As much a part of me as my right arm.
My every breath and step held you in mind.
Then suddenly, one morning, you were grown.
I was not finished with you.
But we must love our children enough to let them go.
But in my heart you will always be
My Little Girl.

One Wild and Precious Life

Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

from New and Selected Poems,
Copyright 1992 by Mary Oliver


Melody's graduation evening

Life's Poetry

"Too often we see life's prose, but not its poetry."
~Mrs. Charles Cowman

I made gallons of fruit salad for my daughter's graduation reception, and couldn't resist snapping this photo of the grapes drying on the table. I had asked the Lord to enable me to savor this event, and He truly did. We had spent the bulk of our budget on producing the piano CD, which necessitated that I prepare the food buffet myself. Thankfully, I had plenty of help both at home and from our beloved church family!

Cinematic Poetry: Wit

If there is such a thing as cinematic poetry, Wit fits the description. John Donne's poems serve as the backdrop for this drama, the story of a middle aged college professor (Vivian Bearing) who has spent her life studying and teaching his poetry. During her final, eight- month battle with ovarian cancer, Vivian has much to say in monologue fashion. Her words reflect some of the wit that John Donne is known for:

"This is my play's last scene Here... 'Heavens appoint my pilgrimage's last mile And my race Idly, yet quickly run Hath this last pace My span's last inch My minute's last point And gluttonous death Will instantly unjoint my body and soul' John Donne... I've always particularly liked that poem. In the abstract. Now I find the image of my minute's last point, a little too, shall we say... pointed."

Vivian flashes back to a time when she sat at the feet of her mentor, learning about the significant comma in Donne's poem Death Be Not Proud:

"Do you think that the punctuation of the last line of this sonnet is merely an insignificant detail? The sonnet begins with a valiant struggle with Death calling on all the forces of intellect and drama to vanquish the enemy. But it is ultimately about overcoming the seemingly insuperable barriers separating life death and eternal life. In the edition you choose, this profoundly simple meaning is sacrificed to hysterical punctuation.

'And Death, Capital D, shall be no more, semi-colon. Death, Capital D comma, thou shalt die, exclamation mark! '

If you go in for this sort of thing I suggest you take up Shakespeare. Gardner's edition of the Holy Sonnets returns to the Westmoreland manuscript of 1610, not for sentimental reasons I assure you, but because Helen Gardner is a scholar. It reads,

'And death shall be no more' comma 'death, thou shalt die.'

Nothing but a breath, a comma separates life from life everlasting.

Very simple, really. With the original punctuation restored Death is no longer something to act out on a stage with exclamation marks. It is a comma. A pause.

In this way, the uncompromising way one learns something from the poem, wouldn't you say? Life, death, soul, God, past present. Not insuperable barriers. Not semi-colons. Just a comma. "

Poetry, lovely though it be, cannot meet Vivian's true human need in the final moments of her life. The mentor who spoke the eloquent words above is Vivian's last visitor and she offers to recite Donne as a well-meaning act of consolation. But Vivian's need is not poetry; her need is love. In a most touching final scene, the elderly mentor climbs into bed with Vivian and extends that love to her. She cradles her head and speaks to her soothingly, as a mother. She opens her bag and takes out a children's book (The Runaway Bunny) and reads it to her. Vivian is comforted and quieted by her touch and her simple ministrations.

This is the kind of movie that leaves a mark on your heart and mind, and I've found myself thinking on it and digesting its message for several weeks following my initial viewing. If you are a crier, you'll want to have kleenex handy for this one.

As an addendum: Shortly after viewing Wit, I came across some interesting information about "poetry of wit" in my current reading, How Does a Poem Mean? The author cites John Donne as the consummate poet of wit. This type of poet "welcome into their poems the rush of every sort of experience." In contrast, poets of high seriousness (Wordsworth is an example) are more concerned with diction and fine writing. This type of poet would exclude certain words or metaphors as being crass or unworthy of mention.

It's always enriching to connect threads of understanding from disparate sources. That is the delight of intellectual freedom.

The Precious Words

He ate and drank the precious Words --
His Spirit grew robust --
He knew no more that he was poor,
Nor that his frame was Dust --

He danced along the dingy Days
And this Bequest of Wings
Was but a Book -- What Liberty
A loosened spirit brings --

~Emily Dickinson

Locked in Winter?

By the time we hit February, the loveliness of the winter season begins to grow dull--at least for me. The snow looks dirty, the floor has that telltale sand brought in with winter boots, and I am craving sunshine.

I'm thankful I am surrounded by youth. The world is still all beauty and wonder in their eyes, and they help me to re-focus. Here is "Winter" as seen through the eyes of my daughter, Melody.

WINTER

Snowflakes fall; white and soft, blanketing the rooftops;
Windows bear the icy glint of winter's frosty fingerprints.

Silence claims the sparkling stream; shrouding it with crystal gleam;
Shutting out, so no one see, the living creatures underneath.

Daylight fades and leaves behind brilliant stars to light the night;
Pictures; hanging in the sky, impress wonder on the mind.

Deep in sleep, the peaceful trees sigh beneath the stirring breeze;
Dreaming of a lively scene, that waits to take its part in Spring.

poem and photo by Melody, age 16

Ideas Have Consequences Chpt 8: The Power of the Word

Community can be possible only via the vehicle of language. Words connect me not only to my contemporaries, but to my forefathers. I have access to a great, universal memory bank when I engage in reading.

If our language degenerates, if we begin to love THINGS rather than words, the link that binds us in community is broken. Do you remember the old song, "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?" It asks a great question! If we cease to be word- lovers, if we cease to read--- our conversation with past generations is broken. We are bankrupt, without the wise guidance of collective ages and having no compass for the future.

When words devolve and become merely utilitarian, we lose the ability to engage in higher thinking. We are robbed of the rich opportunity to grasp truth because we're not able to use metaphor or understand symbolism. This handicap cuts us off from the past and prevents us from laying up for the future. In the words of Richard Weaver:

"(snip)...father and child live in different worlds, and speech fails to provide a means to bridge them."

Need proof? Note that languages have been dropped from the core curriculum of our educational system. My husband, born in 1953, said that all 4 of his older siblings learned Latin, but it had been dropped by the time he went through the system. In my own small-town school system, it was not even an option.

Notice also that poetic/literature courses no longer compose the core curriculum of many schools, but are considered electives. I shudder to recall that "Fiction of the 70's" gave me the necessary credits to graduate from high school, while I missed Shakespeare and Homer. My tastes were not developed. I did not know what was good for me or what I was missing.

Richard Weaver, the author of this book, writes a prescription for the rehabilitation of the word:

• poetry (via literature and rhetoric)
• logic (dialectic)

This is classical education; it is what saves us from utilitarianism, from brutality, from degenerating into sentimentality.

In the second part of his rx, the dialectic, Weaver notes that the science of naming is indispensable to logic. He equates "namers" with "lawgivers" and makes the point that "stable laws require a stable vocabulary." (What does that do to the idea that our constitution is fluid?)

This chapter encouraged me. It affirms my daily, plodding efforts to incorporate Browning and Coleridge and Dickinson to our our routine. These efforts bring us out of the temporal and save us from a merely utilitarian existence.

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal."

~~~2 Corinthians 4:16-18 (New King James Version)

The Shepherd's Song

Vintage Picture from The Graphics Fairy

The shepherds sing; and shall I silent be?
My God, no hymn for Thee?
My soul's a shepherd too; a flock it feeds
Of thoughts, and words, and deeds.
The pasture is Thy word: the streams, Thy grace
Enriching all the place.
Shepherd and flock shall sing, and all my powers
Out-sing the daylight hours.

~~~~George Herbert, 1593-1633