Aerogramme Writers’ Studio: Emily Dickinson Attends a Writing Workshop
EppsNet Archive: Poetry
As Gently as You Can
Our skills are finally in demand. If you mock us, Pan, In whom we also believe, do it As gently as you can. — Stephen Burt, “The People on the Bus” Read more →
There Was an Old Woman
here was an old woman tossed up in a basket, Nineteen times as high as the moon; Where she was going I couldn’t but ask it, For in her hand she carried a broom. “Old woman, old woman, old woman,” quoth I, “Oh whither, oh whither, oh whither so high?” “To brush the cobwebs off the sky!” “Shall I go with thee?” “Aye, by-and-by.” Read more →
Goals for Today
Stop one heart from breaking. Ease one life the aching or cool one pain. Or help one fainting robin unto his nest again. What’s the billing code for that? Read more →
Watch Out for the Gospel of the Times
everything is permitted absolute freedom of movement that is, without leaving the cage 2+2 doesn’t make 4: once it made 4 but today nothing is known in this regard — Nicanor Parra, “Watch Out for the Gospel of the Times” Read more →
Poetry Madness
Powell’s Books has a Poetry Madness bracket online to determine the Best Poet of All Time. Unfortunately, along with some really obvious omissions, they don’t understand the concept of seeding, so while minor poets face off in a number of first round matchups, there are inexplicable heavyweight pairings like T.S. Eliot vs. Emily Dickinson . . . Read more →
Our Children Can Drink Water From Broken Bowls
We must make do with today’s Happenings, and stoop and somehow glue together The silly little shards of our lives, so that Our children can drink water from broken bowls, Not from cupped hands — Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, “Aubade” Read more →
Poems I’ve Read Recently and Liked
“Aubade” by Philip Larkin “He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven” by William Butler Yeats Read more →
Coursera Recommendations
Coursera‘s been around long enough now that some classes are being offered for a second time, including a couple that I’ve taken and recommend: Modern & Contemporary American Poetry, taught by Al Filreis at Penn Social Network Analysis, taught by Lada Adamic at the University of Michigan Read more →
Poems I’ve Read Recently and Liked
“Fisherman” by Kurt Brown “George Gray” by Edgar Lee Masters “The Panther” by Rainer Maria Rilke Read more →
Language Poetry and Aleatory Poetry
The last couple of weeks in ModPo, we’ve been reading “Language Poetry” and aleatory poetry, including the work of Ron Silliman, Lyn Hejinian, Bob Perelman, Charles Bernstein, Jackson Mac Low, Jena Osman and Joan Retallack. I have to admit it all seemed lazy to me. The reader has to do all the work. (See below for a differing opinion.) I didn’t like any of the poems enough to share one, so here instead are the lyrics to Randy Newman‘s “Marie”: You looked like a princess the night we met With your hair piled up high I will never forget I’m drunk right now baby But I’ve got to be Or I never could tell you What you meant to me I loved you the first time I saw you And I always will love you Marie I loved you the first time I saw you And I always will love… Read more →
Aside
Favorite Poem of the Week
My favorite poem of the week — again from Modern & Contemporary American Poetry — was “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” by Bernadette Mayer, especially the final image of the stressed-out new mother reading The Wild Boy of Aveyron, about a feral child raised by wolves. Read more →
Poems I’ve Read Recently and Liked
I’ve been reading a lot of poetry as part of the Modern & Contemporary American Poetry class on Coursera. One of the things I like about the class is that the video lessons are done a little differently than other Coursera classes I’ve taken. Rather than recorded lectures, the videos consist of the instructor, Al Filreis, leading a small group of Penn students in close readings of selected poems. Anyway, here are a few of my favorites so far: I dwell in Possibility by Emily Dickinson Tell all the Truth but tell it slant by Emily Dickinson The Brain within its Groove by Emily Dickinson Danse Russe by William Carlos Williams This Is Just To Say by Willim Carlos Williams A Supermarket in California by Allen Ginsburg Lines for an Abortionist’s Office by Ruth Lechlitner Incident by Countee Cullen These next two, both by Richard Wilbur, I want to single out as being particularly… Read more →
I Have Heard What the Talkers Were Talking
I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the beginning and the end, But I do not talk of the beginning or the end. There was never any more inception than there is now, Nor any more youth or age than there is now, And will never be any more perfection than there is now, Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now. — Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” Read more →
Poetry Slam: Whitman vs Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was good but Walt Whitman would have kicked her ass in a poetry slam. Read more →
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. / I learn by going where I have to go. — Theodore Roethke
Thoroughly Smug and Thoroughly Uncomfortable
O generation of the thoroughly smug and thoroughly uncomfortable, I have seen fishermen picnicking in the sun, I have seen them with untidy families, I have seen their smiles full of teeth and heard ungainly laughter. And I am happier than you are, And they were happier than I am; And the fish swim in the lake and do not even own clothing. — Ezra Pound, “Salutation” Read more →
Reading Emily Dickinson
I’ll read one [Emily Dickinson] poem every few months — and if it’s one of those baffling ones, that’s all it takes to humble me into putting reason back in the tool box, and sitting still until a more appropriate tool presents itself. — Bonnie Nadzam Read more →
My Favorite Poem
Five little monkeys jumping on the bed. One fell off and bumped his head. Mama called the Doctor and the Doctor said, “No more monkeys jumping on the bed!” Read more →