Angelus of Bells: Ten Love Poems of Logic and Loss

“I hold it true, whate’er befall;
I feel it when I sorrow most;
‘Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.”
--Lord Alfred Tennyson, “In Memoriam A.H.H.”


Who among us has not been in love, and lost? While writing in the midst of grief, Tennyson may not have realized how often his words of wisdom would be called upon to help soothe the brokenhearted. And for anyone willing to express their grief in words, poetry is often the language of choice. Such a universal emotion as loss has indeed brought out the poet in many of us. It’s not as common as you would think, however, to find romantic loss and wisdom in the same poem. Poets are often too caught up in their own grief and misery to create poems that aren’t mired in self-pity. While reading through poems about lost love, I have discovered that there is a fine art to crafting a poem built around such passion and emotion, while constructing it with intelligence and purpose and not drowning the words themselves in tears.

To that end, this anthology brings together a collection of poems that speak to the carefully crafted way that poems can express loss without being overly sentimental. All too often poetry about love – lost love in particular – leads the reader to an outpouring of grief of suicidal proportions: “I miss you; I can’t live without you, why did you leave me? What have I done wrong?” And usually there is much weeping and anger and bitterness. No doubt this is true: heartache can lead to despair, and no one can deny that poetry is a valid and creative outlet for releasing the pure sadness that is left after the loss of a relationship. There is a fine line, however, that many “poets” are guilty of crossing when expressing grief. Too much melodrama and sentimentality can actually bog a poem down into amateurism. This can cause the poem to lack significance for the reader, who wants to identify with the universal theme, not necessarily the poet’s personal loss.

Poems that are overly sentimental can also cause readers to assume, incorrectly, that any poem having to do with lost love is purely personal, emotional drivel -- not to be taken seriously on any intellectual level. I think the poems presented here prove quite the opposite: by using various poetic elements such as symbolism and imagery, as well as occasionally stepping outside the boundaries of the “sadness” of the loss described, expert poets can create a world that causes readers to think, as well as feel an emotional connection to the poem.

Certainly worthy of their own collection, these ten poems offer a rare look into how masterful poets take such heart-rending loss and use poetic elements to engage the reader. But be warned: these poems are not without emotion. Just because the poet expertly walks the line without going over the bridge of sentimentality, doesn’t mean the poetic waters below lack depth. Quite the opposite effect occurs: here, the poets appear to convey loss without really trying. It is an expert balancing act, and they succeed beautifully. There is no need for the poet to say, effectively, “I’m collapsing here in a pool of tears.” There is a fine art to expressing this emotion and relating it to the reader who can appreciate it, without being told directly in so many words, “You must cry here. I must tell you by my words that my heart is broken, therefore yours must be too.” In essence, these ten poems are fine examples of sentimental restraint. The emotion is in the scene, in the lover’s absence, in the grand scheme, the loss itself.


In choosing a title for this anthology I wanted to address aspects of the poems that emerge as a cllection. “Angelus of bells” is a unique phrase found in one of my favorites, Conrad Aiken’s “And Already the Minutes.” The term caught me off guard when I read it years ago, and has stuck with me ever since. In the poem it doesn’t seem necessary to read it as its literal definition, which is the Catholic call to prayer and devotion (New Advent). For me it has come to mean the “glorious” sound that is heard in the midst of being madly in love. This is the sound these ten poems remember; this is what has been lost. The sound is what could have been, what you hear when you think of your lost lover. As a collection, these poems attempt to reconcile the loss of this sound, this person, through a logical means: acknowledgement and acceptance.

One thing I particularly love about these poems is that the speaker in each one addresses the lost love directly, allowing each poem to read like a secret love letter from the head and heart. This direct “contact,” this expressing the emotion through the art of poetry, seems to save the poet from despair. As Elizabeth Bishop tells herself so achingly, “Write it!” From this, it seems as though describing the pain of loss in an intelligent, logical way gives the poet the strength to continue on, all the while knowing that their lost lover may never actually hear their words.

As a collection the poems also speak to each other by the use of various poetic elements and themes. Understandably, many of them use the inevitable passage of time to show how the speaker must deal logically with the loss. As we’ve all heard, “time waits for no one.” It reminds us, as we mourn any kind of loss, that we must move on. We must try to cope and think and press forward, for as much as we wish we could, we cannot stay in the moment. Aiken acknowledges this throughout his poem and in the title itself, “And Already the Minutes.” Time is passing, it cannot be stopped. It is almost portrayed as an invisible enemy, who always wins.

Gary Snyder’s “Four Poems for Robin” addresses this dilemma by reminiscing about spending various seasons together before the lovers broke up and “left it behind at nineteen.” He says

Now ten years and more have
Gone by: I’ve always known
where you were -
…I thought I must make it alone. I
Have done that.

As the poem reminds us, there is no going back; the present reality is inescapable. He even speculates that wrongdoing in a past life has brought upon the pain in this one, as “[his] karma demands.” As revealed in these poems, the loss is part of a continuum in time.

Others also lament the passage of time, specifically the seasons, and how they play into memory. Pablo Neruda’s poem begins, “I remember you as you were in the last autumn,” but then later he must admit, “I feel your eyes traveling, and the autumn is far off.” The loss is revealed here in the distance between seasons which should be the same, but cannot be. Brian Patten’s poem has a similar effect, and he too sets it off from the beginning by saying, “Alice, this is my first winter / of waking without you.” Towards the end of the poem he begins to wonder if the season itself isn’t responsible for making the loss so hard to bear. Likewise, Ingeborg Bachmann’s “A Kind of Loss” also starts right off with what the lovers had: “Used together: seasons, books, a piece of music.” In all of these examples, by comparing the loss to the passage of time, the poets deal logically with what is simply unavoidable.

Another particularly effective way many of these poems express loss without being overly sentimental is the poet’s ability to step outside of his or her grief, and look outward. This technique makes all the difference in separating themselves from amateur poets, who tend to focus only on the inward pain. Bishop’s “One Art” and Bachmann’s “A Kind of Loss” mirror each other in this respect. Both compare the lost love with a sense of magnitude, of infinite proportions. The poems are rich with symbolism which compares the loss to everything from household objects to endless boundaries. Bishop herself has lost “two cities… / some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.” Bachmann’s poem claims a loss just as deep. Each saves the full weight of the emotion for the last stanza, and literally the last lines, leaving the reader to ponder their magnitude.

Other poems also look to the outside world and its imagery to address what is now gone. Both Aiken and Neruda conjure up lands and hills, and scenes from a ship. The poets seem as though they are traveling through life, and can sense the lover far off, in another world. Elizabeth Jennings and Brian Patten both look at familiar gardens and see that nothing has changed, except the lover’s absence, which of course changes everything. From as far away as Japan, Snyder recalls moments that he and his lost love spent together, years ago, in the orchards and forests of Oregon. In each of these moments the poets step outside of themselves and look to how the loss applies to what surrounds them, where they have been, what they can imagine. By invoking these scenes and images, the poets allow the reader to come to the same insights as they have: loss occurs not only internally, but throughout time and place. It causes you to reflect on the past and imagine what will never be in the future.

When taken in the context of pure loss, which I have done for this collection, the final three poems represent the role of memory. The word “loss” is not mentioned explicitly, but can certainly be implied when brought together with the other poems in the group. There is a timeless quality in the words woven among these three pieces as the poets look at forgetting, remembering, and memories. In this sense, the “Absence” in Elizabeth Jenning’s poem is permanent, not temporary. The scene that is set reminds me of one that the reader can return to at anytime and reflect, for as she says, it is “unchanged.” Neruda’s poem is written as a memory in itself. The final poem, Arthur Symon’s “You Remain,” feels as if it could be a postscript left unwritten in the other nine before it.

Admittedly, these poems are valuable to me for personal -- and yes -- sentimental reasons. Those of Millay, Bishop, and Aiken have been favorites of mine for many years and could be considered tokens of my past relationships. The other poems are new finds for me that echo the logic and loss I like so much about the three “originals.” As a happily married wife and mother now I read this collection and as Gary Snyder says so poignantly, “I feel ancient, as though I had / Lived many lives.” For even in my current life I have gone back to the gardens of Elizabeth Jenning’s “Absence,” and her words about lost love are true: “there was no sign that anything had ended / and nothing to instruct me to forget.” As these poems have taught me and I’m sure countless other readers, time goes on, but memories remain.

Stumbling upon these “new” poems within anthologies and books I found, as well as revisiting those three I’ve known for some time, was like discovering gems that needed to be dusted off and placed together to say, “Look, this is how it’s done.” These aren’t juvenile or bitter “break-up” poems. There is no anger directed toward the lost love, or wish for torture or hell or some other ill-will. I like to think these are for a more mature reader. Those who understand that loss in inevitable -- something we each face at one point or another. Certainly in each poem there is a sense that the loss is devastating, for they are definitely not emotionally detached. Somehow, though, these poets use that overwhelming sense of loss and combine it with a worldly awareness, a sense of the grand scale of things, an acceptance of time and circumstance. Each poem, then, becomes the preservation in time of a lost relationship as it relates to the ways of the world.

In arranging the sequence of the poems, I began to imagine them as evolving, much like life after the end of a relationship. Initially there is the acknowledgement of pure loss, then reflection and remembrance, then -- most painfully -- the absence of that person from your life. At some point then there is the realization that the love is quite firmly in place in memory, where it remains. If the love was anything worth all of the eloquence written here among these poems, then surely that is its rightful place.

By bringing this collection together, I hope to achieve at least two things. I hope the reader can appreciate the poems as I do, as reminders of lost love and how it can be preserved in the beautiful art of poetry. Something in these poems moves me to a sense of gratitude. In an odd way I am thankful these poems exist: through their language, emotions from my “past lives” have been given words, a tangible identity. I wish for the reader the discovery of themselves, or the memory of a lost love, somewhere among these words.

Secondly, I hope the reader gains a sense that poems about love and loss can be just as thoughtful as those about more “serious” intellectual subjects. Indeed, lost love is no less than a death, a pure absence. In a sense, it is even more surreal than physical death, since the lover actually lives in a parallel universe of sorts, in the same time and physical dimension. The poems presented here understand this inescapable dilemma, and offer a glimpse into how a poet can attempt to reason -- and write -- their way into accepting it.





EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY


Well, I Have Lost You

Well, I have lost you; and I lost you fairly;
In my own way, and with my full consent.
Say what you will, kings in a tumbrel rarely
Went to their deaths more proud than this one went.
Some nights of apprehension and hot weeping
I will confess; but that’s permitted me;
Day dried my eyes; I was not one for keeping
Rubbed in a cage a wing that would be free.
If I had loved you less or played you slyly
I might have held you for a summer more,
But at the cost of words I value highly,
And no such summer as the one before.
Should I outlive this anguish–and men do–
I shall have only good to say of you.





ELIZABETH BISHOP


One Art

The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.

-Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.






INGEBORG BACHMANN (translated by Mark Anderson)


A Kind of Loss

Used together: seasons, books, a piece of music.
The keys, teacups, bread basket, sheets and a bed.
A hope chest of words, of gestures, brought back, used, used up.
A household order maintained. Said. Done. And always a hand was there.

I’ve fallen in love with winter, with a Viennese septet, with summer.
With village maps, a mountain nest, a beach and a bed.
Kept a calendar cult, declared promises irrevocable,
bowed before something, was pious to a nothing

(-to a folded newspaper, cold ashes, the scribbled piece of paper),
fearless in religion, for our bed was the church.

From my lake view arose my inexhaustible painting.
From my balcony I greeted entire peoples, my neighbors.
By the chimney fire, in safety, my hair took on its deepest hue.
The ringing at the door was the alarm for my joy.

It’s not you I’ve lost,
but the world.







GARY SNYDER


Four Poems for Robin

Siwashing it out once in Siuslaw Forest

I slept under rhododendron
All night blossoms fell
Shivering on a sheet of cardboard
Feet stuck in my pack
Hands deep in my pockets.
Barely able to sleep.
I remembered when we were in school
Sleeping together in a big warm bed
We were the youngest lovers
When we broke up we were still nineteen.
Now our friends are married
You teach school back east
I dont mind living this way
Green hills the long blue beach
But sometimes sleeping in the open
I think back when I had you.


A spring night in Shokoko-ji

Eight years ago this May
We walked under cherry blossoms
At night in an orchard in Oregon.
All that I wanted then
Is forgotten now, but you.
Here in the night
In a garden of the old capital
I feel the trembling ghost of Yugao
I remember your cool body
Naked under a summer cotton dress.



An autumn morning in Shokoku-ji

Last night watching the Pleiades,
Breath smoking in the moonlight,
Bitter memory like vomit
Choked my throat.
I unrolled a sleeping bag
On mats on the porch
Under thick autumn stars.
In dream you appeared
(Three times in nine years)
Wild, cold, and accusing.
I woke shamed and angry:
The pointless wars of the heart.
Almost dawn. Venus and Jupiter.
The first time I have
Ever seen them close.


December at Yase

You said, that October,
In the tall dry grass by the orchard
When you chose to be free,
“Again someday, maybe ten years.”
After college I saw you
One time. You were strange.
And I was obsessed with a plan.

Now ten years and more have
Gone by: I’ve always known
where you were –
I might have gone back to you
Hoping to win your love back.
You still are single.
I didn’t.
I thought I must make it alone. I
Have done that.

Only in dreams, like this dawn,
Does the grave, awed intensity
Of our young love
Return to my mind, to my flesh.



We had what the others
All crave and seek for;
We left it behind at nineteen.

I feel ancient, as though I had
Lived many lives.

And may never now know
If I am a fool
Or have done what my
karma demands.








BRIAN PATTEN


Song for Last Year’s Wife

Alice, this is my first winter
of waking without you, of knowing
that you, dressed in familiar clothes
are elsewhere, perhaps not even
conscious of our anniversary. Have
you noticed? The earth’s still as hard,
the same empty gardens exist; it is
as if nothing special had changed.
I wake with another mouth feeding
from me, yet still feel as if
Love had not the right
to walk out of me. A year now. So
what? you say. I send out my spies
to discover what you are doing. They smile,
return, tell me your body’s as firm,
you are as alive, as warm and inviting
as when I knew you first…Perhaps it is
the winter, its isolation from other seasons,
that sends me your ghost to witness
when I wake. Somebody came here today, asked
how you were keeping, what
you were doing. I imagine you,
waking in another city, touched
by this same hour. So ordinary
a thing as loss comes now and touches me.






DARYL HINE


Letting Go

I loved you first the time I saw you last,
I knew you best before I let you go.
All the misapprehensions of the past
Dissipated in an hour or so.
Naked to the human eye you lay
Candid as a cadaver on the couch
I could have slept on, but I went away
Ashamed to stay, afraid almost to touch.

Lost, you seemed the only vivid thing
In a world made moribund and flat
By worldliness. Renunciations bring
Their own reward, apparently, like that
Last look of yours, ironical or tender,
A valediction and a benediction,
Which endless reruns will not soon surrender,
The indispensable, improper fiction
Of your unforgettable perfection.







CONRAD AIKEN


And Already the Minutes

And already the minutes, the hours, the days,
Separate thoughts and separate ways,
Fall whitely and silently and slowly between us,
Fall between us like phantasmal rain and snow.
And we, who were thrust for an instant so sharply together,
Under changing skies to alien destinies go.

Melody heard in the midnight on the wind, -
Orange poppy of fire seen in a dream, -
Vainly I try to keep you. How the sky,
A great blue wind, with a gigantic laugh,
Scorns us apart like chaff.
Like a bird blown to sea am I.

O let us hold, amid these immensities,
The blinding blaze of the hostile infinite,
To the one clear phrase we knew and still may know:
Walls rise daily and darkly between us
But love has seen us,
Wherever we go love too must go.

Beautiful, twilight, mysterious, bird-haunted land
Seen from the ship, with the far pale shore of sand,
And the blue deep folds of hills inviting the stars to rest,
Though I shall never set foot there, nor explore you,
Nor hear your angelus of bells about me, I shall adore you
And know you still the best.






ELIZABETH JENNINGS


Absence

I visited the place where we last met.
Nothing was changed, the gardens were well-tended,
The fountains sprayed their usual steady jet;
There was no sign that anything had ended
And nothing to instruct me to forget.

The thoughtless birds that shook out of the trees,
Singing an ecstasy I could not share,
Played cunning in my thoughts. Surely in these
Pleasures there could not be a pain to bear
Or any discord shake the level breeze.

It was because the place was just the same
That made your absence seem a savage force,
For under all the gentleness there came
An earthquake tremor: Fountain, birds and grass
Were shaken by my thinking of your name.





PABLO NERUDA


I Remember You as You Were

I remember you as you were in the last autumn.
You were the grey beret and the still heart.
In your eyes the flames of the twilight fought on.
And the leaves fell in the water of your soul.

Clasping my arms like a climbing plant
the leaves garnered your voice, that was slow and at peace.
Bonfire of awe in which my thirst was burning.
Sweet blue hyacinth twisted over my soul.

I feel your eyes traveling, and the autumn is far off:
grey beret, voice of a bird, heart like a house
towards which my deep longings migrated
and my kisses fell, happy as embers.

Sky from a ship. Field from the hills:
Your memory is made of light, of smoke, of a still pond!
Beyond your eyes, farther on, the evenings were blazing.
Dry autumn leaves revolved in your soul.





ARTHUR SYMONS


You Remain

As a perfume doth remain
In the folds where it hath lain,
So the thought of you, remaining
Deeply folded in my brain,
Will not leave me; all things leave me –
You remain.

Other thoughts may come and go,
Other moments I may know
That shall waft me, in their going,
As a breath blown to and fro,
Fragrant memories; fragrant memories
Come and go.

Only thoughts of you remain
In my heart where they have lain,
Perfumed thoughts of you, remaining,
A hid sweetness, in my brain.
Others leave me; all things leave me –
You remain.







WORKS CITED

Aiken, Conrad. “And Already the Minutes.” Masterpieces of American Poets. Ed. Mark Van
Doren. New York: Garden City Publishing Co., Inc., 1936. 558.

Bachmann, Ingeborg. “A Kind of Loss.” Trans. Mark Anderson. Bartlett’s Poems for All
Occasions. Ed. Geoffrey O’Brien. New York: Little, Brown and Co., 2004. 360-61.

Bishop, Elizabeth. “One Art.” The Handbook of Heartbreak: 101 Poems of Lost Love and
Sorrow. Coll. by Robert Pinsky. New York: Rob Weisbach Books, 1998. 12.

Ferguson, Margaret, Mary Jo Salter, and Jon Stallworthy, eds.
The Norton Anthology of Poetry, 5th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2005.

Hine, Daryl. “Letting Go.” Ferguson, Salter, and Stallworthy 1868-69.

Jennings, Elizabeth. “Absence.” PoemHunter.com. 25 Nov. 2007.
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/absence/

Millay, Edna St. Vincent. “Well, I Have Lost You.” The Clock’s Loneliness. 21 Nov. 2007.
http://www.erzsebel.com/poetry/?p=658

Neruda, Pablo. “I Remember You As You Were.” Immortal Poetry. 28 Nov. 2007.
http://immortalpoetry.com/I_Remember_You_As_You_Were

New Advent. Catholic Encyclopedia: “Angelus Bell.” 20 Nov. 2007.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01487a.htm

Patten, Brian. “Song for Last Year’s Wife.” The Clock’s Loneliness. 25 Nov. 2007.
http://www.erzsebel.com/poetry/?p=874

Snyder, Gary. “Four Poems for Robin.” Ferguson, Salter, and Stallworthy 1817-19.

Symons, Arthur. “You Remain.” PoemHunter.com. 24 Nov. 2007.
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/you-remain/

Tennyson, Lord Alfred. “In Memoriam A.H.H. (LXXXV).” The Tennyson Page. 21 Nov. 2007
http://charon.sfsu.edu/tennyson/inmemoriam.html

No Need to Get Sentimental

The poets this week all show mastery of restraint. For such personal pieces, there is no overemotional blathering, whining, crying, or otherwise boring the reader with their weeping. There is emotion, to be sure, but overall I don’t get the sense that the poets feel sorry for themselves, or expect you to feel sorry for them either.

I will make one exception for the poem that does tip the “emotional scale” this week, and that, of course, is “Daddy.” This is certainly on the list of favorites for any Plath reader (like me), and I don’t think it’s exaggerating to say that it has what could be considered a “hysterical bent.” In many ways it is a rant, but it is filled with emotional anger, not self-pity. Out of all of the poems this week, I think this is the one that wears the most emotion on its sleeve. But it’s an emotion that is built upon intelligent metaphor, so we completely excuse Plath for raging against her dead father, who died and left her when she was so young. We breathe a sigh of relief along with her when the “vampire-father” is finally dead. It is ultimately a catharsis for her, filled with such irony and cryptic references that we can’t help but read along, hanging on to every word as she makes sure the stake has truly gone thru his heart, and she can safely, finally, say she is “done.” It’s emotional, yes, but I think it builds to a sense of mastery over one’s emotion, and shows the poet’s strength, not weakness. She ends up the heroine, no longer the helpless victim, crying for someone to save her.

I seem to have a new “favorite poet” each week, or at least one that I’m happy to have read and plan to continue reading. This week it is Galway Kinnell. I’d never heard of him before, and I certainly enjoyed his frankness and subtle humor. His “After Making Love We Hear Footsteps” is one that any parent can appreciate. I think my favorite one, though, is one that wasn’t on our reading list. That is the aptly titled, “The Correspondence School Instructor Says Goodbye to His Poetry Students.” Here, there is an emotional tone to saying goodbyes, but, as Richard Hugo says, it “approaches the edge of sentimentality.” He comes right out and says, in so many words, “I did care / I did read each poem entire.” There is a feeling of connection from the instructor to his students: he can feel their loneliness by the postmarks of their hometowns. That is a perfect example of expressing emotion without going over the edge.

They Make It Look Easy

So many good poems this week…..but for my discussion I will focus on Corso’s “Marriage” and Koch’s “To My Twenties.” I enjoyed the humor in each of them, and their related themes of “freedom” in one’s early years.

My first reaction upon reading “Marriage” was, wow, this is a manifesto. It’s quite lengthy and is the only one by Corso in this anthology, so I thought to myself, this must be his “magnum opus.” It’s quite funny in so many ways, and addresses the terror many people feel about the commitment of marriage. I liked that he went back and forth on the issue of getting married and not wanting to live life alone, while weighing in on the pros and cons. When I first read it I got the sense that it was a rant, sort of Richard Lewis style (one of my favorites). A few of the chosen phrases threw me a little, but the poem is so fun to read that you just go with it. “Radio belly! Cat Shovel!”…."Christmas teeth! Radiant Brains! Apple Deaf!”……(hmmm….okay….). Not quite sure of the intended message there, but it does give a sense of spontaneity, of a stream of consciousness as the speaker works out his neuroses.

And, as usual, I fell totally in love with the poetry of someone “new” this week….Kenneth Koch. The three selections we read had me online, looking to buy his collected poetry. “To My Twenties” reminded me a bit of Corso’s poem, sort of a self-analysis of being young, with all of life ahead, all the choices before you. Although in this poem, as he “speaks” to his twenties, he does say “in you I marry.” So, at this point he’s already far ahead of Corso’s mental limbo of “should I? shouldn’t I?” I also love his sarcasm and point that, hey twenties, you sure didn’t give me a hell of a lot of direction! I was completely taken with his simple language, with a few “haughty” phrases thrown in for fun: “Whither, / Midst falling decades, have you gone?”

In a sense, "Marriage" was about the fear of the future, where "To My Twenties" was about the fear of a future lost.

I love the casual style of the Beats and NY School, but I’m not fooling myself. I know there is technique there. They just make it look easy. And fun.

Seeing the Ordinary World in a New Way

This week’s poems of PlainSpeech, Free Verse & Everyday “Mere” Facts open a new world of poetry for many readers. Everyday scenes and situations are the subjects, bringing the often lofty art of poetry to a level that readers can appreciate, and even identify with. Rhyme and metrical forms are not the focus, and may or not be used to heighten the meanings of the poems. In fact many of the poems employ “free verse,” a style that is not written in strict rhyme or meter. There may be rhymes or internal rhymes, or there may be none at all. There may be a particular rhythm embedded within the poems in various places, or there may not. Either way, the poems still retain a “musical” quality, pleasing to the eye and ear. And always, there is a sense that the words convey a deeper meaning; that beneath the surface of “everyday” situations there lays a truth -- a root cause.

Although the speech is plainspoken and often in free verse, the poems still remain true to poetic nature. Rukeyser’s “Boy with His Hair Cut Short” is an example of variations of meter and use of half-rhymes to end some of the lines. Each stanza has five lines, giving it a sense of uniformity. It even appears on the page to be a “standard poem” -- in closed form -- but upon reading it we hear that it is a new variation of form, yet just as poetic.

Many of the poems this week do in fact employ internal rhymes and end-rhymes, clearly creating pieces that are “true to what poems are and what they try to accomplish.” But what sets these poems apart is that there is no strict rule governing that they MUST adhere to the rhymes throughout the poem. Many veer off at the discretion of the poet, taking the poem in a new direction. In Randall Jarrell’s “Next Day” for instance, lines 2 and 5 of each stanza rhyme, but beyond that, the other lines do not. With this, there is a sense of continuity or “form” within the poem, but the effect is subtle, so that the reader doesn’t feel they are reading a forced pattern.

Another way these poems remain true to their ancestors is the use of symbolism, or using one thing to stand for another. This is done perfectly in Rukeyser’s “Ballad of Orange and Grape.” Here, the hot-dog-man’s consistent (and insistent) mix-up of the flavors in each bin represents the non-sense/insanity of human life, from violence and rape to sexism and war…..unfortunate, everyday circumstances.

And, thank goodness for Elizabeth Bishop. Her insight and humor bring a hope to the everyday, in two of my favorite poems. “Filling Station” is observation at its most brilliant. To see beyond the dirt and oil to the female side of life’s machinations is the epitome of this style of poetry. (I have heard her read this poem, and it is endearing to hear the audience laugh along with her when “somebody” oils the plant).

And in my top five favorite poems, there is Bishop’s “One Art.” This is a villanelle, but Bishop makes it her own by changing the refrains to suit her needs. Here she offers a lesson in keeping a smile and sense of humor through heartbreak and loss.

Black Brilliance

Audre Lorde’s “Coal” is a perfect metaphor for the beauty and pride of African-Americans and the Black Arts Movement. This is (again) my favorite type of poem, wherein the title word is not mentioned at all in the poem, but immediately sets it off in a particular direction. By simply using the title “Coal,” Lorde uses one of earth’s most precious resources, and its “blackness,” as an evolving metaphor for the brilliance and creativity of African-Americans.

In the first stanza, the coal, or blackness, is “…spoken / from the earth’s inside” and, once out into the open and put through flame, “becomes” a diamond. Diamonds then become the new metaphor throughout the poem. This expression of something so naturally black that becomes perfectly clear yet infinitely “colored” is pure genius.

Diamonds then become words, which is the metaphor that fills the second stanza. Words can either sing out easily, or they come at a cost. This is illustrated by another brilliant metaphor, whereby Lorde describes the words as “stapled wagers / in a perforated book – buy and sign and tear apart- / …an ill-pulled tooth with a ragged edge.” Words get stuck in the poet’s throat, but then they can escape, or “explode through my lips / like young sparrows bursting from shell.” With this, the poem is literally layered with metaphors that describe the poet’s process of expression. Her colorful words and sounds are finally out in the open, but this requires a rigorous process, just like the creation of diamonds from coal deep inside the earth.

In the third and final stanza, “Love is a word.” The coal has evolved from blackness to diamonds to words to love. Lorde proudly exclaims that “I am Black because I come from the earth’s inside / now take my word for jewel in the open light.” This ending of brightness and purity is a metaphor for the positive worth of the poet’s creation. She and her poems are an expensive perfection.

A Matter of Influence

The five poets from this week each have very distinct voices. They aren’t necessarily easy to label, but there is a distinct aura and personality that is present in each one: Robert Frost and his love affair with nature, Carl Sandburg and his brash in-your-face power, e.e. cummings and his instantly recognizable thumbnosing of convention, Dylan Thomas and his intense passion, and the ever-wickedly intelligent and so ahead of her time, Ms. Millay.

Despite this individual distinctiveness, it is inevitable that other poets played a role in influencing their poetry. Without doing major research on their professed influences or knowing who truly cared for whom in the world of poetry, I will look at who they seem to have been influenced by, or with whom they possess similarities.

A poet that wasn’t part of our discussions per se was Carl Sandburg. I particularly enjoyed the two poems of his, for their strength and clarity. In these I see a nod to Walt Whitman, in the “free verse” style that Whitman seemed to bless as an acceptable form. Here Sandburg does it in similar style in terms of free verse (no rhyme or meter) and lengthy lines. There are even repetitions and rhymes at the beginnings of lines, as I noticed in Whitman. This is seen in Sandburg’s “Chicago,” (“Laughing….Bragging….laughing,” begin lines 20, 22, 24, 25). This same style is found in Sandburg’s “Grass” where several lines begin the same, with either “Pile,” “Shovel,” or “And pile.” There is a sense of survival among violence in these two poems, which may or not be similar to Whitman’s, but there is definitely a raw energy that parallels Whitman’s urges.

An obvious similarity discussed this week was that between Gertrude Stein, Dylan Thomas, and e.e. Cummings. Their experimentation with language puts them in familiar company, regardless of other differences. (I must admit that I find Thomas’ and Cummings’ poems to be clearer than Stein’s “Meditations” poem which personally read like rambling to me. Thomas’ and Cummings’ poems seem more focused and purposeful, in that the words form more complete images, despite the odd syntax. For instance, in Stein’s poem I did not get “the point” because I couldn’t capture her thoughts (which I assume is part of the point). But with Cummings’ “anyone lived in a pretty how town,” I feel there is an actual theme presented). I see Stein as a possible influence on these two simply because of their ages and the times in which they lived (she was 20 years older then Cummings and 40 years older than Thomas). Her freedom of expression seems to have unlocked a few doors -- perhaps for these two who enjoyed breaking through the limits of convention.

I would love to say that Edna St. Vincent Millay was influenced by Emily Dickinson, and perhaps she was, but I see a power and primal urge in Millay’s poetry that also reminds me of Whitman. I have read her biography and of course find her utterly fascinating, and I’m aware of her, shall we say, prowess. Her unapologetic attitude of sexual matters in "[I, Being born a Woman and Distressed]" is very similar to Whitman’s “Song of Myself.” For a female poet to write in her voice in the year 1923 was pure chutzpah, which she and Whitman had in spades. I’d be willing to bet that his breakthrough “Leaves of Grass” made an impression on her, in some form.

Until trying to determine a few influences here I hadn’t placed the scope of Whitman’s breakthrough in the world of poetry, but it is quite clear. He laid the groundwork for a freedom in writing that takes many forms.

Waving Adieu, Adieu, Adieu

Another week, another chance to fall completely under the spell of a different poet. There were so many wonderful poems this week, but I particularly enjoyed Wallace Stevens, and specifically his “Waving Adieu, Adieu, Adieu.” Reading the words themselves cause me to choke up each time, for obvious reasons of memories of farewells. But besides that, the flow and sounds of the words are almost mesmerizing, with the similar sounds and word repetitions. This is the first poem I’ve noticed in the course that truly incorporates internal rhyme and rhythm without end rhymes, so it particularly caught my ear. So here I will focus on the poetic elements of language and sound/rhythm to discuss the poem.

It is interesting to note that Stevens does not use a rhyme scheme at the ends of the lines, but he uses internal rhymes throughout, to give it a feel of musical flow without sing-songy rhymes. With just the first two lines of the poem you see the pattern emerge: “That would be waving and that would be crying / Crying and shouting and meaning farewell.” This internal rhyme and repetition indicates the sureness or finality of the scenario, that there is a certainty here. In fact, in the entire poem of 20 lines, the word farewell is stated 7 times. This word choice and repetition cannot help but reveal the meaning of the poem, and that is, for me, saying final goodbyes.

The internal rhymes continue, in line 6 for example, in speaking of these farewells in a “world without heaven to follow” as “stops,” that they “Would be endings, more poignant that partings, profounder.”

The third stanza uses consonance (if I am using the term correctly), to a large degree, and mirrors the “l” sound of the word “farewell” in several words: singular, self, yielded, little (repeated 3 times), and jubilant. This same sound continues in the fourth stanza with sleep, lie, still, beheld, and of course farewell, twice.

All in all this is a gorgeous poem. It is most definitely musical, in a beautiful and melancholy way. For some peculiar reason, I particularly love when a poem has a stirring title such as this, but the poet chooses not to restate the title directly anwhere in the poem. The title itself plays an important role in the overall meaning and mood of this one, but Stevens doesn’t deem it necessary to restate it verbatim anywhere. In fact, the word "adieu" doesn't appear anywhere in the poem. However, this title is crucial, and in fact sets up the repetition that will occur in the poem, which helps signify a finality, a closure, a certainty. Adieu, adieu, adieu. Farewell.

No Fear of Flying (Or, The Millers Foresee Their Fate)

This study looks at two poems written just after “The Great War,” a time of high emotion and economic change. William Butler Yeats’ “An Irish Airman Foresees His Death,” written in 1919, is a monologue spoken by a WWI lone fighter pilot, determined to face his death in the skies. Edward Arlington Robinson’s “The Mill,” written in 1920, is a third-person narrative which follows the fate of a miller and his wife, whose livelihood has been destroyed by the new industrial economy. By the end of the poem, both spouses have committed suicide. Or have they? Robinson in particular uses effective language techniques to give the reader more than just the surface words to analyze.

Each poet weaves various poetic elements to heighten their texts’ meanings, including similar themes, intense language and rich imagery, and identical rhyme scheme and meter. Both poems easily draw the reader in from beginning to end. Despite the similarities, there are easily some distinctions. In “The Mill,” for instance, some evidence suggests that Robinson cleverly uses sentence structure and punctuation to cause the reader to rethink his conclusions, only to feel compelled to read the poem again, then again.

The similar themes offer a basis of comparison and help establish the meanings of each poem. Yeats and Robinson each employ nameless characters that feel death at their doorstep, but from there the themes diverge. In “The Mill,” the reader senses a greater depth of tragedy as the miller and his wife lose their livelihood against their will, at the hands of the economy. In contrast, Yeats’ speaker in “Irish Airman” fully accepts his fate as a fighter pilot, without any sense that his inevitable demise is at the hands of some outside force. His is a sense of destiny without regret: his death will occur while flying passionately through the clouds, not because of some occupational failure. With these parallel themes of how the characters view their fates, each poet offers the meanings underlying the poems. The airman chooses his fate. The millers, however, are not so lucky. This difference in perspective allows the reader to feel more empathy for the miller and his wife, and their unfortunate circumstances.

While both poems are filled with intense language, Robinson uses it in an unusually effective way. The key strength in “The Mill” lies in Robinson’s ability to say something critical in the poem without saying it directly. His choice of third-person narration is particularly important in this respect because he can manipulate language without quoting the speaker(s) directly in nearly every line of the poem. It is worth noting how he weaves this wordplay throughout the text.

The images in “The Mill” help advance the meaning in the poem more effectively than in Yeats’ “Airman.” This is primarily due to the number of stanzas in each, and how each stanza functions as a separate scene. The first stanza in “The Mill” introduces the miller’s wife, whose “thoughts” narrate the action. She has waited long for her husband’s return, next to a dead fire in their living room. The tragic theme of loss and resignation is firmly established in line five, in which she recalls her husband lingering at the door and stating to her simply, “There are no millers anymore.” This line is critical. It is the one and only direct quote from either of the characters in the poem. With this one line, Robinson puts the reader directly into the mind of the defeated miller, whose hopelessness underlies the crux of the poem and sets the rest of the images in motion.

Robinson’s effective technique of stating things indirectly becomes clear in the second and third stanzas. At the start of the second, upon thinking of her husband’s comment, the wife is “Sick with a fear that had no form” (9). She then “follows” the miller to the mill, in hopes of finding him. Instead, “…what was hanging from a beam / Would not have heeded where she went” (15-16). The inference here is that, with the stanza’s scene set in the mill, and no other character or object besides the miller having been introduced, what is hanging from the beam is the miller himself. The image is created for the reader without the literal words. His clever word choices continue in the third and final stanza, which leaves the reader with a haunting vision. Here, the focus is on the wife, after seeing her dead husband. “Where she went” as she “reasoned in the dark” (18), is someplace that “Would hide her and leave no mark” (20). By this, she wishes to be gone, without a trace. In the final lines of the poem, she sets off to the milldam next to the mill and sees the

Black water, smooth above the weir
Like starry velvet in the night,
Though ruffled once, would soon appear
The same as ever to the sight. (21-24)

Without being stated explicitly, the poem’s carefully chosen words indicate the wife takes her life in the milldam waters. The reader, in Robinson’s skilled hands, is an eyewitness to a double suicide.

The language and imagery are used to different effects in Yeats’ poem, primarily because the emotional distance is greater in “Airman” than in “The Mill.” The airman claims that “Those that I fight I do not hate / Those that I guard I do not love” (3-4). With this the reader quickly senses that there will not be much emotional rapport with the speaker, who is emotionally disconnected from others. The airman addresses only himself in the monologue. Yeats’ language is direct, with simple statements made by the pilot to express his existential outlook. There is no “hidden” language, as in “The Mill.” Yeats’ first-person speaker technique is effective, however, and he uses it to full advantage. It allows the reader to hear the speaker through the speaker’s own words throughout the entire poem (unlike the third-person narrative technique in “The Mill”). Granted, here, the emotion is between the airman and himself. The reader doesn’t experience the same fear and despair that we feel for the miller and his wife.

The intense language is clear and commanding in Yeats’ poem, but there is not the contextual layer of unspoken words that the reader gains in Robinson’s. Here, the airman describes his reason for flying:

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds. (9-12)

This lack of connection with anyone other than himself is Yeats’ point: the pilot’s death will be caused by him alone. The poem is written in one stanza, as if one running thought of the pilot. The pilot’s resolute words are laid out before us, with no ambiguity or uncertainties.

The imagery is effective but not as extensive or necessary in Yeats’ poem, as it focuses on the pilot’s thoughts, not on tangible settings or particular scenes for the reader to follow. A clear declaration of the pilot’s mindset opens the poem: “I know that I shall meet my fate / Somewhere among the clouds above” (1-2). There is a lack of self-pity in his realization, unlike the miller’s sad quote in “The Mill.” The pilot states his existential claim in the poem’s last four lines:

I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death. (13-16)

This sums up the speaker’s philosophy without needing to set a particular scene for the reader. We can simply imagine him in flight, at peace when the moment of death finally arrives. The image of the pilot possibly ascending to “the clouds above” at the outset of the poem allows the reader to imagine the airman on his last flight, as we hear his last words. This is powerful imagery in and of itself, but the reader isn’t given any particular change in scenery.

The poetic elements of sound and rhythm play a role in each poem, but a particularly strong one in “The Mill” due to the unfolding events. Both poems are written in the same rhythm, iambic tetrameter. This consists of 8 syllables, one unstressed followed by one stressed, which helps the reader move carefully through each line. This is especially effective in “The Mill” because the reader is curious about what is going to happen next, as we follow the miller’s wife from stanza to stanza. In “Airman” the poem is written as one stanza, or scene. The rhythm moves musically from line to line, but not to any particular “destination.” The reader simply experiences the thoughts of the airman alongside him, without needing to “go somewhere.”

Finally, sentence structure and punctuation provide a vital key to interpretation of “The Mill.” Obviously both poems use these elements, but upon close examination there appears to be more than one way to interpret Robinson’s poem. It can be argued that if you break the poem down by each word and punctuation mark, there is yet another underlying layer that Robinson reveals, again without laying it out directly for the reader. In her 1993 essay on the poem, poet and teacher Glorianna Locklear (Highbeam) proposes that, given that Robinson “works in layers of ambiguity…the..evidence …rests largely on [his] subtle handling of verb tenses, sentence structure, and punctuation” (Locklear). Her extensive argument on these elements makes for fascinating reading for those willing to do a fine-grain analysis on Robinson’s true intent. The crux of her analysis is that based on these elements of the poem, the careful reader will deduce that all of the action after the miller’s quote occurs in the wife’s mind. Locklear's proof includes Robinson's use of various conditional clauses, such as “And there might yet be” (3), as well as speculative memory, as in “And he lingered at the door / So long that it seemed yesterday” (7-8). In this study, these speculative comments show no indication that the wife has gotten up from her chair by the fire.

Locklear also notes that throughout the poem, “the verbs are all conditional,” as in “She may have reasoned” (18) and “water would soon appear” (23)”. Further, she points out that the final stanza begins with “And if,” which “cast[s] the entire stanza into the speculative mode” (Locklear). The semi-colons also allow for dependency on all of these speculative clauses, as in the second one that appears in the poem: “She knew that she was there at last; / And in the mill there was a warm / And mealy fragrance of the past” (10-12). For Locklear, this semi-colon indicates that what follows is merely the product of the wife’s “fear that had no form” (9) from the previous line; that the following scenes are simply imagined (Locklear).

Yeats’ “Irish Airman” obviously uses sentence structure and punctuation, including semi-colons, but there are no conditional clauses in the poem that suggest ambiguities of thought or interpretation. There is a simplicity of language and structure that moves the reader along, but as a distant observer to a death that will occur, someday. In this respect, the pilot feels about his death much as the reader does; it is expected and not worth being troubled over.

In the end, both poems are written with language and rhythmic elements that feel right for each. Obviously Yeats and Robinson were both poetic masters that knew what they were trying to express with each poem. For the reader, it is a matter of preference. Do you want your poem straight up, or with a twist? Both are here in fine form. No-nonsense language from Yeats, and an expertly woven reminder from Robinson that lurking beneath some poems are unspoken worlds, waiting to be uncovered.


WORKS CITED

Ferguson, Margaret, Mary Jo Salter, and Jon Stallworthy, eds. The Norton Anthology of Poetry. 5th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2005.

Locklear, Glorianna. “Robinson’s ‘The Mill.’” The Explicator 51.3 (Spring 1993). 27 Sept. 2007 http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/robinson/mill.htm.

Robinson, Edward Arlington. “The Mill.” Ferguson, Salter, and Stallworthy 1214-1215.

Yeats, William Butler. “The Irish Airman Foresees His Death.” Ferguson, Salter, and Stallworthy 1193.



WORK CONSULTED
Highbeam Research. “Locklear, Glorianna”. 27 Sept. 2007 http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-134176124.html

Free Will and Free Verse

It is a mystery to me how a poet determines where to break a line. I would love to learn the secret; the code that makes all the difference. I have been dissecting Williams' “A Sort of a Song” for some time now and am not sure I’m closer to an answer! The biggest factor I can think of to explain the poet’s decision is obviously timing. Where do they want the reader to make the slightest pause with their eye and ear, to help separate it from prose? After all, if they wanted to write prose, they would write a simple paragraph, or prose poetry—I suppose! So in the case of this poem, which is obviously brilliant and contains the famous line we’ve been asked to explain, “No ideas but in things,” why did Williams break it as he did? I will do my best to come up with some ideas…

I think regardless of punctuation and whether or not the line is enjambed, the reader pauses - ever so briefly - at the end of the physical line, simply because of the way we’re taught to read. So breaking the lines more frequently causes you to take in each separate line nearly as an individual image, with its own sound. So, in the first stanza, I think Williams wants you to take it in slowly, just as he is describing the snake, waiting. Instead of giving you the line all at once, “Let the snake wait under his weed,” he breaks the images up. “Let the snake wait under”….where? a slight pause. “his weed.” The next line ends in “writing,” which accentuates the importance of composition. He speeds things up in the next line by giving us more syllables, and ends the line again on a closed consonant sound, “sharp.” The harshness of this sound almost prepares us for the “strike” in the next line. He ends the stanza with just 1 word, 2 syllables (and he ends the poem with 2 syllables, most likely no accident). The word is “sleepless,” which clues us into the action coming in the second stanza.

Line breaks are also a very musical choice. Although it’s free verse with no set meter or rhyme scheme, there is still a rhythm the poet wants to achieve. In the second stanza of this poem, it’s almost fun to say the first line, “through metaphor to reconcile.” It makes sense to end the line there. I wish I could write musically through my blog: da DA DA DA da DA DA DA. Williams only wants to put so many syllables in a line, syllables that sound “right” when spoken as one.

I think it’s very interesting that in the 3rd and 4th lines of the second stanza he inserts his famous quote, parenthetically, buried really, in between 2 words, “Compose. Invent!” I take this burial as his way of telling the reader he is calling up his subconscious, in the middle of these two lines. How is he going to compose? Invent? What’s it going to take for the flower to split through the rocks? Let’s put it right in the middle of these 2 words, which would have each been their own line, but his subconscious broke through. Again, he ends the poem with those two syllables, “the rocks,” to mirror the sound of the last line in the first stanza.

Williams in particular had a way of saying multitudes with very few words, when he desired. I thought maybe there was a “secret code” in this one, but what I came up with is that he wrote it in 2 stanzas, 6 lines each. 27 syllables in stanza one, 35 in stanza two. Not exactly a major decoding breakthrough. All I know is it sounds beautiful when you read it!

Overall I think it’s a poet’s personal choice. How do they want the poem to sound, spoken? What words do they want hanging in the air, even briefly, as the reader/listener takes it in? How can they change it up so that it doesn’t get sing-songy and monotonous and hold the reader’s attention?

Victorian to Modern Poets

This week’s poems are all written in closed forms, unlike Whitman’s “wild American style” from last week. In this respect they adhere to the safe, standard style of end-rhymes we have seen so far. This does not mean that the poems lack any depth or power. Quite the contrary. In fact, in my humble opinion, we are starting to see in these poets a different direction, almost a precursor to the confessional mode. I especially noticed this in my favorite poem of the week, “Neutral Tones,” by Thomas Hardy. (Can I say in my own blog that I fell totally in love with Thomas Hardy, or rather his poems, this week?) This particular poem has a similar sound to Keats’ “This Living Hand” in that it expresses love -- directly, quietly, to the beloved. “Neutral Tones” addresses the deep personal loss of love and time, with the sweetest melancholy: “Your eyes on me were as eyes that rove//Over tedious riddles of years ago”…”Since then, keen lessons that love deceives//And wrings with wrong, have shaped to me//Your face, and the God-curst sun, and a tree//And a pond edged with grayish leaves.” This seems to me the “tone” used in later confessional poets to describe personal relationships. There are still outside forces at work: here, in 1898, God still plays a major role in two of the four stanzas, both related to the sun on the day described in the poem.

With an exception or two, I must admit that I personally didn’t see much indication of the “tumultuous time” frame in which these poems were written. Instead, most of these poems seemed rather personal to me. In addition to “Neutral Tones,” I felt that “Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now” also lamented the passage of time: “Now, of my threescore years and ten//Twenty will not come again//And take from seventy springs a score//It only leaves me fifty more.” What a lovely sentiment, that the cherry tree is so beautiful that the poet is disheartened that he will only get to see it bloom another fifty times, each spring. That was a lump in the throat moment.

I did make the connection about the “tumultuous time” in at least a couple of poems. One of them was obvious and straightforward: Yeats’ “An Irish Airman Foresees His Death” about a soldier killed in war. I also see the connection, if I’ve judged it correctly, with my second favorite poem of the week, “The Mill” by E.A. Robinson. Here, industrialization has set in, and a miller and his wife both feel the downfall of their livelihood and kill themselves in despair; he by hanging, and she by drowning.

All in all, very intimate and moving poems, like many we’ve read so far. I loved Robinson’s request in “George Crabbe:” keep the great poetic masters alive!

Whitman - Radical Departure

After reading "Song of Myself," I felt compelled to do a bit of research on Whitman. This poem was a very exciting departure from the British Romantics we have read so far. I will admit I hadn't read Whitman at any length before and was not aware of the, shall we say, "modern" themes he addressed. The only images I recall seeing of him were of a very much older-gentleman with a thick gray beard (yes, resembling Kris Kringle himself). But the Whitman I read in these poems almost reminded me --born in 1968 mind you -- of a 1960's radical hippie! So of course I did some googling and checked out the Whitman archive and read up on some history about this radical and influential poet.

After reading his biography it becomes very clear that he was ahead of his time. The influence of the British Romantics is there, as far as references to God and nature. But you don't need to be well-versed in Whitman's biography to see the "radical departure" he takes from the styles and content of the British. The poems speak for themselves. The sexual content is at once a sensual and in-your-face celebration of the human body and pleasures. He celebrates himself, not just the sun and moon and sky and stars. He "enjoys" himself, without apology. I think his "American-ness" is refreshing, although I'm sure it was quite shocking to readers, both American and abroad in his day. More than anything, his utter abandon allows the reader to appreciate all that it means to be human without shame and self-loathing.

After reading bits of his biography the hints of homosexuality become more obvious in his poems, but I don't think his intent was to be overly blatant on that front, if that was indeed his sexual orientation. I read the poems more of a "celebration of man" as something new and unique for humankind, not as some sort of homosexual manifesto.

He also addressed other themes that were crucial in history, such as race. I particularly loved verse 13 of "Song of Myself" in which he discusses the strength of the "Negro," almost foreshadowing his freedom and position in the world.

Besides radical content, Whitman's form almost thumbed its nose at his predecessors. He invented his own style, free from past traditions and molds. He didn't need rhyme or patterns or schemes to create poems. In this sense I'm sure he gained new "fans" of poetry - the everyman - who felt he could finally understand and appreciate the world of poetry. I found this refreshing and quite obvious in the short and simple poem, "When I heard the Learn'd Astronomer." He basically says, you don't need to know all of the science, graphs, formulas and diagrams to appreciate life and God's creation. Just go out and look into the sky for yourself. That's really all you need to know.

Ode to the West Wind

I’m going to attempt to tackle a response to Shelley’s “Ode to the West Wind.” This (for my information!) is written in terza rima, in which the second line of each stanza rhymes with the first and third lines of the next. Easy enough. I chose this poem because a bit of background was provided (I love footnotes), and because of the length. I figured it would be a bit of a challenge to look at a poem with 25 (albeit brief) stanzas.

So what can I conclude about the speaker/summary? From the footnote, which is a direct quote of Shelley’s, I can assume the speaker is the poet himself, so therefore male. He says, “This poem was conceived and chiefly written in a wood that skirts the Arno, near Florence, and on a day when that tempestuous wind, whose temperature is at once mild and animating, was collecting the vapours which pour down the autumnal rains.” The footnote also states that Florence was the home of Dante, who originated the terza rima with his masterpiece, “The Divine Comedy.” So it appears from this bit of information that Shelley’s ode is not only to the west wind, but a nod to Dante as well. As the reader I also get a sense that the speaker is approaching death: “The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge//Of the dying year, to which this closing night//Will be the dome of a vast sepulcher//Vaulted with all they congregated might.” Then again: “Drive my dead thoughts over the universe//Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!”

Is the speaker/poem reliable? One can assume so, since it is said to be based on an actual event that inspired the poet. The poem is intended for a general audience, as it pertains to a natural occurrence (the wind) and its affect on this particular man, and in a sense every man. Anyone might read this poem and appreciate the speaker’s situation/emotions. The wind, that Wild Spirit that moves everywhere, is both a destroyer and preserver, in unison with the seasons and Nature. The seas and the woods know the Wind’s “voice” when they hear it coming. They realize its power, as does the speaker.

In the 4th and 5th stanzas, the situation and themes shift so that the speaker wishes to be one with the almighty, powerful Wind, in an attempt to feel its strength, freedom, and proximity to Heaven. He asks the wind to “…lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!” Then, “I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!” (I know this line is often quoted….where have I heard it recently?) The 5th stanza, in particular, has the speaker compare himself literally to the wind. “What if my leaves are falling like its own!” He wishes outright to become the wind itself: “My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!” His earnest request is that the wind will scatter his words among mankind. Then, in the last lines, a rebirth: “…O Wind//If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”

I think “Ode to the West Wind” is a perfect example of the “Correspondent Breeze” effect we read about last week, which “begin[s] with a literal wind which transforms itself into the metaphorical wind of inspiration.” This is exactly what happens in this poem. Interestingly, the poem doesn’t just begin with the wind, it is utterly devoted to it throughout. I enjoyed seeing this metaphor played out, since I haven’t had the chance to read the entire essay.

For the poetic element, I’ll focus on language. I would say the diction is a mix of casual and elevated (casual for its time, elevated for mine!). I certainly sense that the poet/speaker has written this in the midst of emotion, especially since this is stated in the footnote. It is obvious that emotions run high, as the poem is filled with quick, passionate exclamations. This intense language creates a powerful and urgent tone throughout, but especially in the last 2 stanzas. The poet seems to work himself into a frenzy! Exclamations!

I enjoyed this poem, but then again I try to enjoy all that I read. This one held my interest and wasn’t too long. The themes of nature and aging and death and rebirth are universal, so there is much to appreciate in this one. I did read it 3 or 4 times, as one and then in pieces, just to try to understand the themes and elements. I liked it initially, and liked it even more as I read it again.

I must say that the longer poems are a huge challenge. I’ll admit, if the poem fills more than 2 pages in a book I sigh and think….oh, great. Why didn’t they just write 2 or 3 or 4 poems? Why is this a “poem?” Alas, I’m not Wordsworth or Shelley. And I also must say, one of my favorite poems is Tennyson’s “In Memoriam A.H.H.”--all of it. I just can’t read it in one sitting!

Looking forward to next week’s poems….

Romantic Poets and the Natural World

Wow, this is some serious poetry reading! I've enjoyed reading Blake, Wordsworth, and Coleridge this week, but I must admit it's been just slightly taxing on the brain! It’s safe to say that reading poetry is an art in itself. There is reading, then re-reading, then trying to find similarities and differences, and most importantly, trying to make sense of what you've read, and only hoping you come CLOSE to what the poet intended. I'm not sure I've succeeded but it has been an interesting challenge.

The class blog background on these poets and their collaborations and "rebellions" helped bring the readings into better focus (not 20/20, but better than my initial readings!). I can see many of the major themes we've discussed, including childhood, and the ever-present Nature. I can understand that Nature has multiple meanings, including God and his design of the universe, as well as the natural world.

So on to the discussion for this week's blog. What importance does the natural world hold for these three Romantic poets? I would have to say it is of extreme importance. The poems are filled with images, memories, and observations of the beauty found in the natural world. Wordsworth's "Ode" starts straight off with his lamenting about a time when "meadow, grove, and stream//The earth, and every common sight//To me did seem//Appareled in celestial light." He goes on to describe visions of rainbows, roses, the moon, sunshine, birds, lambs, the wind, land and sea. Of course he is lamenting that these things no longer seem as glorious as they did in childhood, but the poem would not be the same without the vivid descriptions of the beauty that is found in nature. One of his poems that wasn’t assigned this week but is one of my favorites is “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud.” Once read, you will always remember the beauty of the dancing daffodils. But I digress….

The natural world figures prominently for Blake as well. This is obvious just by looking at some of the titles of his poems in our text. The poems from Songs of Innocence are pleasant enough, but I tried harder to appreciate the natural world Blake describes in his Songs of Experience. “A Divine Image” made a huge impression on me. Humans don’t come out looking very pretty in this one. For better or worse, this is reality. Every line describes the most evil, primitive, “unGod-like” aspect of what it means, as a human, to live in the natural world. Juxtaposed against the title, the lines of the poem carry an infinite weight. We were made in God’s image, but the reality of having free-will in the natural world brings horrifying consequences.

Coleridge also uses natural world imagery, as we discovered by comparing his “Dejection: An Ode” to Wordsworth’s Ode. Again, there are images of the moon, sky, clouds, stars, the earth, and wind. The “Correspondent Breeze” wind-metaphor explains the winds at the outset of the poem, and gives the poem a sense of direction I hadn’t realized until reading this background. I have to say that his “Frost at Midnight” gave me a little chill (pardon the pun!). It is a beautiful, sweet poem that I consider to have been written for his infant son, as gentle and protective as any mother could write. The natural world abounds, beginning with the title. The frost, “unhelped by any wind” (the intentional non-use of the breeze metaphor?) is the backdrop and impetus for the poet’s dream-like reminiscences of his childhood. This leads him to address his infant son, sleeping by his side, and to wish for him a life filled with greater heights than the poet has achieved. He hopes the child will “wander like the breeze" (there’s the metaphor), by lakes and shores, mountains, and that “all seasons shall be sweet to thee.” That last paragraph is teeming with natural world images (summer, greenness, redbreast, snow, bare branch, apple tree, sun-thaw, and the quiet Moon).

I hope I’ve done some justice to the understanding of these poems. Again, it is a challenge to read these poems and imagine you’re somewhere on target. I wouldn’t dream I’ve hit the bullseye, but I certainly enjoy the aim!

A little about me...

Welcome to my blog, as they say! This is my first venture into creating what seems to be an essential outlet for so many people nowdays. So here goes!

This is my first semester at UH. I'm a junior transfer student, having just completed my associates at Montgomery College. I was a PTK member and graduated magna cum laude, if I may toot my own horn here on my own blog! :-) I live in the Woodlands and am married with 2 kids, ages 3 & 6. I'm originally from Ohio but have lived off and on in the north Houston area for nearly 30 years. I worked in marketing for 14 years and then decided to jump off the track for awhile to take care of the kids and go back to school to study my two biggest passions...

I'm a Psych major/English minor, and I'll just state right up front: I love poetry. I've been reading a small circle of poets and their biographies for the past 20 years and am enamored with the genre and its place in literature as a pure intellectual and emotional outlet of expression. I must admit, however, that I've done far more reading of poetry than writing. I want to change that and give myself the confidence not only to write poetry, but dare to send some off for publication. I hope this course gives me that extra "push" I need to dedicate more time to writing. I want to learn the mechanics of how poems are built, technically and musically. I want to take my "life stories" and thoughts and turn them into sound poems that aren't gushy and sentimental, but passionate and intelligent. I want to learn the secrets and tricks involved in the language of poetry. How to be an artist of words. Not a small goal!

A few months ago I took a "Pleasures of Poetry" class and re-acquainted myself with the basics of poetry. I enjoyed the class and am bringing what I learned into this one, with a slightly more knowledgeable ear and eye. The writing wasn't easy. I have the emotional stories and ideas for poems, especially a line or two I love and maybe a title, but putting it together takes effort. I can't expect it to come naturally, but I want to feel that I can write a GOOD poem, that isn't overly sentimental. What do you need to know about me in order to teach me well? I tend to wear my heart on my words. I need to improve in that area. I want to write poems, not hallmark cards! I have stories to tell in my poems; about my life, my past, my perspectives. Perhaps I've read too many of the "confessional" poets and have determined that that's where my heart is. Poetry as therapy!

Besides being a mom I'm into other things, including a book club (one MUST be in a book club now!). It's a great diversion from the labor of love that is taking care of kids. Also have a great group of friends. One of our monthly outings is to go to Houston Roller Derby bouts & cheer for 2 of the ladies in our group. Go Burlesque Brawlers! I love to skate but didn't have the time to dedicate to the team...but at least I can skate vicariously through my friends, Mata Scari and Ms. Treatment! :-) Moms can be cool, too!!

You will see from my links that I'm into Plath and Sexton, among other poets. In 2000 I went to visit a friend working on her masters in Leicester, outside London. We spent a good bit of time on a "Plath pilgrimage," visiting her grave in Heptonstall, as well as her last flat. Moving moments for me since I've spent a lot of time reading her poems.

So there's a brief introduction! I'm thrilled to be in this class and will put my heart into absorbing all I can. What is my muse? The art of poetry itself. I'm making a deal with myself that this is the year I'll begin my own journey as a poet.

Also, just for fun, here's a shot of me on a trip I made last month to Costa Rica. I went with my church on my first mission trip, and had a wonderful time. We helped build a children's school and library for a Methodist church in Puerto Viejo Sarapiqui, an area known as the northern lowlands. After a week with the church I then ventured alone to meet up with an uncle who lives in Esterillos Oeste on Costa Rica's pacific coast. What a beautiful country. Such a lush life, despite the obvious poverty throughout the region. Amazing land and people. I can only hope to make another trip there someday. Pura Vida!