The Sounds of Simon

Paul Simon sings for the 9/11 10-year memorial

I thought one of the most touching moments during the recent 9/11 anniversary memorial was Paul
Simon’s playing and singing of “The Sound of Silence”.

His simple and direct rendition brought tears to my eyes. The song somehow seemed to evoke a sense of sadness with its first words—“hello darkness my old friend”. These and the words that follow awakened memories of our shared national tragedies when we did come together and speak words of comfort and compassion.

But as the song continues, the silence begins to take over and grow “like a cancer”.

This lack of connection---the inability to embrace each other with words or even to understand each other has taken over center stage in many of our encounters.

I think the poet of song, Paul Simon captured these dark moments. Hopefully, we can find the courage to cross the abyss and dare to “stir the sound of silence.”


“Fool said I, you do not know, silence like a cancer grows

Hear my words and I might teach you, take my arms that I might reach you

But my words, like silent raindrops fell, and echoed in the wells of silence.”


Some links of interest for the fall.

www.folger.edu/poetry

Library of Congress is featuring a September Symposium on Brazilian literature

which is featuring folk poetry called cordel----booklets of poetry illustrated with woodblock images.

Hitting the Books

 It's that wonderful time of year, or at least getting close, when the doors of learning swing open for eager minds. With that in my mind, I'd like to mention two books that deal with the subject of poetry.

The first, "Beautiful and Pointless", I alluded to in my May blog. The author, David Orr, is the poetry critic for the New York Times. He termed his book his "peculiar project". I agree with him in that it is an odd mixture of very analytical, technical moments sprinkled with flights of fancy...i.e humor and lyricism. It is always dense in the sense of richness of thought...albeit at times disjointed.

His chapter headings speak to its content. He addresses the differences and similarities between the personal poem and the political one. He even expresses the idea that poetry can create a change in opinion as it edges toward politics. A powerful idea!

He then launches into a pretty technical analysis of form, but not without creating a category of his own called Resemblance. Curious? I was too.

He then talks about the poet in terms of personal ambition and the need to be in the spotlight or fishbowl.

The best chapter for me was the final chapter "Why Bother?". Why spend time reading or writing poems when we could be doing something else---anything else? I recommend reading Orr's book to find out his take on that. Trust me when I say it won't be simple and it won't be short, but it will hold your attention.

The second book "Unless It Moves The Human Heart" by the distinguished author Roger Rosenblatt records a running dialogue between Roger and his students during one semester of his writing class. It flows like a lively conversation, which it basically is ---with asides from Rosenblatt, the teacher, who distills the craft and inspires the art of writing. It is a small book--- written by a teacher with a large intelligence and a generous, passionate spirit. I wish you all teachers of this caliber as you pass through the swinging doors.

 
 
 
http://davidorr.com/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/21/AR2011012106626.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504367_162-20034367-504367.html

THE POETRY OF FAMILY

Claire with her muse

David Orr and his book have been pushed to the back of the shelf. Lethargy is front and center. Heat, Haze and Humidity have settled into my brain. I would be sitting and happily staring into space, but for the summer summons to jump into the gene pool for our annual family reunion.

We come together, a mixed set of ages, experiences and perspectives, tied together by ancient history, common ancestors and shared memories.

Flying from east and west coast into the center where it began and ended for the immigrants and will end in distant days for those who stayed. The much maligned snow capital, tiresome and difficult in winter, gifts us with warm, sunny days and cool evenings.

The poetry of our encounters embraces many forms: the rambling prose poetry of one on one long conversations, short, punchy exchanges that leap---haiku to haiku and the occasional blank verse.

Some of us speak in lower case, others in italics. There is an ease of language, a connection without the need for explanations that eliminates the dictionary and takes us quickly to the heart of the matter or perhaps better said---the matter of heart.

It is a language of mixed metaphors---losses, disappointments, accomplishments, leavings, beginnings, and secrets once whispered that are now openly spoken and enrich the family history.

In many ways it is a universal language---one that all families speak and understand, but since it does have its own idioms and dialect, it becomes the poetry of our family.

A poetry that is comfortable and comforting and a joy to speak.

The Poetry of Surgery

I'm not crazy about the idea of these blogs getting too personal or straying far from the theme of poetry in all its wonderful forms...but I
think the anesthesia from recent surgery has dulled my brain, so I'm going to write a few lines about a seeming oxymoron--the poetry of surgery. When I mentioned this idea to my friend and fellow poet Helen, she replied that I would then be on the cutting edge. Indeed.I guess one could stretch and see the surgeon as an artist and not just a technician, depending on the canvas on which she's working. Some intuition must come into play.

I could go on with metaphors---the knife as a brush---the gall stone as a jewel (apparently some of them are quite luminous), but I'm going to jump to the patient as poet and write a few lines about the hospital experience, I hope for your reading pleasure. If I miss the mark, blame
it on the drugs.

Hospital Hype

Blanket fed by a vacuum hose
puffs warm air over me...I imagine
floating above 5th Avenue in the
Macy's Christmas Parade...floating
freely, bumping along giddy and gleeful

Suddenly diminished, I am deflated but
not quite
my tethered legs gasp on the bed
inhaling, exhaling
giving me hope
I will rise again.

Next month I will return to semi-sanity and continue writing some
impressions of David Orr's book "Beautiful and Pointless" {A Guide to
Modern Poetry}.

The Critic

Years ago, my friend Pam and I used to discuss the art critic's power. Pam was a fine artist and often commented that one critic could make or break an art career, even though it was just one man's opinion. The art world has opened up since then, but it is often the opinion of one man (it seems most art critics are still men) which carries a great deal of power.

Which brings me to David Orr, the New York Times poetry critic. I was ready

Mary Oliver

to devalue Orr's opinions because he made a rather condescending remark about Mary Oliver's poetry, which I like. I rethought this and admitted I might have been too critical of the critic. I read a few more of his recent reviews in the "New York Times Book Review" and decided to read his recently published book "Beautiful and Pointless" (A Guide To Modern Poetry). I have reached the halfway point in the book and am ready to cut Orr some slack. I still don't agree with his opinion of Mary Oliver, but am aware he has done his homework and brings some heft to his criticisms. Still one man's opinion, but one worth considering and a lot of food for thought in what he terms his "peculiar project." I won't comment any further until next month's blog by which time I will hopefully have thoroughly digested his book. The first course certainly has been tasty enough.

Poetry and Film

In “Poetry” a Korean film to be released this fall in the United States, a sixty-six year old Korean grandmother enrolls in a poetry class at her local community center. She is told by the instructor to look deep and hard at everything around her for the inspiration to write poetry. Great advice. It is advice that can be applied to many of the arts, including filmmaking. The film “Poetry” won the 2010 Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Screenplay. Mija, the main character, turns to poetry to help deal with her sullen grandson with whom she lives and her own medical challenges. Poetry as self help? I don’t want to trivialize it by calling it that, but reading and writing poetry can help one find liberation. The Australian poet, Les Murray in his book “Killing The Black Dog” credits writing poetry with having helped to save his life. He goes on to say “I’d disapproved of using poetry as personal therapy, but the Black Dog (depression) taught me better.” The words and images of poetry carry great power.

The images in the film “Of Gods And Men” are also powerful. It is clear that the writer Etienne Comar and the writer/director Xavier Beauvois looked deeply into the lives of the Trappist monks living and working in Algeria during the ongoing civil unrest of the 1990’s. Comar and Beauvois met with theologians and did extensive research as well as contacting the relatives of the deceased monks. The writers and the actors lived for weeks with the monks of Tamié Abbey in Savoie to ensure the authenticity of the film’s historical and liturgical content. “Of Gods and Men” won the Grand Prix at Cannes in 2010. The film inspired me to write this poem.

The Monks

I want to tell you about the monks,
that band of mismatched brothers bound
by a strange, strong calling
to live and work in the mountains
between sea and desert.

I want to tell you
of the utter simplicity of their lives,
of their service to the Muslim people
stacked in poverty on the Algerian hillside.

I want to tell you of their fear,
caught in the confusion and cruelty of civil war,
and finally I want to tell you of
their courage and faith
that stuns me into silence.

Close To The Ground

"Language is not an abstract construction of the learned, or of dictionary makers. but is something arising out of the work, needs, ties, joys, affections, tastes of long generations of humanity, and has its bases broad and low, close to the ground."-Noah Webster, lexicographer (1758-1843)

I somehow always sensed that Noah Webster was a smart guy, but I absolutely love this quote. It describes so perfectly for me the fertile ground from which poetry springs.

Poetry is not "an abstract construction of the learned" but arises from "the needs, ties, joys, affections and tastes" of the humanity of the poet. I could add a few adjectives to Webster's list, but why burden a good thing?

I love the idea that the base of language is broad and low. It means to me that good poetry appeals to everyone, does not put on airs---is in fact close to the ground and close to the heart. It is of the earth and earthy. It can take us to new heights, but it flows from our very humanity which after all will end in the earth.

The earth is so much with us these near spring days. As the sun warms it, I can smell it and long to put my hands into it.

I remember my father putting cooling mud on my bee sting when I was a child. It was a folk remedy and probably the coolness that relieved the sting, but who knows what magic healing power it contained. The earth is magical in so many ways. Imagine the potter taking a lump of earth and making it into a bowl from which we eat. And the food that we eat growing from that same earth. Magic.

So here are some thoughts as spring nears.

Live close to the ground.

Write from your humanity.

Celebrate our earth. It might be all the magic we need. It and poetry.