Ida Lou on 82
From Lubbock to Spur
The dust bowl
A small house on the horizon
Amid desolate cotton fields
The shack with its windows blown out
A wind howls through its shell
Taking its heart on to another journey
The landscape dotted with cotton debris
Loaves of lint sit in tilled ruts
The road: an arrow to the distance
And the next town
A golden oval
With dimples
Sharp, bitter juice
A pin pierces my mouth and
Cuts open my tongue
A shock
Smarts on the mouth
Fresh icy winter
A quick sensation
As if my mouth
Jumped into a cold lake
Or slid down the side of a frozen mountain
Part One in The Art of Poetry covered the tools of the trade and observing the world through all our senses. The assignment was to write five short pieces, each making particular use of one of my senses concentrating on the content rather than the form of the writing. The sixth piece was to write about a situation where I deliberately trying to shut off one of my senses.
The first lesson taught me the basics of writing: somewhere to write, tools of writing, reference books, and a notebook for my ideas. The notebook is also where I free write about anything and everything. Goldberg states in Writing Down the Bones that ‘…the aim is to burn through to first thoughts, to the place where energy is unobstructed by social politeness or the internal censor, to the place where you are writing what your mind actually sees and feels…’ (1986,p.9).
The poems grew from freewriting ideas about the different senses. Reading poetry also gave me inspiration. All poetry uses one sense or another, even if it is only sight. When I can see something vivid within a poem, I am inspired. Raisin Pumpernickel by Piercy caught my attention with the first four lines. I could clearly see the sugar maple’s bright autumn leaves lying resplendent on the ground:
‘You shine, my love, like a sugar maple in October,
a golden-orange overarching blaze of leaves,
each painted its own tint of flames
Tossed on the ground bright as silk scarves (2002,p.253).’
In the poem regarding smell, I wrote about how, when drinking wine, the smell overwhelms the body. As the smell of wine makes me feel languid, I decided to write long words and lines to slow the poem down. Oliver writes in A Poetry Handbook that ‘… when the prevailing mood is one of confidence and leisure, we take the time for length and breadth… The longer line… can also indicate abundance, richness, and a sense of joy’ (1994,p.40-41).
Because my hearing poem is about music, I decided to write free verse and bring the rhythm of the orchestra to it. Rather than having a strict rhyming pattern such as a couplet or quatrain, I used the rhythm of a symphony. I also used words that sounded similar such as ‘graceful’ and ‘crescendo’ and alliteration with ‘harps hum’ to help give the poem form. In Writing Poems by Sansom, he mentions that ‘Free verse… relies on other devices such as alliteration and assonance and the way words are laid out on the page; and though it doesn’t have a metre it often establishes patterns in rhythms through grammatical structures’ (1994,p.83).
In conclusion, I produced six poems that highlight the senses and remove one of the senses; practicing some of the tools of the trade to bring form to my poetry. Through these examples, I created an assignment that met the requirements of Part One.
Bibliography
Goldberg, N. (1986) Writing Down the Bones.Boston: Shambhala.
Oliver, M. (1994) A Poetry Handbook. New York: Harcourt.
Piercy, M. (2002) ‘Raisin Pumpernickel’ In: Astley, N. (ed.) Staying Alive: Real Poems for Unreal Times.Hexham: Bloodaxe Books Ltd. pp. 253-254.
Sansom, P. (1994) Writing Poems.Tarset, Bloodaxe Books Ltd.
“Good writing depends on good observation”
See through all senses
Touch
Taste
Smell
Hear
See
“The more accurately you use your senses, the more you will find that you need to distinguish between the words at your disposal in order to record your observation.”
Needed for writing poetry
Workplace
Maybe a space set aside (I find I can work anywhere, in front room with my husband, on train, at work)
Pens (I like to work on computer but do use pens on train)
Notebook to hand
Computer (but beware distractions of the Internet – that black hole that sucks you in)
Wastepaper basket (to get rid of those poems that don’t work!)
Resources
Dictionary with etymological component
Thesaurus
Sources of myth
The Bible
Greek and Roman myths
Time
Poems can’t be hurried. Sometimes you need to leave them a while and come back to them.
READING POEMS
IMITATION
SOUND
THE LINE
SOME GIVEN FORMS
VERSE THAT IS FREE
DICTION, TONE, VOICE
IMAGERY
REVISION
Apparently, “poets are born and not made in school.” I might as well give up. Unless, of course, I was born a poet. There is the evidence as I enjoyed writing in school and have always had a yearning to write a novel; but that is no poetry. However, Oliver does go on to say that “whatever can’t be taught, there is a great deal that can, and must, be learned.” That makes me feel better.
All books I have read on how to write say you must read and Oliver is no different. She has a chapter on Reading Poems. She goes on to say that the choice can be overwhelming. She says to be careful not to only read the present poems but read the past too. That is many poems. I have bought five poetry books from different eras: current, Victorian, and further back. Oliver recommends imitating the poets that we enjoy in order to learn from them.
Poetry from the past was written in metric form and with full rhymes. Current poetry is written in free form. Its form comes from imagery, language, alliteration, and assonance.
Oliver tells us about the “Families of Sound.”
Vowels and consonants.
Consonants divided into semivowels and mutes.
Semivowels are consonants that can be imperfectly sounded without a vowels so that at the end of a syllable its sounds may be protracted as l, n, z, in al, an, az.
Semivowels are f, h, j, l, m, n, r, s, v, w, x, y, x, and c and g soft. But w. or y at the end of a syllable is a vowel. C, f, g, h, j, s, or x is only protracted as an aspirate, or on a strong breath.
Four of the semivowels – l, m, n, r, – are termed liquids because of the fluency of their sounds.
Four others – v, w, y, and z, are more vocal that the aspirates.
A mute is a consonant that cannot be sounded at all without a vowel and stops the breath at the end of a syllable – k, p, t, in ak, ap, at.
Mutes are: b, d, k, p, q, t, and c and g hard (k, g, c, hard sound the same). B, d, g, hard stop the voice less suddenly than the rest.
This all sounds really boring until you realize how it makes the poems sound.
Oliver gives the examples of Hush! Please be quiet! And Shut up! They all mean the same but sound different.
So a poem can sound angry just with the words we use.
More Devices of Sound
Alliteration – repetition of the initial sound of words in a line or verse “The bear’s tongue, pink as a baby’s.” It also includes the repetition of initial and internal sounds “blueberry”.
Assonance – repetition of vowel sounds within a line or verse. “and land so lightly”.
Onomatopoeia – word that sounds like what it means “buzz” “belched”.
The Line
Where the line turns is and should be meaningful.
Length and Rhythm – each line divided into feet – each foot into stresses. An iambic foot is one light stress followed by one heavy stress “upon”. Five iambic feet in one line is an iambic pentameter line
Page 37 – list of metrical line names and metrical feet names and symbols.
“Put one world on a line by itself in a poem of otherwise longish lines and it becomes a critical word” 43
“Lines of good poetry are apt to be a little irregular.” 44
She talks a lot about the different metres and how they are used.
Most poems start with iambic meter. The mood is relaxed. If you begin with a heavy stress (spondee, trochee, or dactyl) it signals that something dramatic is at hand. 52
Ending lines with rhyme gives pleasure. That can either be true rhyme (spears/tears) or off rhyme if they almost rhyme (down/noon). Feminie Rhyme uses words of more than one syllable that end with a light stress (buckle/knuckle). Femine and off rhyme blur end rhyme where true rhyme (masculine) are forthright.
Repetition of lines is s source of enjoyment.
Turning the line – using a sentence or full meaning works so that the reader is invited to pause and weigh the information. If enjambment occurs (the meaning is cut over two or more lines) the reader hurries up to read the rest and so is pulled along. This can make that part of the poem faster.
Forms – Stanza (verse)
On page 59 Oliver gives examples of rhyming patters – couplet aa bb cc dd etc.
Any change from an established pattern indicates that the poet wants the reader to feel something different at that point. 61
Syllablic verse – a good example of that is on 65 The Fish – shows how different sized lines (by syllables) can add rhythm and pull the reader along.
Free Verse
Free verse is not quite so free. It still has some sort of pleasant form, or if it changes that form, it points to the reason in the words and sound – the change highlights that something of import is happening.
The initial premise is made up of everything the old metrical premise is composed of – sound, line length, and rhythm patters, but in this case they are not strict, they are not metrical. Refrain and repetition are still effective. Alliteration and assonance are used. 68
Free verse poems are more friendly and less “teacherly” than the metrical form poems. Less formal. Probably came about because of a more classless society.
Enjambment can be serious, disruptive, almost painful. In the Red Wheelbarrow it is not 75
The Red Wheelbarrow – Williams
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens
Diction, Tone, Voice
Diction – word choice
Tone – choice of subject imagery design of the poem
Voice – Agent who is speaking through the poem 76
Diction – sound, accuracy and connotation of word (connotation – idea or feeling invoked by a word)
Atmosphere created by word choice
Modern poetry mostly written in language that belies a friendly and natural intimacy
Modern poems – words placed in order you would use yourself – accessible
This tone of intimacy did not just happen but it is created by the poet.
Past poems – voice took role of professor
Modern poems – voice takes role of friend and intimacy
Negative Capability– where you step back ad the poem takes over. Phrase originates with Keats
Poem by Type –
Fairly brief up to about 60 lines
Usually concentrated on one subject
No more than a single voice
Simple and natural musicality
Might feel in a vortex
Longer than Lyric
Discursive – digressing from subject to subject – rambling
More comfortable than Lyric
Examples – Whittier’s Snowbound
Walter de la Mare’s The Listener
Robert Penn Warren’s The Ballard of Billie Potts
No longer epic poems are written now but long poems are
They have central idea, digressions, and different voices
Example – TS Elliot’s The Wastelands
No longer written
Requed dignified theme, organic unit and orderly progress of action
Examples – Beowulf and Iliad
Very recent form
Looks like short block of type on page
Paragraph or two – no more than a page
Perhaps characters – perhaps not
Seems to have at center a situation rather than a narrative
Nothing much happens
A problem is making language work without musicality of the line
Syntax (arrangement of words and phrases) is often exquisite
Examples – Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud first
Then maybe, James Wright and Robert Bly
Inappropriate Language
Language of poems is romantic – patches of woods are bowers – fields are emerald carpets – avoid these clunkers
Do not use clichés
Inversion – changing natural order of the words – mostly does not work – sounds @out of whatck@ – Bad inversion occurs in metrical verse in order to make syllables fits. – it calls attention to itself – good inversion is difficult to achieve
Informational language – the language you would use to write a paragraph on how to operate a can opener – don’t do it
Appropriate Language
Syntax – correct grammer and forceful graceful syntax
A phrase with no verb does not work
Advert and adjectives worth 5 cents
Verbs worth – 50 cents
Variety versus habits – effective writing varies its ingredients – use loads of different words
Beginning writer should write poems simply, freshly and clearly
Imagery [figurative language]
Language of poetry is language of particulars
Detailed and sensory language incorporating images
“My love is like a red rose” = imagery
“My loves is sweet, wild wonderful” are all abstract and not specific
In a poem there is a figure/image.
Patience could be represented as a statue as patient as stone
Specific devices are metaphor, simile, allusion, personification
Particulars and Texture
Fruit – informational – no image
Apple or peach – abstract and only a word mean any or all apples
The last apple on the tree or The one small peach as pink as dawn = developing texture
Example – The Fish by Elizabeth Bishop
Particulars –
Whitman, in one line, establishes the reader in place-where-the-poem-is “over the sharp-peak’d farmhouse, with its scallop’d scum and slender shoots from the gutters”
Stanley Kuntz in the Round – the poet leaning closer into the flowers so that he sees more than how the light flowed over the honey bees “down blue-spiked veronica light flowed in rivulets over the humps of the honey bees”
The poet must scrutinize the world intensely.
Figurative language –
Love like a burning city in the breast – Millay Fatal Interview
The clouds were low and hairy in the skies like locks blown forward in the gleam of eyes – Frost, One by the Pacific
Simile –
“Like” or”as”
Metaphor –
Implicit comparison – does not use like or as
Little boys lie still awake, wondering, wondering, Delicate little boxes of dust – Wright, The undermining
Personification –
Gives physical characteristic or quality of animation to something inanimate
I bowed my head and heard the sea far of / washing its hands – James Wright
Allusion –
Reference to something that belongs to a world beyond the specific sphere of the poem, e.g., using Van Gogh’s paintings of sunflowers to describe any old sunflower
Universal language –
We all live in the saem world country and city and feel same emotions. Some language is used by everyone to describe:
Ocean as mother
Sun as health
“Dark satanic mills”
“My love is like a red, red, rose”
The power of poetry comes from both mental inquiry and figurative language
Too much imagery can be jolting and cause poem to lose its meaning. Make sure imagery is appropriate – if not sure, don’t use it.
Revision
All poems need revision
Leave poem few days – so you come back to it fresh
Write poem for stranger who will be born in some distant country hundreds of years from now – everything necessary must be on page – it needs to carry all that it must to sustain life and not a lot of extra weight.
Too many metaphors can slow down the forward flow
Cutting is important
Oliver revises 40/50 drafts – others take longer
Some poems are unfixable
Conclusion
Flaubert to Van Gough – Talent is long patience, and originality an effort of will and of intense observation”
What Oliver says about that “…Look at what he does say: Patience is necessary and an effort of will and intense observation. What a hopeful statement! For who needs to be shy of any of these? No one!
That makes me hopeful.
Turned off the TV down stairs
Husband quietly settled
Shut window in bedroom
Stopped
Aircraft
Clock ticketing (removed clock to spare bedroom)
Dove cooing
Caw caw – is that a crow
Calm
Peaceful
The wind whooshing – wooing
Head noises
Seems in both ears
Like a whistle
And the sea
Like white noise
Car noise
Very faint
(my head noise is louder)
Mind chatter
My breath
Whistle in my nose
Door closing
Put fingers in my ears
Low humming or drone like an explosion far away or
Cars going through a tunnel
I like the peace and quiet
It is calming
Makes me feel relaxed and mellow but
My head oise gets louder then and I have to
Control my brain chatter
Do deaf people chatter in their heads like we do or
Do they have picture chatter? Is it as distracting as mine?
Meditating I have found that I cannot be completely quiet. I can not sit without letting my body and mind distract me from the pain of separation. The illusion that I am separated from God from others whoever they are
I feel the pain in my body – I identify with the pain in my back and neck
I cannot just feel the pain and push through to the feeling of together.
I feel the pain. I want distraction. I move. I think. I chatter.
This could be a poem called I chatter about separation from God
Love it xoxox
Sausage
It was a bit of a shock to begin with having it placed in my hand
Felt like a penis
But a flaccid one
Smooth silky
Damp
Squidgy
When I threw it on the table it went “thrump” but did not break
Smells like earth; mild earth
It is cold and clammy
What does flesh smell like – it doesn’t really smell of anything – it smells of the perfume and soap and cream – it smells of sweat when you are in the sun – so the sausage does not smell of flesh.
Long and tubular with nodules on the end
When you squeeze it – clammy nodule bits squeeze out of the end – seepage
Licking the outside it does not really taste of anything except a bit sweaty – I was too scared to taste the insides that oozed out
Skin over meat
Stretchy skin
Destination flower picking
Darkness disturbs sleep of the blind (heading from an ABC News article) good title for a poem
As soon as I close my eyes, anxiety appears. Also feel sleepy – do blind people feel more sleepy than us (see answer below)?
Crept slowly forward as fear I would fall or bump into something
Felt the smoothness of the glass as I struggled to open the back door
Even though my eyes are covered I see an increase in light. Many blind people can see light.
The cold and wind brushed my face and ears
My hair whipped my face – scents of shampoo – like the flick of a dogs tail
The concrete felt strong beneath my feet
I inched more carefully as I felt I was nearing the steps to the lawn
My heart beat a little faster my breathing shallower
I felt like I was waiting for an explosion
I reached out to touch the fence that I thought was to my side. It was not there. I side stepped a few times and found it. I felt less scared as I edged towards the steps
The grass and earth were more buoyant than the stone
I stood to rest for a moment. I could hear the cars on the road. The boiler humming as a bath filled with water. Birds tweeted. I could smell cooking and smoke from a wood fire.
I picked the flower and tore off my blindfold. The light and visuals flooded back into my brain in an exultant rush of joy. How lovely is sight
According to Sleepfoundation.org – https://sleepfoundation.org/non-24/content/facts-prevalence
The majority of blind people have some light perception and circadian rhythms that are synchronized to a 24-hour day-night cycle as in the sighted. For a totally blind individual with Non-24, their visual disorder or lack of eyes prevents the light-dark cycle from synchronizing their internal body clock to the 24-hour day-night cycle.Often, the sleep disturbance is less clear, with more subtle changes in the timing of sleep, or may even look normal, even though the circadian clock is still not synchronized with the 24-hour cycle. Only an assessment of a strong biochemical circadian rhythm, such as the melatonin or cortisol rhythm, can confirm whether a non-24-hour rhythm is absent or present.
Poems I read for Part 1
These are not all the poems I read just the ones that resonated because I read a lot of poems. All are from Staying Alive
Andrew Greig
Orkney/This Life
Simple poem in free verse
Easy to understand
He is describing Orkney
But also his relationship with his wife as they lean into each other like tidal islands – connected and then inaccessible – I am guessing Orkney has tidal islands so he is showing his life alongside the island life.
He describes the sound of the ferry’s engines as
‘this life this life this life’
I can hear that
He’s describing home to
‘This is where I want to live
Close to where the heart gives out’
The form includes repetition ‘It is’ and ‘it is the way’ and ‘the way’
It is in sentences that enjamb over a few lines
It also includes the imagery of the islands as the relationship – and other images that show the island
James Merrill
My Father’s Irish Setters
A poem about his father’s later years
He had dogs but his third wife made him keep them outside
His son had always seen them in the house until then
Later in life the father divorces
And the dogs are no longer there
Sounds sad
Imagery of the dogs includes
‘wining to take us walking’
‘Caked with dirt’
‘A joyous barking’
‘A russet-and-rapid-as-flame’
‘Whimpering lickings’
I’m not exactly sure what the last verse means – this is interesting as it is obviously a well loved poem but David Morley says pomes should be clear
The feeling I get from the last verse is the father is old and sad that he let his ex-wife dictate about the dogs as he loved having them around and misses them
Vernon Scannell
Legs
This poem shows how you can write about something simple
Write about a single object and make an interesting amusing poem
The form includes rhymes at end of lines – not regular
ABABCDDEFGFGHIHJKLLetc
And random rhymes within lines
Dough show grow
Starred scars
Plain Veined Stained
Transport brought
The last two lines sound like an ancient poem – 16thor 17thcentury
‘You more than please, thought pleasure you have brought me
And there are often times when you transport me’
Sounds Shakespearean
Gwen Harwood
Naked Vision
About collecting a fresh corneal graft
An amusing poem
Describes the park they sit in
I question why she sat with the eye and did not just deliver it!
Not sure about form
The first verse is collecting the eye
The second is looking at the eye
The third is describing the park and its visitors
Odd little poem
Once again shows how you can write about one thing
Michael Longley (43)
A Prayer
A small poem 4 lines long
I like it because it shows a moment with images it also speaks out against an issue but not in a preachy fashion
It talks about a church as if the roof has been removed/destroyed and rain comes in and snow
It tells us the country is
Destroying churches but hopes the churches will be blessed with rain in its font and snow on its altar
It sounds like a prayer
‘May the rain’
‘May snow lie on’
The form includes repetition with ‘may’ and ‘pour’ and ‘altar’
Syllables are 11 12 13 per line
Les Murray
An Absolutely Ordinary Rainbow
I don’t think the rainbow was ordinary because of the word absolutely which as absolve in it
It feels like a spiritual awakening in a poem
And shows how a spiritual awakening absolves us but is also ordinary
It talks of workers stopping traffic halting because a man is weeping in the streets
People reach out to him in awe
One man feels like he has vomited because he utters ‘ridiculous’
The poem is like a story
It reminds me of the poem Out of the Dust
It is easy to read and captured my attention
The form includes repetition
‘The word goes round’
The murmur goes round’
‘There’s a fellow weeping down there…’
He repeats ‘weep’ and ‘man’ many times
The verses are 5 lines long except for the first (6) and last (1)
Repetition again ‘does not cover it’ ‘does not declaim it’
‘some will say in years to come’
‘some will say they were shocked’
‘not words but brief’
Not messages but sorrow’
Charles Simic
The Old World
Easy to understand
He is writing about a time in Italy
He describes the landscape
The food and wine
But calls them delicious – abstract?
It isn’t red wine just wine
I guess we all know what olives and cheese taste like so not so abstract
He uses simile ‘like naked lovers’
He describes eh time of day
‘Coming night’
And then he goes back in time as if he can see it now
‘Eternity eavesdropping on time’
4 verses and 5 lines each
All the letters at beginning of lines are capitalised which causes me to pause
‘And so did the wine
With which I toasted the coming night’
It is conversational with little rhythm and rhyming
Stephen Dobyns
Where we Are
This is like a story
Describes a moment a bird
Flies into a room
Lots of details
‘Wipes the gravy from his plate’
‘fill their mouths with duck and roast pork’
‘black with white patch’
‘muscles and tendons beneath the fabric of her dress’
6 verses 5 lines
2 4 and 6 verse last line ends with full stop – other verses last line enjambs to next verse
There’s no romantic words of meaning – just a story about a moment in history
I cannot see any repetition except in the last verse
‘To think the table…’
‘To think the forest…’
‘To think our bubble…’
There are similes
‘As straight as a taut string’
‘The way a single rock can be surrounded by a river’
Maura Dooly
History
It seems to be about waiting for communication from a lover who is away and how precious it is and how easily the relationship could be lost if you don’t keep in touch but then you do get a letter or a postcard and it is as precious as a saint’s bones
I wonder if she is German because she talks about ‘the wall’ ‘except in pieces’
The Berlin wall?
She uses metaphors
‘cold black chute of history’
‘a pile of dirt some god has shaken down’
‘a fleet of strange cargo’
‘a heart’s small journey’
‘opening the dry white papers is kissing a bone’
She uses simile
‘It’s like never having seen the Wall’
‘They’re like the relics of a saint’
3 verses – 4 lines each
Mary Oliver
The Journey
It’s almost like a list poem
The lines are short
Some only 2 words
It’s about an internal journey from thinking of others and taking bad advice to moving on and taking care of yourself first instead of trying to mend others
There are some half rhymes
‘knew’ ‘do’ ‘you’
‘advice’ ‘house’
‘tremble’ ‘felt the’
‘full’ ‘fallen’
‘new voice’ ‘recognise’
The last four lines are repetitive
First and third have 5 syllables
Second and fourth have 7 syllables
‘determined to’
‘the only’
Serious Wool-Gathering 