National Poetry Month 2014

Anyone doing/reading anything interesting during National Poetry Month?

I signed up for two email lists, one at:
http://knopfpoetry.com
and the other via
http://poets.org

I'm counting my ongoing Dante's Inferno project as "reading poetry".

Edited to try to get rid of the Dan Brown touchstone that generates when I enter the Inferno, but it seems impossible, so I'm eliminating the touchstones altogether. (Even when I choose "others" and pick what I want Dan Brown shows up in the list at the right . . . annoying!)

Light a Candle! Drink a Toast!

For years, i despised Poetry Magazine. This last issue, the old staff in place, under a new editor -- is WUNDERBAR. Many NEW POETS! Canʻt get over how MIRACULOUS they "sound." (The older POETRY MAG was VISUAL; ear dead, mainly, stretched to vacuousness.) Well, SLAM POETRY and RAP may or may not have slonr brought poetry alive, YOUTH WILL HAVE ITS FLING, but they certainly help us to use ALL THE SENSES (or almost all) for READING OUT LOUD, instead of reading down soft into a navel gazing, drowsing, sleeping. (I respect Wimanʻs Russian translations, however. And Mana to him in his new work!)

My personal find (by chance) is DIANE GILLIOM FISHER. KETTLE BOTTOM, Florence, Mass., Perugia Press, 2004). Take one stanza and savour it. Title, poem: EXPLOSION AT WINCO NO. 9.

"Delsey Salyer knowed Tom Junior by his toes,/which his steel-toed boots had kept the fire off of./ Betty Rose seen a piece of Wlllyʻs ear, the little/ notched part where a hound had bit him/ when he was a youngʻun, playing at eating its food."

Another: PAUL CELAN: Selections, ed. Pierre Joris, UCLA, 2005. 7 translators.
Celan is no easy work.

. . . .
Spoke, spoke.
Was, was.

We
did not give way, stood
in the midst
pore structure, and
it came.

Came up to us, came
right throuogh, stitched
invisibly, stitched
to the last membrane,
and
the world, a thousand crystal,
shot forth, shot forth.

. . . .
tr. Cid Corman. (Thank you!)

THE STRAY DOG CABARET: a book of Russian poems, tr. Paul Schmidt, ed. C. Cipiela, Honor Moore, NY, NYRB, 2007. The Introduction is indispensable: the variation among the poets is great. I do not know Russian, but as English poems (however the Russian) these are exceedingly credible, many are delightful. You can see the translatorʻs hand, after a while. Heʻs witty, bold, frank, soft-stepping when it counts for the meaning/effect of the whole -- itʻs an incredible experience. Iʻve read some pretty poor "translations" of Tsvetaeva -- from the view of a poem in English (ask: good English/ good poem in English or Not? -- so PAUL SCHMIDTʻs are the best. Brodsky said Tsvetaeva was one poet he would never challenge. In some examples, you can see why.
She has the inventiveness of a Sylvia Plath.

Includes Blok, Akhmatova, Mandelstam, Khlebnikov, Mayakovsky, Pasternak, Tsenin.

POEMS OF AKHMATOVA, Boston, Houghton Mifflin, composite ed. 1967-73. These are my favourite translations of Akhmatova by STANLEY KUNITZ and MAX HAYWARD. Every poem that Kunitz wrote/published is exquisite. Itʻs hard to tell the difference between Akhmatova and Kunitz, frankly, except Akhmatovaʻs life reflects Russia under Stalin; Kunitzʻs, his personal hard toned insights of American life and the Western intellectual of soul.

THE COMPLETE POEMS OF ANNA AKHMATOVA, TR. Judith
HEMSCHEMEYER, ed. Roberta REEDER, Expanded ed. Boston, Zephyr; Edinburgh, Canongate, 1992.

TWENTY LOVE POEMS AND A SONG OF DESPAIR, by Pablo NERUDA, Penguin, 1969, 1976, 2004 (various dates for various parts) A Manʻs Lyrical testament to the subject. After Sappho, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and many (too many to list) . . .the subject is still fresh, amazing. As though one had not really visited this country before. His style is initmitable.

and many more . . .at home and a-wilding.

The newest if SCOTT COFFEL (Boston Poetry Prize. Review, Gregson, BOSTON REVIEW, 2013) The Ghost of T.S. Eliot superceded. One corner, at least. One of two shoes. The other is simpler, a FROST to be or already has superceded. This is A NEW AGE. POST-POST MODERN?

SCOTT COFFELʻS Poems:
(1) "MAN HALF THE SIZE OF NAPOLEON" (2) GOLDMAN SACHS," (3) MR STILL," (4) CROSSING THE MIGHTY CATSKILLS."

A TOAST! A TOAST! TO ALL POETS ALL OVER THE WORLD!
-pau. (finis).

I just learned of an Emily Dickinson Marathon being held here (St. Paul, MN) on April 25th from 8am - 9pm. I'm looking forward to it.

Details are at:
http://www.stthomas.edu/english/events/201420emily-dickinson-marathon-reading.ht...

They'll be using the R. W. Franklin edition of The Poems of Emily Dickinson . . . and reading starting with #1 and going through #1789.

Greetings, LucindaLibri! As one poet to another (Iʻm sure you are), it is good to be on this your train of the Month. Dickinson is perennial, world-wide -- for which I am glad. I wish I could step away from the suffocating worship. Dickinson would herself would probably have suffered too. I was in a class at MHC, which was her alma mater (though she withdrew after a year or two, for reasons not clear), and was astonished by the notion of loyalty: it brooked no questions among Loyalists (there), in that long ago time thatʻs been hard to forget. That was so counterproductive and ever since although numbers of Dickinsonʻs poems are HARD TO FORGET! once one has just GLANCED at THEM! proving how powerful they are, one need NOT LIKE THEM! Or is it HER? No, the hammer-and-thongs beating that is promised the un-enthralled who dare . . . . IF one reads Dickinsonʻs poems through, from cover to cover, without stopping, the poems have a rather smug quality about them that was perhaps transferred from her choice life of isolation. I always wondered if it is true, as her sister implied, that Emily and she had to serve their mother, seemingly hand and foot, Emily herself took to the same bed, after her mother died, and her father ruled on, because she was thoroughly exhausted. There are philosophies such as that behind the ART for ARTʻs sake school that claims Poems Have an Integrity All In Themselves irrespective of the lives behind/beneath/before/over/ and thoroughly or partially through them; but I think Science has convinced most of us that just as any material (matter bound) being (including the chemically inorganic) cannot be known without its accompanying ecology and history, so do poems. Poems do not NEED the poetsʻ histories to be understood, but MAY BE UNDERSTOOD better for them. In the end, many poems are individual in their appeal; i.e., De gustibus non disputandem -- and perhaps all should be in some way, so that Critics are a disservice if their criticism is not serviceable to the user(s).
A poet that I rate Top of the Mountain in execution is Sylvia Plath. If inventiveness in metaphors is not divorced from her life choices ( responses and/or reactions), one robs the world of a genuine achievement in the art. Carol Joyce Oatesʻ criticism nevertheless is welcomed, I think, for it provides a chance to re-assess Plathʻs gifts (and failures, where possibly also genuine) and reinvoke our gratitude in new ways whether freshly negatively conditioned or not. Ted Hughes tried to make his peace and we are better for that, difficult as it must have been -- he was roundly shunned by Plathʻs followers, notably asserting their new found feministic rights and privileges which may or may not be of much worth to the real merits of Plathʻs poetry. Well, peace to all camps. Life is short. And whatever truth may be, it cannot exist long without -- I hate to use the overworked word, but (here goes) --love. Is poetry not about both (and more, with our lying, cheating, and hating lives too) concerned with the conditions of human life. I make my peace with Dickinson here. And embrace Plath without reserve. If also, SOME times, like Dickinson, in puzzlement, also.

Marta Werner and Jen Bevinʻs UNSETTLING EMILY DICKINSON accounts for many of the kinds of questions I asked. I have not read Susan Howeʻs MY EMILY DICKINSON but that may or may not clarify the issues, but at least probably reflects the attitude of my "opposition" (thatʻs too big a word). Poetry needs more of these -- set out for reflection.
Some other time I may sit down and cite specific lines and imagery that was then under "dispute" (too big a word). Better that Werner, Bevin, and Howe et al convince part skeptical readers, preferably on occasion outside of New England?

MANA to Poets, to Poetry!

Thanks for the info.
I'm neither a poet nor a critic . . . just someone who appreciates poetry, especially when it is read aloud.
There's no way I'll have the energy for the entire 13-hour marathon (I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome), though I am looking forward to attending for part of the day. I'm told it will also be "live-streamed" so I may be able to follow parts of it from home.

So, did you? How did it go?

The ED marathon is on April 25th . . . will report back after . . .

I'm looking forward to tomorrow's (4/25) Emily Dickinson Marathon . . . If all goes well, the live audio stream will be available here: https://stream.stthomas.edu/view/live?id=93ea17310c374d0c8121a584007ebe50
from 8am until 9-10pm CDT.

I'm going to try to go in the morning. I want to be there in time for "There's a certain slant of light" . . . the Emily Dickinson poem I memorized in high school that became even more meaningful to me a few years later when I started to suffer from migraines (I know others view the poem as about depression, but for me, it's about migraines).

Did anyone participate in Poem-in-your-pocket Day today (4/24)?

Just home from a few hours at the Emily Dickinson Marathon . . . unfortunately the live audio stream I posted above sounds pretty jumbled . . . the readers are in a big circle in a large room and the mic is on a table in the middle, so it doesn't seem to be picking up very much of the reading :(

Being there was very cool. Listening to many poems by the same poet read aloud is definitely a great way to experience poetry . . . We should do this more often!

Excuse me. A microphone in the middle of a group seated in the round at a table circling it? I canʻt believe it was intended to hear each of you, but have you meet each other -- and perhaps commisserate . .. .? Incredibly well planned for failure -- that was. Itʻs a disservice to Dickinson and every one who went to it, hoping to . . . . make it a memorial to Dickinson, would you not think? Otherwise, itʻs purely a ad junket. A disservice to poetry, Dickinson, and all of you who are so enthusiastic -- and good hearted to forgive . . so readily. But you should not, you know. Or the same scam will be held in perpetuity -- and which other poet treated like fodder for advertising?

But Iʻm glad you had fun, nonetheless. And in the name of Emily Dickinson, if I can be presumptuous (I will anyway), thank you! From all of us, out here, as well.

Can someone recite a poem from Stevensonʻs "Childʻs Garden of Verses"?

And from anything by Dr. Seuss. e.g. "Cat in the Hat."

And from Shel Silversteinʻs
. . . (Iʻve forogotten his most popular title ) . . .

Then i would like to recite Elizabeth Barrett Browningʻs "Sonnets From the Protuguese" (if I can find a copy of it).

>10 leialoha:
The event itself was GREAT! You just had to be there . . . which to me is better anyway.

No scam (why would you even say that?) The live streaming (it wasn't a conference call, just an audio feed) was an addon to this year's Marathon, not the point at all. No table, no "memorial", no assigned big name readers, no comisserating (there were no words spoken in the room except Emily Dickinson's poems) . . . Just a large room in the library with comfortable chairs/couches in a big circle, people coming and going, readers with different voice levels . . . no good way to test a mic system given the way the event works. I was able to hear people with strong voices via the stream, but when someone spoke very quietly only a few words would get through. I think it was the students' idea to try live streaming, because few people could just sit there for 14 hours, but might hope to follow along from afar . . . It's also possible that the campus has faster/better internet than I do, so it might have worked better on site.

In any case, the point was to relax and enjoy the flow of Dickinson's poems. In the two hours I was there, I noticed phrases/topics/words that kept repeating across poems. (I really want to do some word clouds of her poems by year.)
I was very impressed by the students who came and read . . . including one young man who struggled with a stutter but made it through every poem that came his way during the hour or so that he was part of the reading circle (we all were using copies of Franklin's edition and started with Poem #1 and just went around the circle with each person reading one poem, so no way to prepare, look up challenging words, etc.).

Other ED marathons are done in a more formal way . . . but this was much more relaxed and accessible to everyone who went . . . though there were some people who only listened and didn't join the reading circle . . . Still a great event!

Good to hear it. Glad it was a success. And that you enjoyed it.