thanksgiving fun

Over thanksgiving break my old high school held a poetry slam. I was sort of shocked by some of the people who got up and performed. Some of these were people whom I never would have pegged as poets themselves, let alone capable of appreciating poetry. I guess that just goes to show how easy it is to be deceived by appearances. Back to the point – I was thoroughly fascinated by the broad range in style. This was my first poetry slam, and I have to admit I definitely had some preconceived notions as to what to expect. Some of my predictions were indeed quite accurate, but I was in for a few more surprises as well. I typically imagined slam poetry as the highly politicized, rhythmic, almost most rap-like poetry we had listened to in my English class whilst we completed our standard AP English poetry unit. There were definitely a lot of these sorts of poems. I heard poems that criticized war and government and society and global warming and commercialization and consumerism. One of the most memorable of these was written by a quiet girl I knew from drama club. I knew her by face and name, she was a techie in the production I was stage manager for. Still, I had never really talked to her before, and I found her poem to be sort of bittersweet in its accuracy. She spoke of the unrealistic expectations students are often forced to meet in the search for perfection, that overwhelming state of constant anxiety that I seem to remember haunted all of my junior and senior year. In the end she was the much deserving winner of the slam.
Now, all of this seemed to me to be, as I mentioned before, the norm for slam poetry – political/social critiques, rhythmic etc. Turns out, what I thought characterized slam poetry actual is a different style of poetry that is, nevertheless, very common in slam poetry. It is dub poetry that has this outspoken, rhythmic critique, and it just so happens that dub poetry is one of the more popular types of poetry performed at poetry slams.
Aside from the dub poetry, there were a lot of readings of free verse and sonnets, it seemed. There was one villanelle, I think, and yeah a remarkable number of sonnets. I thought that was a bit unusual. Free verse I would have expected, but there must have been four or five sonnets! Perhaps the form is being revived in the next generation? Meh. Anyways, I found the experience to be an overall pleasant one. I was quite happy to revisit a familiar place and learn something new about the same old people inside of it.

“What is existence?”
“It doesn’t matter what they will make of you or your days: they will be wrong,” Jane Hirshfield states in the final poem “It Was Like This: You Were Happy,” in her book of poems, After. In a vast variety of poems, Hirshfield experiments with style and form, utilizing eloquent language that elevates her poetic voice and yet stops short of sounding pedantic or presumptuous. At first this eloquence of voice seems to be the only link amongst the sixty three poems Hirshfield presents. Initially the disparity in form and subject leads the reader to believe After to be a mere collection of works by the same poet. After careful reading, however, it becomes evident that while these poems are each vividly expressed in different manners, they dwell upon similar themes of the parameters of existence and significance.
Part of the apparent lack of unity is somewhat due to the visual disparity between poems. There isn’t any defined consistency or pattern in poem length and form. Most of the poems consist of any number of lines, from as few as six lines such as “Red Scarf” (86) or as many as thirty lines such as “Beneath the Snow, the Badger’s Steady Breathing.” All of Hirshfield’s poems fall within this range except for one five part poem, “A Letter to C,” which consists of over sixty lines. Individual line length varies too with each poem. In “I Write These Words to Delay” (58), the lines are rather short in length, creating a rough jaunt in the rhythm.
What can I do with these thoughts,
given me as a dog given her flock?
Or perhaps it the reverse –
my life the unruly sheep, being herded.

These succinct lines cause the reader to move through them quickly but abruptly, creating a sense of urgency. This speed-reading effect is almost ironic when the title implies that the purpose of these words is to delay, yet the accelerating tension with which they are put forth, reflects this desperation for delay. Yet, to directly contrast the hasty suddenness of this poem, “One Sand Grain Among the Others in Winter Wind” is expressed through lengthy lines such as,
I wake with my hand held over the place of grief in my body.
“Depend on nothing,” the voice advises, but even that is useless.
My ears are useless, my familiar and intimate tongue.
My protecting hand is useless, that wants to hold the single leaf to the tree
and say, Not this one, this one will be saved

Here, the long lines generate an atmosphere of enormity, You get that seem feeling of insignificance that seems to sweep over you when you stare at the vastness of the night sky for too long. The first of these poems is hasty and abrupt, the second vast and gradual, and yet they convey a similar feeling of helplessness. This question of worth and free will in a world that moves so fast.
The resulting length of lines seems to the product not of regulated meter, but rather the natural flow of speech. I noted that Hirshfield limits her use of enjambment, that often she condenses and expresses individual thoughts in one line statements. In “What is Usual Is Not What Is Always” (16) Hirshfield tells us,
What is usual is not what is always.
As sometimes, in old age, hearing comes back.

As is evident in this instance, one line is a complete sentence. The pair of lines, though related, is two separate thoughts. I have found that when the poet chooses to utilize enjambment, she makes the break where there is a natural pause. We can see this in the very same poem,
A woman mute for years
forms one perfect sentence before she dies.

Rather than insert extra punctuation, Hirshfield simply makes the line break to create the necessary breath mark. In creating the length of her lines, she sacrifices metrical regularity for a natural speech-like flow of language.
While she experiments with short poems and long poems, poems of many stanzas and poems of single stanzas, there is evident continuity in diction and imagery. Hirshfield takes images that could seem trivial or mundane, and expresses them elevated diction, utilizing these concrete images to convey abstract themes. This flavorful combination of the mundane and finery makes for memorable images such as in the opening poem “After long silence,”
Politeness fades,
a small anchovy gleam
leaving the upturned pot in the dish rack
after the moon has wandered out of the window.

What could be considered an everyday object or image, such as an anchovy or a pot on a dish rack, seems profound when used in conjunction with the image of the wandering moon. These details are elevated to roles as central focus points rather than minor details. This emphasis is the result of the unexpected pairing of images perceived as trivial and elegant. This phenomenon is even more evident in Hirschfield’s “Theology” (4), where she tackles religious dogma with a literal dog.
My dog would make her tennis ball
Disappear into just such a hollow
Pushing it under with both paws…
… And almost always, her prayers were successful –
the tennis ball
could be summoned again to the surface.

In this Hirshfield addresses the question of faith, is there universal faith or personal sanctuary? This investigation of religion is undeniably a topic for elevation, and yet Hirshfield chooses to explore the question with a border collie’s devotion to a tennis ball. Hirshfield remarks that, “everyone hurries to believe it,” acknowledging religion’s undeniable role in our lives. Whether or not we ourselves embrace it, faith is always there to be retrieved if the need arises.
With further attention to seemingly unrelated to subjects, Hirshfield devotes at least ten poems to “assays”. I must admit, I was initially unfamiliar with the term though I suspected it to be somehow related to the French verb essayer – to attempt or try. As it turns out, a poetic assay seems to be just that, and attempt to something, which in Hirshfield’s case is an attempt to understand and define. Her topics for assays range from abstract ideas such as hope and judgment to the more concrete gravel and termites. I noticed that the only three prose poems in After were assays, one of which, “Tears” (18), I found to be very interesting. In “Tears” Hirshfield explores what evokes tears and how this reflects what the tears mean. She notes that there are tears of laughter and grief and rage and the tears that a provoked by “a misplaced dust mote, errant eyelash or flake of soot.” The poet makes the insightful comment that “the composition of tears of laughter and tears of grief is not, it seems, the same, though the tongue cannot tell this.” It’s as though the tears are defined by the emotions they represent, and yet of completely separate identity. In using prose poetry, the poet creates stream of consciousness, allowing the reader to both distance themselves and become absorbed in the question at hand. By exploring the relationship between tears and emotion Hirshfield examines the role of the person who must experience these emotions in order to shed the tears.
Hirshfield combines emotional appeals with familiar images depicted in comfortably elegant language in each of her poems. These elements create a unity of the collection of poetic works in After, a unity that would otherwise go unnoticed, lost in the variations of form, style and subject matter. Yet as we examine what abstract meditations these elements of language and imagery connote, we begin to understand what Hirshfield addresses. Her theoretical musings address hope and judgment and “Sheep’s Cheese” (10), and “Seventeen Pebbles: Insomnia, Listening”(63). In these poetic explorations she attempts to discern what defines human existence? What defines any existence? Moreover, what defines our existence as important? The final poem, “It Was Like This: You Were Happy,” (92) celebrates life itself. To some, our lives are meaningless and insignificant; but with others we are inextricably entangled. In her final poem, Hirshfield reaches a rather existential conclusion that we are defined not so much by what we do, but rather how we feel about what we do. Rather, the only meaning anything has is that which we assign it. While some might be intimidated and discouraged by this, Hirshfield embraces and celebrates this freedom with an open heart and a mind ready to choose.
Works Cited:Hirshfield, Jane. After. New York • London • Toronto • Sydney: Harper Perennial, 2006.

"Building Bridges"

A few weeks ago, I don’t quite remember exactly how, I came across “Rainy Day” Cornell’s very own undergraduate literary magazine. I have to admit it successfully prevented me from starting my chemistry problem sets but it was definitely worth the extra dose of caffeine I needed to finish my chemistry. To anyone who hasn’t taken a look at it yet, I would highly recommend you check it out! If you’re interested the link is : http://rso.cornell.edu/rainyday/. I don’t know about anyone else, but I could easily spend hours reading the pieces. The magazine has both fiction and poetry, so again I highly recommend it!
So, I was reading through the Spring 2005 issue and I came across this poem that I really liked called “Building Bridges” by Cameron Cooper. He opens the poem talking about building bridges of toothpicks, like I used to do in art class in elementary school. The tone of the poem is childlike in its lightness and innocence evoking the image of a small child with fingers all sticky with glue. The way in which the speaker describes what is happening really appeals to my memory. He speaks of peeling the dried glue of his hands, and I am filled with the memory of doing the very same thing! Until about sixth grade, I always made more of a mess than actual art, and even now I can never escape paint splotches and marker scars.
The innocent voice continues, but takes on more adult subject matter. There is an implied conflict that has created the “chasm” which bridge is intended to span. The last stanza swings back to more childhood imagery, strawberry stains and twelve year olds’ laughter. The tone of the poem creates an atmosphere of both innocence and helplessness. As if the conflict became much more than speaker had ever anticipated, so much more that the speaker is now helpless to do anything to fix it.

SUUUURREEEEEAAAAAALLLL

I often enjoy surrealist poetry, but sometimes I feel very intimidated by it. Sometimes I feel like I am missing a big piece, but other times I love the dream like eccentricities of the poetry, the way it plays with you r mind. I love poems like “Transfiguration.” I like the images evoked in this particular poem. It seems that this “transfiguration” is less of some sort of transmutation and more recanting time. Each image presented is a defining moment of some sort. It is the exact moment of transformation in which a larva becomes an insect, the turning point of its existence, is reversed. This particular image, of the insect and larva, jars a bit with some of the other images. The poem is heavy with biblical allusions and this images neither directly displays nor connotes (as far as I know, my biblical background is not so sturdy as to claim this with vigor) such a religious reference. Perhaps this is a reference to another religious culture; I didn’t find much on this so I am not too sure about that hypothesis. I think the image is present mostly for its reflection of change rather than a retraction of action. Many of the other images are in fact just this--I do not say just as in, merely, but to connote sameness-- and evoke a feeling of highness, of deity and power. I also find it interesting the way these images seem to fix on incidence of conflict and betrayal. We have the murder of Abel by Cain, Pilate and Judas, the death of Christ, the implication of the removal of sin from the removal of Eve (the mother of sin—oh how I detest this blatant misogyny. These are highly negative concepts to be dealing with, and the poet is depicting them as being reversed, removed, as though to erase evil and sin from the source, Eve. But it almost seems that in doing so, good things must also be erased. The words of Moses, the Garden of Eden is untouched and thus unappreciated. What good is beauty if nothing recognizes and appreciates it? And again, the sun “feeds” each day from “the last day to the first” – giving this feeling of moving backwards through time.

I am a sucker for sound. It’s kind of strange I suppose because I have had a serious hearing impairment all of my life, but I suppose that since I have never experienced things any differently, I don’t feel that I am missing something special. I have learned to distinguish notes and melodies and harmonies just as I am, and I have got to say I am addicted. This connects to poetry, I promise!

When it comes to sound over sense, I find myself drawn to poems whose sound appeals to me. This isn’t to say that I read poetry only for the aural pleasure, ignoring the meaning. Hardly! I do very much enjoy getting into the analysis, picking each phrase, each word, each letter apart, figuring out how it all connects. That is perhaps what I love the most, when a poet utilizes every element of expression to convey her message. Unwrapping each brightly packaged implication brings joy to rival Christmas morning!

I was browsing The Norton Anthology of Poetry, that is actually something I do in my spare time, and I came across a couple of poems by John Updike and the particular poem I was drawn to was “V. B. Nimble, V. B. Quick.” First of all, I love the title! I love that play on words (say it aloud if you get it at first.) The focus of the poem is on V. B. Wigglesworth, a professor of Biology in the University of Cambridge and very serious science. The use of perfect rhyming couplets, alliteration, “V. B. Wigglesworth wakes at noon, washes, shaves, and very soon is at the lab,” and “He reads his mail and tweaks a tadpole by the tail,” combined with silly sounding words, “Wigglesworth,” “tweaks,” and “jellyfish,” create a playful air of frivolity and pleasantries. Some of the things he does in the lab, such as “Dip[ping] a spider in a vat” and “Instruct[ing] a jellyfish to spawn,” seem quite ridiculous. This directly contrasts the sterile environment we usually associate with a lab. I think that perhaps it is a satirical critique of science when lost in “pure science” rather than, perhaps practical science. It is as though Updike is criticizing those scientists whose experiments have little to do with the real world, or have no practical results.

Now, I find all of this very fascinating. I love how there is sort of tongue-in-cheek humor hidden in here, however, I would have never noticed had it not been for the lovely sound of the poem. It was the style of the poem, the alliteration, the bubbly rhyme scheme, that caught my attention. This intrigued me and led to further analysis. So basically, my point, it all comes back to sound.

Why I Am Not a Painter

At the very beginning of this course we briefly discussed ars poeticas while talking about Perdomo’s “Papo’s Ars Poetica” and, I quote this from my notes on that particular day, ars poetica is “a poem where you say what a poem should be.” Defining a poem is like defining art, it’s easy and impossible at the same time. You know something is art, but can you explain why? For every element of support, there is a counterexample undermining your entire argument.

I think that maybe that is part of the beauty of it all. You can create something wonderful, something beautiful, something that expresses everything and explains nothing. The creative process involved in the conception of art is something that never fails to fascinate me and perhaps this is why I found myself identifying with Frank O’Hara’s “Why I Am Not a Painter.” I like the way O’Hara opens with the first line, “I am not a painter, I am a poet.” It is so simple, so clean, so very direct. This line could have come off a bit arrogant and self-glorifying, but the next two lines counteract and neutralize that possibility with honesty, a sort of sheepish admission. It makes me feel akin to the speaker, as I too wish I were a painter. I get that urge to paint, sculpt, sketch what it is that am yearning to express, how cathartic it would be to do so. Unfortunately my motor skills are a bit lacking.

I like how both painting and writing are portrayed in such a lengthy, procedural way, while still maintaining the artistic vision. The creation of the painting and the creation poems last over days, subject to alterations and modifications. The way the artist adds sardines to fill an empty space, reflects the necessary deliberation an artist must make. This is not unlike the poet, who reflects and creates with premeditated purpose. At the same time, the sardines are removed when they become “too much” and the poet’s single line inspired by orange transpires into twelve poems, where the poet hasn’t even “mentioned orange yet.” Somehow the poem, the painting, each has evolved beyond its original design. For me, this really reflects art, writing anything and everything creative in the way that one small taste, smell, color, texture, can inspire pages and paintings and sculptures and photographs, each full of words and wishes and images and dreams.

Hello to all! I hope everyone enjoyed fall break, whether here in Ithaca or elsewhere. Did anyone else procrastinate all of their studying until today?? I know I did, which I suppose is why I am writing this in the early hours of the morning. Well anyway, enough chatter, down to business. I’d like to focus on a couple of different things today. To start off, anyone have any favorite poems in this bunch? I always appreciate the poems we read for class, I enjoy them, but I don’t always have a particular favorite. This go round I found myself quite drawn to W. H. Auden’s Lullaby. I found Auden’s imagery to particularly moving. He addresses a “delicate” subject with taste and elegance. I find that he aptly describes his subject matter without offending the reader’s propriety. This is essential because the audience is mixed, not all people can embrace such explicit portrayals of sexual intimacy. When the poet pushes the imagery too hard, sometimes the poem is lost in the expression and the audience loses focus. Auden uses metaphor to paint quite vivid scenes that would otherwise be categorized as pornographic. By expressing himself in this manner he leaves no doubt as to his subject matter, creating the imagery vibrantly, but not offensively, leaving the censoring up to the reader. This allows the reader to focus on the emotional implication of poem. We are filled with the passion of the lovers while the images generate the sensory ardor that only strengthens our amorous zeal.

I could ramble about that a bit more but I had another topic I wanted to address. I was wondering if anyone noticed the way Harryette Mullen’s Dim Lady paralleled Shakespeare’s sonnet 130. I actually read Dim Lady first, then the sonnet. Though I am rather familiar with this particular sonnet, I didn’t recognize the congruency while reading Dim Lady. By the end of the second line of the sonnet, however, I had already taken Dim Lady out again to read the two poems side by side. I have very mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I really like the contemporary interpretation of the sonnet, the cultural references that place the sonnet in a new, more relatable context. On the other hand, I feel like it objectifies the poem, making it seem more like a commodity that has gotten old and needs to be reinvented. Or perhaps like old software, computer systems out of date that must be updated and made-over with a brand new spin to boost sales. Maybe that’s the point. I feel that Shakespeare is timeless, or rather that his work is timeless. This is what defines his literary genius as literary genius. So, by reinventing Shakespeare, is Mullen commenting on our society? The way we fail to appreciate that greats that were, the way we are caught up in what is new and shiny. Any opinions?

Green-Colored Nightmares

Dulce Et Decorum Est is one of my favorite poems. I tend to really like poems of experimental form, poems that either defy or mutate and disguise traditional structure. Hence, this piece, with its oh-so-traditional meter (it’s roughly iambic pentameter) and predictable rhyme scheme (abab), doesn’t exactly fit the genre for one of my regular candidates. This recipe for banality succeeded in shocking me with its powerful imagery. I think it was Julia who mentioned in class that after reading this poem, she had a dream about being gassed. I actually read this poem for my English class last year, but the first time I read it, the piece had the very same effect on me! I had this bizarre dream where I was in chemistry class and this alarm began to sound. Everything in the room turned a strange under-sea blue-green hue and plumes of green smoke filled the lab as we dove under lab benches and into in the chemical supply closet. I literally began to choke, smothered by the fumes. Needless to say I woke up in a bit of a panic. I had actually given myself an anxiety induced asthma attack from the dream (hence the suffocating).
Clearly, the poem had quite an effect on me.
So my question, exactly what does the poet do to create such a powerful impact? I know that, for me, this poem exposes a deeply disturbing scene. I know I mentioned this in class, but I the way Owen opens the poem by describing the soldiers as they march, really gets to me. The typical depictions would glorify the soldiers as brave, proud, marching tall, shoulders back, head held high. But these soldiers are “bent double, like beggars under sacks.” Owen puts the men usually glorified and celebrated alongside the creatures that repulse us, those we alienate and ignore. When the gas bombs drop, the soldiers do not spring into action, there is “an ecstasy of fumbling fitting the clumsy helmets just in time.” Here the use of “fumbling” and “clumsy” really fleshes out the image of the downtrodden, overwrought soldier. And then the sheer helplessness of the man who doesn’t get his helmet in time, “guttering, choking, drowning,” infuses the atmosphere with futility and despair. Both the victim and the onlooker are helpless to do anything as the victim slowly dies, horribly and grotesquely. The onlooker hears the “gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs” and can do nothing but continue to listen. As the gas, the violence, the war itself acts “obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud.” The pure irony of the last line is nearly painful with the stark contrast of the eloquent Latin to the horrific scene just depicted.
I find the whole piece emotionally overwhelming.

a shakespearean medley

Oh Mistress Mine

Oh Mistress mine! where are you roaming?
Oh! stay and hear, your true love's coming,
That can sing both high and low.
Trip no further pretty sweeting.
Journeys end in lovers meeting,
Every wise man's son doth know.
What is love? tis not hereafter,
Present mirth, hath present laughter:
What's to come, is still unsure.
In delay there lies no plenty,
Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.


Take, O take those Lips away

Take, O take those lips away,
That so sweetly were forsworn;
And those eyes, the break of day,
Lights that do mislead the morn!
But my kisses bring again,
Bring again;
Seals of love, but seal'd in vain,
Seal'd in vain!


Sigh No More

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh nor more;
Men were deceivers ever;
One foot in sea and one on shore,
To one thing constant never;
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny;
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey nonny, nonny.

Sing no more ditties, sing no mo,
Or dumps so dull and heavy;
The fraud of men was ever so,
Since summer first was leavy.
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny,
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey, nonny, nonny.


The above are three works by William Shakespeare. The first and third are excerpts taken from broader works by Shakespeare to be appreciated independently. The first is intended to be sung aloud, taken from Twelfth Night, Act II Scene iii. The last, also intended as a song, is from Much Ado About Nothing, sung by the character Balthasar. I was simply flipping through pages in Norton… when I happened across “Oh mistress mine.” I have to admit, before I even looked at the poem, I began to sing a song that I had learned in chorus. We had sung a medley of three different songs, songs our director alluded to as “very popular, well known verses from the seventeenth century.”

You can imagine my surprise when I realized that I was singing the very words that were written in the anthology. Apparently, I had never taken the time to look up who had written the lyrics for the song. So often we sing songs that are madrigals (medieval/renaissance pieces) that are author-less, the original writers swept away with each century, that I had simply assumed this was another collection of anonymous works.

As I continued to hum the medley softly to myself, I realized that on the page preceding my discovery there was another revelation! As I sang, “Sigh no more ladies, sigh no more,” the words turned rather mocking in my own mouth! There was Shakespeare’s “Sigh No More” staring me in the face, the third verse of our medley! I decided to look up the second verse, “Take O Take,” and what do you know, there it was, another Shakespearean poem!

This brings me to a question that we’ve addressed in class. Where do we draw the line between poetry and lyrics? What exactly is the difference? Is there a difference? I know we have had several discussion on these very questions, but I feel as if somehow we never really answered them. We sort of danced around the answer in debating semantics, but never really concluded anything. Is there anything to conclude?

I know that when I sang these same words for chorus, that they had an entirely different feel. The stress was always primarily on the musicality of the piece. We had a guest director, one of five vocalists who were admitted into the vocal program at the Chinese Conservatory of Music, and while he encouraged us emote an interpretation of the piece, the focus was always on the music. The lyrics were a way to intensify the music. The music was primary means of expression and the lyrics acted as accentual emphasis. When I read the very same words as a poem, they have a complete different weight and a different rhythm than that which we forced the lines to move along.

So does the music distract from the merit of poem? What about the fact that two of these poems are meant to be sung?

I am a big fan of e e cummings’s poetry. I love the avant-garde style of poetry, the way it flies and hops and skips and leaps. The structure of the poem reflects and intensifies the meaning and connotation and sub-meaning and alternate connotation of each and every line. I feel as if each poem is a puzzle, a rubics cube waiting to be solved. Yet, what I love most of all is the way he combines this bold and experimental style to classic forms and subjects. He is notorious for playing with sonnets, blues forms and even acrostic poems. I love the way he shapes these traditional forms into something unrecognizable, disguising them through punctuation, capitalization, enjambment, approximate rhyme, internal rhyme and anything else he finds useful in expression. I love how the form brings a new level of understanding once you’ve sifted it out of the style.


all which isn't singing is mere talking

all which isn't singing is mere talking
and all talking's talking to oneself
(whether that oneself be sought or seeking
master or disciple sheep or wolf)

gush to it as diety or devil
-toss in sobs and reasons threats and smiles
name it cruel fair or blessed evil-
it is you (ne i)nobody else

drive dumb mankind dizzy with haranguing
-you are deafened every mother's son-
all is merely talk which isn't singing
and all talking's to oneself alone
but the very song of(as mountains
feel and lovers)singing is silence

ee cummings


What does everyone think of this particular cummings’ poem? It seems to me that cummings is expressing mankind’s deafness to one another. We spend nearly all of our lives talking, chatting, gossiping. But since we spend so much time asserting ME, saying what we think, thinking of what to say, we forget to listen. Everyone else is nattering away while we condition ourselves to muffle useless noise so that we may construct our own ideas. When everyone forgets to listen, we end up talking only to ourselves. With no one to hear our words, they are rendered meaningless. W e become wordless, mute, “dumb mankind.” At least singing has the element of music, something we can recognize and understand. Singing manages to seep paste our careful filtration, resonating with its lyrical hum. Perhaps it is only through music that we open ourselves to foreign expressions.
What about the last two lines? I feel as if only in the absence of something can we appreciate its greatness. Silence has this tacit immensity and power about it, just as daunting mountains and lovers’ emotions do. What does anyone else think?

a whole lot of "junk"

Okay, so, to jump right in to everything, the poem I wrote about in my most recent essay was not at all the poem I wanted to write about (no offense to Miss Dickinson). I had intended to write about Richard Wilbur’s Junk, but things didn’t work out the way I had planned. I started off busting with enthusiasm only to be deflated by obstacle after obstacle. I am not exaggerating in the slightest when I say I spend many, many hours searching for anything written on this particular piece. Oh, I found plenty of essays and articles on other poems by Wilbur. I found myself looking at essays about some of my favorite poems, poems I’d forgotten I’d like to begin with. Too bad I never found a single essay on Junk. After a few other failed attempts with other poems, I settled on a Dickinson poem and proceeded to write my essay based on My Life was stood - a Loaded gun. Since I never got to write the essay I wanted to write about Junk, I have decided to write just a wee bit about my reactions and feelings towards the poem. This is, of course, all very rough. I am literally drawing on scribbles. Did I mention I have horrible handwriting? Alleluia for computers!

I find it fascinating the way Wilbur both degrades and glorifies the “junk”. He is clearly criticizing the craftsmanship of the axe when he refers to it as “hell’s handiwork the wood not hickory the flow of the grain not faithfully followed.” He focuses on flaws, imperfections, judging just how unworthy it all is. He cries out for those who have discarded the useless items, “Haul them off! Hide them!” He compares them to the sort of people we look down upon, “the bought boxer” and “the paid off jockey,” only to make an about face in comparing the junk to “captives who would not talk under torture.” Here Wilbur has paralleled the junk to some of the most revered and respected people in our culture. He goes on to describe the dump in terms of “dolmens,” which is remarkable in several ways. The dolmens are supposed tomb-markers, playing on the idea that these items are dead, gone, destroyed. The suggestion that the “death” of these items merits a tomb-marker instantly glorifies them. This play on death comes up again when Wilbur says, “they shall all be buried to the depth of diamonds.” Again, here is further glorification through mere juxtaposition of the junk and diamonds. The line, “the sun shall glory in the glitter of glass chips,” screams of exaltation.

Wilbur is reveling in this idea of destruction, of dissolution. He loves the idea that all things decompose, fall about and degenerate. It’s as if he is insinuating not only the insignificance of everything we do and make, but the beauty of our finite existence. We live only because we die. The value of our lives is defined only by the fact that they are limited. And not only are we mortal, but our creations suffer mortality as well. Wilbur shows us that everything we have sought to tame, will inevitably escape us. Nothing truly lasts forever; we must die; things must break and be forgotten. But that is the beauty of existence, of life.

"The Morning After" by Langston Hughes

Whenever I read this poem I am struck by the language, the powerful control of dramatic diction that Hughes employs. The opening lines, “I was so sick last night didn’t hardly know my mind” gives me very strong, negative image. Automatically I sympathize with the speaker, even when it becomes apparent that this “sickness” was due to his own “licker” drinking. If I had any doubts about the speaker I find myself further forced to empathize when in the second stanza he says “Had a dream last night I thought I was in hell”. Words like “sick” and “licker” and “hell” have undeniably negative or unpleasant connotations. Inspiring equally upsetting images, they give an overwhelming feeling of negativity. To enhance this lingering distaste, the general syntax of the poem is littered with hard consonants, mostly d’s and k’s that give a rough, harsh, even sharp texture to the ambiance of the poem.

All of this technical structure leads me to the last stanza where the speaker awakens to his lover’s face. Does this sight fill him with joy, erasing all doubts and fears? No. Though at the sight of his lovers face the tone of poem does indeed lighten, it becomes wearisomely playful rather than simply worn out. All of this culminates in this singular image of two people, lovers yes, but partners. They are partners in life, the dreary, burdensome hardship that is life. Life is not always sweet and pleasant; sometimes it is angry and violent. We find solace in the strangest things, the obnoxious snores of a loved one torments a literal or metaphorical hangover yet at the same time its comforting sound sooths and appeases. Life is not a fairytale where every ending is happy, where the villains are always villains and the heroes are unfailingly courageous. We all have faults and flaws that characterize who were are and that distinguish our experiences in the world. To see only the worst of the world sends us plummeting into a downward spiral, a dangerously suicidal path that Hughes knew quite well. When faced with hardship we cannot simply pretend it is otherwise, to do so would be our demise. At the same time, to acknowledge only fear and chaos destroys us as well. We must be aware of the world, of the unrighteous, unjust nature of the world; but we must persevere with, and we will persevere with the love and support of those around us.

hello all

Hey everyone! I’m Samantha. I am a freshman in the College of Arts and Sciences. I don’t have any clue as to what I want to major in. Well, I suppose I have some clue; there is no way that I will be a math major. Aside from that one restriction, I really don’t know what I want to do. My greatest problem is that I like too many things. I love literature and poetry and writing. I love ancient history, contemporary history, politics, and philosophy. While it may seem like I at least have a “humanities” bent to my interests let me surprise you with one more. I am fascinated by astronomy and biology but most of all; I love chemistry, particularly organic chemistry.

I am from a small town in southeastern Massachusetts called “Mattapoisett”. I have lived there nearly my entire life, and as far growing up is concerned, it is a great place to spend your childhood. I live about three miles from the beach, which is where I spend most of my time off during the summer. It’s a sleepy little town, my high school had about seven hundred people in it, ninety seven percent of who were Caucasian. The summer and fall in Mattapoisett is really quite exquisite, we are actually a summer/fall vacationing destination for many urban-dweller. Unfortunately the winters are too cold for it to be pleasant, but to mild for much snow. We regularly get a few inches that melt within a week, leaving behind a very boring taupe tinted world. Being allergic to grass and leaves and the mold that flourishes in the springtime, I don’t enjoy the spring as much as others might.

Music is an enormous part of my life. I nearly always have music on, I can’t drive without it. I play flute and I like to pretend that I play piano (that is, I love to play but I have never been taught) and above all I love to sing. Strangely enough, I don’t much like to perform. I don’t mind so much in groups, but I detest singing solo and whatnot. For me, music is something more personal, something I love for the experience it brings to me.In addition to music, I love to run. I find that it is a great way to clear my head and it helps me keep firm control of my asthma. I prefer long distances, three to ten miles, maybe more; I have never tried more than ten. You may think I am crazy, maybe I am, but I like to think of it as being delightfully eccentric.

What makes writing good? That’s a tough question; I mean there are so many ways to answer that. Are examining grammar, structure? What about content? Does it matter if the content is dry but clearly organized and factual? It is hard to compare that to an expressive piece that utilizes figures of speech and imagery to portray an experience. So what makes writing good? I guess primarily, others must be able to understand whatever it is that you are trying to say. Whatever theme or message or information must be comprehensible to the reader. Overdressing your writing in complicated structure and diction really does you no good without a distinct purpose. Writing is a craft and we must remember that whenever we write.

I chose to discuss Willie Perdomo’s “Notes on a Slam Jam” for my paper. I find Perdomo a particularly evocative writer. I found both “Notes on a Slow Jam” and “Ars Poeticas” fascinating and moving and simply wonderful. The rhythm, the structure, the diction, the overall expressionism of the poem was simply beautiful. I almost wish had been able to write more. I feel as if my analysis could have been so much deeper and that my overall essay seemed incomplete. And aside from these instinctual reactions, after today’s class I wish I could rewrite my thesis. Ah well, it’s all a part of the learning process I suppose. That is why I am in this class, to learn. I love poetry but I also love poetic prose. One of my favorite authors is F. Scott Fitzgerald partly because of the poetic imagery he incorporates into his prose. I am fascinated by the ability of poets and prose-writers alike to string together words in such a vivid and lyrical manner. I only wish that I could write with such elegance and expression.