I understand and relate to Robert Service. By and large, my response to poetry is determined by the poet's style and subject matter.
Poetry.
- Thread starter Sam Gamgee
- Start date
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I love good poetry...both Yeats and Keats and Thomas, Heaney and others... here is my favorite by the late, great Dorothy Parker:
I like to have a Martini,
Perhaps i'll have two at the most.
After three i'm under the table,
And after four i'm under the host.
She also wrote a poem about a popular light verse writer of yesteryear named Edgar
Guest:
I'd rather flunk my Wasserman test
Than read the poems of Edgar Guest.
(A Wasserman test detected venereal disease)
Dorothy was smart witty, brilliant, cynical and, sadly, sad.
I like to have a Martini,
Perhaps i'll have two at the most.
After three i'm under the table,
And after four i'm under the host.
She also wrote a poem about a popular light verse writer of yesteryear named Edgar
Guest:
I'd rather flunk my Wasserman test
Than read the poems of Edgar Guest.
(A Wasserman test detected venereal disease)
Dorothy was smart witty, brilliant, cynical and, sadly, sad.
Lincoln’s second inaugural address, by that standard, is one of the most terrifying poems in our history.
I discovered the work of Stanley Kunitz through a show hosted by Bill Moyers called The Power of the Word. It ran in 1989 and can be seen here. I sought out Mr. Kunitz's work as a result, and was a fortunate enough to meet him several times—he inscribed a number of 1st edition books for me.
I found the two poems below, about his father, very moving.
The Portrait
My mother never forgave my father
for killing himself,
especially at such an awkward time
and in a public park,
that spring
when I was waiting to be born.
She locked his name
in her deepest cabinet
and would not let him out,
though I could hear him thumping.
When I came down from the attic
with the pastel portrait in my hand
of a long-lipped stranger
with a brave moustache
and deep brown level eyes,
she ripped it into shreds
without a single word
and slapped me hard.
In my sixty-fourth year
I can feel my cheek
still burning.
Quinnapoxet
I was fishing in the abandoned reservoir
back in Quinnapoxet,
where the snapping turtles cruised
and the bullheads swayed
in their bower of tree-stumps,
sleek as eels and pigeon-fat.
One of the gashed my thumb
with a flick of his razor fin
when I yanked the barb
out of his gullet.
The sun hung its terrible coals
over Buteau’s farm: I saw
the treetops seething.
They came suddenly into view
on the Indian road,
evenly stepping
past the apple orchard,
commingling with the dust
they raised, their cloud of being,
against the dripping light
looming larger and bolder.
She was wearing a mourning bonnet
and a wrap of shining taffeta.
“Why don’t you write?” she cried
from the folds of her veil.
“We never hear from you.”
I had nothing to say to her.
But for him who walked behind her
in his dark worsted suit,
with his face averted
as if to hide a scald,
deep in his other life,
I touched my forehead
with my swollen thumb
and splayed my fingers out—
in deaf-mute country
the sign for father.
I found the two poems below, about his father, very moving.
The Portrait
My mother never forgave my father
for killing himself,
especially at such an awkward time
and in a public park,
that spring
when I was waiting to be born.
She locked his name
in her deepest cabinet
and would not let him out,
though I could hear him thumping.
When I came down from the attic
with the pastel portrait in my hand
of a long-lipped stranger
with a brave moustache
and deep brown level eyes,
she ripped it into shreds
without a single word
and slapped me hard.
In my sixty-fourth year
I can feel my cheek
still burning.
Quinnapoxet
I was fishing in the abandoned reservoir
back in Quinnapoxet,
where the snapping turtles cruised
and the bullheads swayed
in their bower of tree-stumps,
sleek as eels and pigeon-fat.
One of the gashed my thumb
with a flick of his razor fin
when I yanked the barb
out of his gullet.
The sun hung its terrible coals
over Buteau’s farm: I saw
the treetops seething.
They came suddenly into view
on the Indian road,
evenly stepping
past the apple orchard,
commingling with the dust
they raised, their cloud of being,
against the dripping light
looming larger and bolder.
She was wearing a mourning bonnet
and a wrap of shining taffeta.
“Why don’t you write?” she cried
from the folds of her veil.
“We never hear from you.”
I had nothing to say to her.
But for him who walked behind her
in his dark worsted suit,
with his face averted
as if to hide a scald,
deep in his other life,
I touched my forehead
with my swollen thumb
and splayed my fingers out—
in deaf-mute country
the sign for father.
I do. I'd like to read more. I've enjoyed Emily Dickenson and Charles Bukowski. Also have written over the years.
And when they bombed other people’s houses, we
protested
but not enough, we opposed them but not
enough. I was
in my bed, around my bed America
was falling: invisible house by invisible house by invisible house.
I took a chair outside and watched the sun.
In the sixth month
of a disastrous reign in the house of money
in the street of money in the city of money in the country of money,
our great country of money, we (forgive us)
lived happily during the war.
-Ilya kKaminsky
protested
but not enough, we opposed them but not
enough. I was
in my bed, around my bed America
was falling: invisible house by invisible house by invisible house.
I took a chair outside and watched the sun.
In the sixth month
of a disastrous reign in the house of money
in the street of money in the city of money in the country of money,
our great country of money, we (forgive us)
lived happily during the war.
-Ilya kKaminsky
love poetry but think most of it is really bad in one way or 50.
Ha ha that is true but it's simply the ratio of great poetry vs self indulgent crap.
it seems really easy to write good poetry. But it isn't. One thing people forget is the part about expressing themselves, often they try to sound like the poets they like.
Those Stanley Kunitz poems posted are stellar. He was a mentor to Louise Gluck who won the Nobel Prize. They share clarity and accessibility without surrendering complexity. The fact that Kunitz could write such poetry and then pass the baton to one who received more acclaim is a great tribute to him. Louise presented him with a manuscript of hers, and when she came back to hear the critique, he said something like: You know this is bad, so I won't tell you that, but keep writing. She understood and did. I bet the poems were good, but he knew she could do better, and wanted to encourage her to those heights.
nope. You really can't be a Shel Silberstein fan. His work sure, the guy not so much.
I have not found any modern poetry to enjoy. Doesn’t mean there isn’t any that would be enjoyable, but I’ve not seen it. When the form (and punctuation) is abandoned, it becomes unenjoyable, to me at least.
Someone mentioned “self-indulgent crap.” This is a big part of modern poetry IMO.
I’ve heard it said that a poet is not someone who says, “Look at me,” but rather someone who points the reader to something beyond himself/herself and says, “Look at THAT!”
Someone mentioned “self-indulgent crap.” This is a big part of modern poetry IMO.
I’ve heard it said that a poet is not someone who says, “Look at me,” but rather someone who points the reader to something beyond himself/herself and says, “Look at THAT!”