National Poetry Month: 30 New Poems--the 16th poem

I think it was Poem #10 where I featured a poem I had never heard before by Naomi Shihab Nye, one of my favorite poets ever. Today I'd like to share a poem by another of my poetry idols, W.S. Merwin. I am in utter awe of anyone, like Merwin or Nye, who every thing they touch turns to poetry gold. Like this one, for example:

"Rain at Night"
by W.S Merwin

This is what I have heard

at last the wind in December
lashing the old trees with rain
unseen rain racing along the tiles
under the moon
wind rising and falling
wind with many clouds
trees in the night wind

after an age of leaves and feathers
someone dead
thought of this mountain as money
and cut the trees
that were here in the wind
in the rain at night
it is hard to say it
but they cut the sacred ‘ohias then
the sacred koas then
the sandalwood and the halas

Read the rest here.

Enjoy your Saturday. Only 14 more poems left!

Poetry Friday: Birthday Poems Mix Tape

I'm a huge supporter of birthdays. In a way, I feel like birthdays are the most important of all holidays. Well, today happens to be mine and once you pass a certain age and become the parent of the certain amount of children, it becomes impossible for birthdays to be as special as they once were. However, I still think everyone deserves to be treated to whatever they want on their birthday. My birthday wishes, the ones that are attainable, are pretty simple...I want to watch whatever I want on TV, and I want to share Merwin and Kunitz with the world.

Forced to choose, I am 99 percent certain that I'd have to pick W.S. Merwin and Stanley Kunitz as my all-time favorite poets. I hardly ever read anything they write that I don't like/love. So on my birthday, I turn to them. Here's a bit of W.S. Merwin's "A Birthday"...

Something continues and     I don't know what to call it
though the language is full of suggestions
in the way of language
                but they are all anonymous
and it's almost your birthday     music next to my bones

these nights we hear the horses     running in the rain
it stops and the moon comes out     and we are still here
the leaks in the roof go on dripping     after the rain has passed
smell of ginger flowers     slips through the dark house
down near the sea     the slow heart of the beacon flashes

Read the rest here. But you should also check out "In the Winter of My Thirty-Eighth Year" by Mr. Merwin:

It sounds unconvincing to say When I was young

Though I have long wondered what it would be like

To be me now

No older at all it seems from here

As far from myself as ever

Walking in fog and rain and seeing nothing

I imagine all the clocks have died in the night

Now no one is looking I could choose my age

It would be younger I suppose so I am older

It is there at hand I could take it

Except for the things I think I would do differently

They keep coming between they are what I am

They have taught me little I did not know when I was young 

For this poem, you can read the rest here.

This may not be the best birthday poem ever, though. That title may belong to Mr. Kunitz's "Passing Through:"

—on my seventy-ninth birthday

Nobody in the widow’s household   

ever celebrated anniversaries.   

In the secrecy of my room

I would not admit I cared

that my friends were given parties.   

Before I left town for school

my birthday went up in smoke   

in a fire at City Hall that gutted   

the Department of Vital Statistics.   

If it weren’t for a census report   

of a five-year-old White Male   

sharing my mother’s address

at the Green Street tenement in Worcester   

I’d have no documentary proof   

that I exist. You are the first,   

my dear, to bully me

into these festive occasions.

Read the rest of this amazing poem here. And if today is your birthday, too, (I'm talking to you, P. Diddy) or even if it's not, please take the time to enjoy these beautiful birthday poems. 

Poetry Mix Tape: Poems of Autumn

Is it trite to say that autumn is my favorite season? It seems to be a lot of people's favorite season. Granted, all of these people are awesome, so maybe it's not trite at all. Maybe it's brilliant.

Anyway, I wanted to revive the mix tape concept for some autumn poems before it gets to late. Here in Michigan, autumn can often seem like it last's about 3 weeks. Before we know it, the leaves are all on the ground waiting to be raked or, even worse, those leaves are blanketed by a layer of snow.

There's just something about a crisp autumn day or taking a walk and kicking up clouds of fallen leaves as you go that just seems perfect. It seems I'm not the only one to think so, because there is no shortage of poems about autumn. I tried to pick a few you might not have heard before...

Autumn Movement by Carl Sandburg
The name--of it--is "autumn" by Emily Dickinson
To Autumn by John Keats (I set aside my Romantic bias for this one. It's a really good poem.)
Echoing Light by W.S. Merwin
Sonnet 73 by William Shakespeare
When Autumn Came by Faiz Ahmed Faiz

And then there's this one by Lucy Maud Montgomery called "An Autumn Evening:"

Dark hills against a hollow crocus sky
Scarfed with its crimson pennons, and below
The dome of sunset long, hushed valleys lie
Cradling the twilight, where the lone winds blow
And wake among the harps of leafless trees
Fantastic runes and mournful melodies.

The chilly purple air is threaded through
With silver from the rising moon afar,
And from a gulf of clear, unfathomed blue
In the southwest glimmers a great gold star
Above the darkening druid glens of fir
Where beckoning boughs and elfin voices stir. 


Read the final stanza here. I love the imagery and word choice in this poem: "crocus sky" and "purple air." Words that don't go together but somehow here make perfect sense.

Got an autumn poem or two to share? Add them in the comments below, please. And happy falling.

Poetry Friday: Poetry Mix Tape...Rivers

Not only is Tuesday my first day of school, it's the first day of school for two of my children as well. One of the things on my "Things to do with the kids before summer ends" list is to take them downtown to ride the People Mover (a train that carries commuters and visitors around the city's main downtown area) and have a nice picnic lunch by the Detroit River. I guess I don't have many days left to do this, but I think we can squeeze it in.

Detroit's downtown isn't the most bustling of places, but I do have a fondness for the river. Water of any kind is something I enjoy, but I always find myself enchanted by the shores of the Detroit River. Maybe it's the view of a foreign country. Maybe it's that "water symbolizes rebirth" thing. Maybe it's the huge ships and barges. Who knows.

Source: www.flickr.com/photos/22735153@N06/2741610040

This got me thinking about poems about rivers. I don't know that many, so it seemed a good one to research. Thanks to the Poetry Foundation's Poetry Tool, I even came across one (albeit a slightly depressing one--you'll see when you click the link to read the rest) about the very river pictured above:

Poem to the Detriot River

By Terry Wolverton

Not really a river at all,

but a handshake between two Great

Lakes, Huron stretching to embrace

Erie in its green-gray grasp. You

stitch the liquid boundary of

a city dismantling itself,

bricks unmortared, spires sagging, burnt

out structures razed to open field.

Prairies returning here, foxtails

and chicory, Queen Anne’s lace sways;

tumbleweeds amble down Woodward

Avenue, blow past fire hydrants,

storefronts and rusted Cadillacs.

You are the mirror into which

we plunge. 

Read the rest of the poem here.

And please also check out these poems about rivers (although I'm not sure "Gold River" nor "The Way to the River" are about rivers, they river in the title and I like them a lot, so they make the mix tape!):

"A River" by John Poch
"The Way to the River" by W.S. Merwin
"The Negro Speaks of Rivers" by Langston Hughes
"Trout" by Kathryn Starbuck
"Gold River" by Catie Rosemurgy
"Niagara River" by Kay Ryan

Know more poems about rivers? Please add them in the comments section. I just know there are more out there.

And while I have your attention, if you haven't subscribed yet, please do so either by email or RSS. My ego needs a boost and topping the 10 subscribers I currently have would certainly do the trick. Also, if you are new to my "Poetry Mix Tape" concept, please check out the previous three, which I do think were top notch, in my humble opinion.

Oh, and please check out the Poetry Friday Roundup over at Susan Taylor Brown's wonderful blog.

Poetry Mix Tape: Summer Poems

I had some trouble thinking of a theme for this week's Poetry Mix Tape. I toyed around with a few ideas, but couldn't settle on a good one. I really thought last week's Mix Tape was a home run, thanks in no small part to a number of great comments from readers. A tough act to follow you might say.

But then I got to thinking about the end of summer. I go back to work on Monday, so my summer has just about come to a close. So although it took some research on my part, these are all poems I read for the first time this week, I have chosen SUMMER for this week's Poetry Mix Tape theme.

Here are five poems about summer for you to (hopefully) enjoy:

"Summer Song" by William Carlos Williams
"Morningside Heights, July" by William Matthews
"Jet" by Tony Hoagland
"To the Light of September" by W.S. Merwin
"Summer" by Carlo Betocchi

Now, I have to say I applied the theme fairly loosely here. Not all of these are strictly about summer. Some are set during summer or simply just mention "summer." They are, however, all very good poems. Check out the opening of Hoagland's "Jet:"

Sometimes I wish I were still out

on the back porch, drinking jet fuel   

with the boys, getting louder and louder   

as the empty cans drop out of our paws   

like booster rockets falling back to Earth

and we soar up into the summer stars.   

Summer. The big sky river rushes overhead,   

bearing asteroids and mist, blind fish   

and old space suits with skeletons inside. 

It gets better, too, so make sure you read the rest at The Poetry Foundation.

Maybe you know some good ones that fit this theme a little better. Please contribute to our Poetry Mix Tape by leaving your poems in the Comments. I am sure there are more great summer poems out there than these. Share them with the world!

Merwin Named Poet Laureate

Acclaimed poet W.S. Merwin's recent appointment as Poet Laureate has got me thinking about and re-reading some of my favorite Merwin poems.

To be honest, not every one of his poems strikes a chord with me. This spring, I took a look at The Shadow of Sirius and really had trouble getting into it.  Even in the poems of his I like, Merwin is usually a challenging read for me. But that, for me as a reader, is part of the pleasure. I enjoy the complexity, the joy of trying to master the language and make sense of it all.

I also enjoy the raw emotion of some of his poems. There are some feelings that words just can't do justice because of their depth and complexity. Merwin, however, finds the language and captures these emotions exquisitely. Take, for example, "Separation," a short and perfectly painful poem about loss.

Or what about this one?

Yesterday
By W.S. Merwin

My friend says I was not a good son
you understand
I say yes I understand

Stop right there. The ambiguity caused by the absence of quotation marks has me totally hooked. Go on to read the rest of the poem and see if the sadness of this poem resonates with you, too. Or, better yet, listen to W.S. Merwin read it himself:




One of my other favorites is one I can't find a copy-written version online, "The Unwritten." Maybe you know it--it's fabulous. So instead I leave you with one last poem from our newest Poet Laureate:

To the Blank Spaces

BY W. S. MERWIN

For longer than by now I can believe

I assumed that you had nothing to do

with each other I thought you had arrived

                  whenever that had been

more solitary than single snowflakes

with no acquaintance or understanding

running among you guiding your footsteps

                  somewhere ahead of me

in your own time oh white lakes on the maps

that I copied and gaps on the paper

for the names that were to appear in them

Read the rest of the poem here if you wish. And be sure to share your favorite Merwin poems in the comments.