The Small Nouns: poet to know

Every so often as a reader, I come across a new poet that I know I should know already. They're just too good for me not to have read before. But, alas, it happens. Often.

One such poet is Linda Pastan. Her poem "The Bookstall" was one of the first I read in the anthology Poetry After Lunch edited by Joyce A. Carroll. I love it for its similes (a poetry move that I definitely need to write about in the future)...

Just looking at them
I grow, greedy, as if they were
freshly baked loaves
waiting on their shelves
to be broken open--that one
and that--and I make my choice
in a mood of exalted luck,
browsing among them
like a cow in the sweetest pasture.

(I couldn't find this poem reprinted anywhere with permission except in the Amazon "Look Inside" feature for this book. So you'll have find the rest there if you'd like to read it.)

Also featuring some great comparisons is the poem "A New Poet," which in addition to being brilliant is also perfectly suited to this particular post:

Finding a new poet
is like finding a new wildflower
out in the woods. You don't see

its name in the flower books and
nobody you tell believes
in its odd color or the way

its leaves grow in splayed rows
down the whole length of the page. In fact
the very page smells of spilled

red wine and the mustiness of the sea
on a foggy day - the odor of truth
and of lying.

Read the rest here.

In addition to wonderful similes and metaphors, I find Pastan's poems to have vivid imagery. She paints a picture with each one. Her word choice appeals to me, too. Each poem seems to be exquisitely and painstakingly crafted. You can tell that she has poured her soul into each and every one.

Why Are Your Poems So Dark?

BY LINDA PASTAN

Isn't the moon dark too,

most of the time?

And doesn't the white page

seem unfinished

without the dark stain

of alphabets?

When God demanded light,

he didn't banish darkness.

Instead he invented

ebony and crows

and that small mole

on your left cheekbone.

Read the conclusion of "Why Are Your Poems So Dark?" here.

If you want to explore more of Pastan's poems, I recommend her page at the Poetry Foundation, which features many of her best works. Garrison Keilor obviously likes her, too, because she's been featured countless times at the Writer's Almanac. You will also definitely enjoy this post on How a Poem Happens about another excellent poem of hers "Rereading Frost."

Linda Pastan is definitely a poet to know and follow. If she's new to you, I hope you enjoy her as much as I do (and remember this post when she becomes Poet Laureate someday). If you're a previous fan, you have great taste.

Please check out this week's Poetry Friday roundup, hosted at Read Write Believe. And be sure to check back next Friday when Poetry Friday will be hosted here at The Small Nouns!

Do you ever read a poem by a poet that you really, really love and then spend the next few days, weeks, or months reading all the poems by that person that you can? Like most poetry fiends, I have favorite poets, but I also enjoy discovering writers that are new to me.

That happened this past week when I read New Year's Day by Kim Addonizio. I blogged about it Sunday and since then, I've found myself somewhat entranced by Ms. Addonizio's work. Granted, I haven't explored everything or gotten my hands on any of her books, but what I've found I've liked. A lot.

The language or her poems is so rich with imagery and emotion. There's also sensuality, which I'm often not drawn to in poetry, but Addonizio makes it work. Her poems operate on many levels and they have such depth that they make me realize what a poetry novice I am--I just know there's more to them that I'm not totally "getting," and trying to write about them probably just makes me seem like a doofus--but I really enjoy reading and re-reading them. Kim Addonizio is a poet to know and one I'll be reading more and more of in the future.

So on this first Poetry Friday of 2011, I wanted to share this poem:

THE NUMBERS
How many nights have I lain here like this, feverish with plans,
with fears, with the last sentence someone spoke, still trying to finish
a conversation already over? How many nights were wasted
in not sleeping, how many in sleep--I don’t know
how many hungers there are, how much radiance or salt, how many times
the world breaks apart, disintegrates to nothing and starts up again
in the course of an ordinary hour. I don’t know how God can bear
seeing everything at once: the falling bodies, the monuments and burnings,
the lovers pacing the floors of how many locked hearts. I want to close
my eyes and find a quiet field in fog, a few sheep moving toward a fence.
I want to count them, I want them to end. I don’t want to wonder
how many people are sitting in restaurants about to close down,
which of them will wander the sidewalks all night
while the pies revolve in the refrigerated dark.

You can read the rest here via Poetry Magazine.

And since I had a really hard time picking just one Kim Addonizio poem to share, you might also want to read this one:

My Heart
by Kim Addonizio

That Mississippi chicken shack. That initial-scarred tabletop, that tiny little dance floor to the left of the band. That kiosk at the mall selling caramels and kitsch. That tollbooth with its white-plastic-gloved worker handing you your change. That phone booth with the receiver ripped out. That dressing room in the fetish boutique, those curtains and mirrors. That funhouse, that horror, that soundtrack of screams. That putti-filled heaven raining gilt from the ceiling. That haven for truckers, that bottomless cup. That biome. That wilderness preserve.