A wee bit of me...

Word became flesh and dwelt among us
Your creation has now, for me, become word...

Saturday, October 4, 2014
Anastasia Island, FL


Beach, long and winding
dune, hillock
sea grasses taller than me
their golden pods tinkling like jewelry

Wide expanse
world holding its breath
one step over the last incline

Stop. Panorama of endless
sky, water and sand

Waves pound gushing foam
sucking water back
again. again. again.

My view is marred by
a huge beach umbrella
the young couple in love
place in front of me

Impossible. So I join my boys
collecting sharks teeth
joyfully we wash bits of black teeth
and discover...its faux shark teeth!

One beach umbrella attracts more
as this glorious day beckons

Squeals fly as sand in the air
shovels, buckets of water
sand castles

And then, as a soaring signal in the sky
Like a cardinal flitting about
is one solitary red kite
diamond-shaped with trailing ribbons

Captivated, I notice another
blue kite and blue and red
flags waving back

The play of unwieldy wind
and unyielding string
interact in this playful art


I also wrote this little poem after our fun day at the beach, seeing dolphin and my boys, with their daddy's help catch fish off the long ocean pier.


People.
People commenting.
People asking.
People complimenting.
People helping.
People showing.
People laughing.
People sharing.
People praying.
People advising.
People joking.
People

How to Read a Poem

     If I were to go to wiki-how online, this is a question I would ask.  Along with whipping perfect meringue or understanding Albinoni's music.  When it comes to reading poetry, we need help!  Anything worth knowing needs proper study and understanding.  Not the least of which is poetry.  Here are some suggestions by our dear friend, Mr. Perrine, to help us from his Sound and Sense.

     1.  Read a poem more than once.  Imagine listening one time to Beethhoven's 5th Symphony and then saying you understand his music.  Repeated hearings give new discoveries each time!  Or, this quote by Perrine, "A poem is not like a newspaper, to be hastily read and cast into the wastebasket.  It is to be hung on the wall of one's mind."  Beautiful.

     2.  Keep a dictionary by you and use it.  Avail yourself of improving your vocabulary!  Recommended by Perrine is keeping a reference on Greek mythology and a Bible.  I also think a Latin lexicon is helpful.  Many of these resources are now available online.

     3.  Read so as to hear the sounds of the words in your mind.  Poems are written to be heard; its meanings conveyed both through sound and print.  Every word should be given special attention.  Read s-l-o-w-l-y, enunciate the words, sounding them out loud or lip-reading.  Allow the full weight of meaning each word possesses to sink like pebbles into the pond of your mind.

     4.  Always pay careful attention to what the poem is saying.  You may at the first read pay attention to grammatical facts.  A second or third read need ensue before venturing an audible read.  Imagine reading a poem as if on a roller coaster or train ride without noticing the passing scenery.  Take a walk, take a stroll through the poem and notice the budding leaf or interesting shell... in fact, pick it up and observe it!  This is how to take a poem!  Perrine says, "One should take the utmost effort to follow the thought continuously and to grasp the full implications and suggestions."

     5.  Practice reading poems aloud.  For this, you need at least an audience of one.  "Read it affectionately, but not affectedly,"  says Perrine.  The two extremes you want to avoid would be the monotone read or the overly eloquent read using funny voices.  "It is not necessary to put emotion into reading a poem.  The emotion is already there," so read naturally and sensitively.  Again, avoid the extreme of reading too fast or too slow.  But read slow enough for the meaning of the words to sink in.  Regular grammar within the poem should regulate how you read.

     Much more could be stated here.  But this will give us a start!  Happy reading!   

     

Studying the Masters: Archibald MacLeish (1892-1982)

     All forms of art: music, dance, painting... require the study of classical masters.  Poetry must bend the knee in this regard.  Or rather, I should bend the knee in studying them!  I hope you will join me and find real gems of meaning and pearls of wisdom in what we discover!
   
     We shall start with Macleish's famous poem: Ars Poetica.  The title is Latin for "The Art of Poetry,"  borrowed from Horace, who wrote a prose treatise in the first century A.D.  

Ars Poetica

BY ARCHIBALD MACLEISH

A poem should be palpable and mute   

As a globed fruit,

Dumb

As old medallions to the thumb,

Silent as the sleeve-worn stone

Of casement ledges where the moss has grown—

A poem should be wordless   

As the flight of birds.

                         *               

A poem should be motionless in time   

As the moon climbs,

Leaving, as the moon releases

Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,   

Memory by memory the mind—

A poem should be motionless in time   

As the moon climbs.

                         *               

A poem should be equal to:

Not true.

For all the history of grief

An empty doorway and a maple leaf.

For love

The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea—

A poem should not mean   

But be.

Archibald MacLeish, “Ars Poetica” from Collected Poems 1917-1982. Copyright © 1985 by The Estate of Archibald MacLeish. Reprinted with the permission of Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

William Pratt writes thus about the poem,

MacLeish wanted to link the classical with the modern in his poetic "treatise" as a way of implying that the standards of good poetry are timeless, that they do not change in essence though actual poems change from age to age and language to language. His succession of opening images are all about the enduring of poetry through time, as concrete as "globed fruit" or ancient coins or stone ledges, and as inspiring to see as a flight of birds or the moon rising in the sky. The statements are not only concrete but paradoxical, for it is impossible that poems should be "mute" or "Dumb" or "Silent" or "wordless," which would mean that there was no communication in them at all; rather, what MacLeish is stating in his succession of paradoxical images is that the substance of poetry may be physical but the meaning of poetry is metaphysical: poems are not about the world of sensible objects as much as they are about invisible realities, and so the universal emotions of grief and love can be expressed in words that convey the experience in all its concreteness, yet the words reach into the visionary realm beyond experience, toward which all true images point. The final paradox, that "A poem should not mean but be," is pure impossibility, but the poet insists it is nevertheless valid, because beyond the meaning of any poem is the being that it points to, which is ageless and permanent, a divine essence or spiritual reality behind all appearances. MacLeish's modern "Art of Poetry" is a fulfillment of the three rules of imagism (be direct, be brief, and use free verse), of Pound's definition of the image, and at the same time of Horace's Latin statement on poetry, that good poetry is one proof that there is a permanence in human experience that does not change but endures through time.

from Singing the Chaos: Madness and Wisdom in Modern Poetry. Copyright © 1996 by the Curators of the University of Missouri

Forgive me for my own lack of observations for you today, but I really felt William Pratt, out of others I read, summed up the ideas the best.  I hope this broadens your understanding and enjoyment of poetry as it is doing for me! 

 
        

What is Poetry?

     My dear husband picked up a 9th edition of Perrine's Sound and Sense, revised by Thomas R. Arp at our local thrift store dive.  This book is divided in two parts.  The first: The Elements of Poetry, and the 2nd part: Poems for Further Reading.  What I like about this book is the variety and types of poetry both analyzed and recorded for pure reading pleasure!  For each genre of poetry, there are fit examples and questions asked of the reader about the poem.  Also, unfamiliar or archaic words are noted so one can look them up!  I feel as if I have found a gem!  I love poetry, read it, write it for years.... but yet, there is a treasure trove waiting out there!  I thought of finding some college or on-line poetry course.  But, to find the time!  Sigh!  Alas, not!  This book literally fell into our hands and I am ever so grateful for it!

     Back to my question, what is poetry?  I hearken to Perrine, "Poetry might be defined as a kind of language that says more and says it more intensely than does ordinary language." The concern of poetry is primarily with experience. Poets select, combine and reorganize from their own store of felt, observed or imagined experience.  This is turn creates new experiences for the reader - sharpened, focused and formed. It allows for a greater awareness to know the experience of others, and to understand our own experience better.

     How does poetry, then, relate to real life?  I say, experience!!!  In the space of a day, you can experience beauty and ugliness, clean and dirty, strange and commonplace, good and bad - even real and fantasy!  To make sense of this, one can transmit these feelings through the medium of art.  Even the painful and strange appear beautiful in art!  So, Perrine's sentiments match my own!

     I leave you with a poem.  Not my own, for I could scarce compare them to the greats!  I will in future as rusty pen becomes more fluid.  But, here is one from John Donne:

The Computation 

For the first twenty years since yesterday

I scarce believed thou couldst be gone away;

For forty more I fed on favors past,

And forty on hopes that thou wouldst they might last.

Tears drowned one hundred, and sighs blew out two;

A thousand, I did neither think nor do,

Or not divide, all being one thought of you.

Or, in a thousand more, forgot that too.

Yet call not this long life; but think that I

Am, by being dead, immortal. Can ghosts die?    

Life Is Poetry - 31 Days

Setting this blog up to take up the 31 Days of Writing Challenge - my topic is "Life is Poetry" and I will be posting one new link for every day

Day 1 - What is Poetry?
Day 2 - Studying the Masters: Archibald MacLeish
Day 3 - How to read a poem 
Day 4 - A wee bit of me
Day 5 - The use of metaphor
Day 6 - Some exercises for analyzing and evaluating poems
Day 7 - Another little ditty...Can you guess who this is about?
Day 8 - Indelible Ink
Day 9
Day 10
Day 11
Day 12
Day 13
Day 14
Day 15
Day 16
Day 17
Day 18
Day 19
Day 20
Day 21
Day 22
Day 23
Day 24
Day 25
Day 26
Day 27
Day 28
Day 29
Day 30
Day 31

Breath of Morning

    Many kind folks have asked me since I started homeschooling (and still retain 17 piano and voice students) where's the "Me Time?"  After pondering, asking older saints, and reading the Word I want to say that pouring my life out for others is MUCH more satisfying than all the "Me" time I ever had!  Didn't Jesus say you have to lose your life in order to find it?  Just look at Jesus' life!  He was constantly ministering to people, discipling a small band... and quiet time?  Yes, He went away in the wee hours or during the night when humanity slept to pour out His heart to His Father, to be counselled by and re-energized to re-enter the "battle" as it were.  I am beginning to see the value and necessity of this in my new busier life.  Carving out time to be alone with God while my wee ones sleep (or dadda has taken them somewhere to give me a little break)...  He ministers to me in His Word, with His Presence and I am energized for the day like never before!  He SO KNOWS what I need, I don't need more of myself ("me time"), I need more of Him! So in praise to Him for these wee hours we have together, I've written this little poem...

                                 Breath of Morning

They say your Name, YHWH (Yahweh),sounds like breathing - 

Your breath gives breath to all...

Listen, you heavens, and I will speak;
    hear, you earth, the words of my mouth.
 Let my teaching fall like rain
    and my words descend like dew,
like showers on new grass,
    like abundant rain on tender plants.

 I will proclaim the name of the Lord. (YHWH)
    Oh, praise the greatness of our God!

Deut. 32:1-3

Sing to my soul!

I drink Your Word as I sit

in this sweet sacred spot.

You water my dry places...

Like the woman at the well...

 "When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.[a])

10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

I only want to go to You!

Like Peter who said,"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."

John 6:68

The boys have been memorizing different Psalms,

but now it is Psalm 19.  They know the first four verses,

as is follows:

 "The heavens declare the glory of God;

    the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

 Day after day they pour forth speech;

    night after night they reveal knowledge.

 They have no speech, they use no words;

    no sound is heard from them.

 Yet their voice[b] goes out into all the earth,

    their words to the ends of the world."

Creation, does it speak? Yes. It tells us

the glory of God...

World, in infant stage

is coaxed awake

First fairy light

beckons the seedling

to emerge

Mist blankets

lift like cobwebs

Torn strips of cloud

stack the horizon

and slowly infuse

apricot sun

Mama mockingbird perches

on a pokeberry bush

Two bluebirds dart

Cardinals chirp, chirp

Long grey locks

of moss

fall gracefully down

necks of trees

Sun-kissed leaves
dance like mirrors
in the Crepe Myrtle

Steam fog rises and curls
off the pond

Dew glints snow-like
over golf cart tracked hills

Mushrooms pop up
lifting their umbrella tops

I ask a lone giant mushroom
"Where are all your friends?"
Smiling he says, "They pop up
sooner or later!"

Geese doing basic training
One squadron in the sky
Another lined up at the pond
ready to dive,
their black chin-straps secure

It's morning! Glorious morning!
Is anything as dear and delicious as
Morning?!!!!!

"In the morning, Lord, you hear my voice;
  in the morning I lay my requests before you
  and wait expectantly." Psalm 5:3

Breath of morning, Yahweh
who breathes
life into all creation

I will listen to You
I will praise all the 
works of Your Hands!

“Come, all you who are thirsty,
    come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
    come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
    without money and without cost.
 Why spend money on what is not bread,
    and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
    and you will delight in the richest of fare.
 Give ear and come to me;
    listen, that you may live.
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
    my faithful love promised to David."
Isaiah 55:1-3

Homeschool Dayz

Days flash into days..
School books open and close,
stomachs hungry, feet anxious to run

Three days of math struggle
Derick takes over two more days
Monday morning, Isaiah flies through math
ready for what is next...!!!

And they memorize facts, Scriptures, songs.
Eager for science, art, music too

We read books together as a family
Amazed, Isaiah relates science facts to the story..

David helps his brother, asked him yesterday,
"How was your day today, Gundu?"

Afternoons, with my piano students,
the boys have play mates!

And one morning, picnic, these two
Water bottles, napkins open-spread,
and two boxes of nerds, yum!

A solar system mobile, lamp-turned
palm tree, their room is looking
like a science museum!

So its back to school for us all,
mom, dad, kids, all!

I wouldn't trade a minute of this
for all the "free" time I used to have!