Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 146 (Lodestar), acrylic on paper and digital, 11 x 14, Miles Pasick.
I opened myself,
and there I was.
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NaPoWriMo | Entry #1: A key turns…somewhere
Tag: poetry
Lifesaving Poems: Mary Oliver’s ‘The Journey’
A great poem to start National Poetry Writing Month. Also, this one:
Wild Geese
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.Mary Oliver
If there is one theme I keep going back to in these Lifesaving Poems posts, it is this: behind every discovery of every single poem in the list there is a person who nudged it forward, often directly, sometimes invisibly, frequently without knowing it, towards me. From friends, fellow poets and teachers, to sitting in a car park waiting for a poetry workshop, or driving to one, I feel the luckiest of people to have had such great mentors.
This is no less true of my discovery, some three or so years ago, of Mary Oliver’s poetry. Now, I realise, as with my discovery of Billy Collins, that I was pretty much the last person I know to come to this particular party. Until I found this marvellous blog post by my old friend Malcolm Doney I had kind of felt Oliver’s searching and tough-delicate poems…
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Poetry.Org Celebrates 20th Anniversary of National Poetry Month — JCU // Creative Writing Workshop
The time has come again. The sunshine of April, twittering birds, budding flora and that overwhelming desire to create signals not only the beginning of spring but also the start of a month-long celebration of poetry. Yes, it is National Poetry Month, the world’s largest literary celebration, and this year marks its 20th anniversary. To celebrate, […]
via Poetry.Org Celebrates 20th Anniversary of National Poetry Month — JCU // Creative Writing Workshop
April 26 | Poet Eleanor Wilner to Read at JCU — JCU // Creative Writing Workshop
Tuesday, April 26, 2016, 6:30-8:00 PM, Reading by Poet Eleanor Wilner. Eleanor Wilner is the author of seven books of poems, including Tourist in Hell (University of Chicago Press) and The Girl with Bees in Her Hair (Copper Canyon Press). Her work is widely anthologized, most recently in The Best American Poetry 2014. (From JohnCabot.edu) […]
via April 26 | Poet Eleanor Wilner to Read at JCU — JCU // Creative Writing Workshop
i’ll eat tomorrow today
do not worry.
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count.less
the clock on the wall.
when last did I hear it? still.
my feet leave the door.
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Poetry | Snowfield
It is always winter despite the passing seasons. Life remains suppressed beneath a frozen ground. The icy white of the sky, the absence of the birds, the leafless grass: is this the taste of empty solitude? It is time, once again, to cross the void of meaninglessness to existence.
A woman drinks tea,
reads leaves, shakes head, smiles and says,
“Never mind the snow.”
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Poetry | Life–
am I conscious yet?
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Poetry | Dream
Cloud walk (Photo by D Blake)
If I were to say to you
that my hands can no longer,
that my legs cannot,
that my mind is lost,
is wandering,
has forgotten
you,
me,
that barren,
waste, land between,
still, I
dream,
Poetry | Twine,
untangle.
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Toward the within... 