Poems and Poets

[SpaceOddity]

Not anywhere I ever went. I was taught one poem of his once, Dulce et Decorum Est, in college, and went and bought a book of his poetry based on that.

Everyone studies his poems in the UK.

[Llopin]

Very classical choices, I see.

Where's E.E. Cummings? What about non-english poetry? My favourites are Artaud, Pessoa and Leopoldo MarÃ*a Panero.

[Sven]

Very classical choices, I see.

Where's E.E. Cummings? What about non-english poetry? My favourites are Artaud, Pessoa and Leopoldo MarÃ*a Panero.

I have a difficult time with translated poetry.

[Melville]

Very classical choices, I see.

Where's E.E. Cummings? What about non-english poetry? My favourites are Artaud, Pessoa and Leopoldo MarÃ*a Panero.

E.E. Cummings is great. Do you exclude translated poetry when you say non-English poetry? At least four non-English poets/poems in translation have been listed thus far. But I agree with Sven that reading translated poetry is iffy; in my experience, the best translations are usually by other poets who largely make the poems their own (e.g., E. Fitzgerald's Rubayyat and Dryden's Aeneid).

[Mara]

Everyone studies his poems in the UK.

Glad to hear it. I think he's great.

And I can't handle translated poetry on any level. I can barely read translated novels. (Well, let's be honest. I almost never do. It bothers me too much.)

As for e. e. cummings, I feel he's a bit overrated. I've tried reading a number of his poems, and they mostly felt gimmicky after a while. The only one of his I really like is Buffalo Bill's.

(I can't duplicate the spacing, forgive me.)

Buffalo Bill's

defunct

who used to

ride a watersmooth-silver

stallion

and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat

Jesus



he was a handsome man

and what i want to know is

how do you like your blueeyed boy

Mister Death

In Just-- is his most famous poem, and it's... okay, I guess. I just don't get into it much.

But the poet that was taught regularly in my college courses that I just hated is Wallace Stevens. I just can't stand him. Not sure if I can explain why... he just seems... smug?

[Mara]

I should perhaps mention that I really like William Blake. I might actually say that I love Blake. I once drove three hours to see an exhibit of original Blake prints and it was an amazing experience. I love that crazy, crazy man.

Speaking of crazy, anyone familiar with Christopher Smart? I often see the portion of his epic poem Jubilate Agno dedicated to his cat anthologized, but I've never read the whole thing, and I've always sort of meant to seek it out.

The cat portion of the poem ("For I Will Consider My Cat, Jeoffrey") is very quotable. Spoilered for length.

[

Show Spoiler

For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry. from Jubilate Agno
by CHRISTOPHER SMART

For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.

For he is the servant of the Living God, duly and daily serving him.

For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way.

For is this done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness.

For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his prayer.

For he rolls upon prank to work it in.

For having done duty and received blessing he begins to consider himself.

For this he performs in ten degrees.

For first he looks upon his forepaws to see if they are clean.

For secondly he kicks up behind to clear away there.

For thirdly he works it upon stretch with the forepaws extended.

For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.

For fifthly he washes himself.

For sixthly he rolls upon wash.

For seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.

For eighthly he rubs himself against a post.

For ninthly he looks up for his instructions.

For tenthly he goes in quest of food.

For having considered God and himself he will consider his neighbor.

For if he meets another cat he will kiss her in kindness.

For when he takes his prey he plays with it to give it a chance.

For one mouse in seven escapes by his dallying.

For when his day's work is done his business more properly begins.

For he keeps the Lord's watch in the night against the adversary.

For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin and glaring eyes.

For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life.

For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.

For he is of the tribe of Tiger.

For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.

For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he suppresses.

For he will not do destruction if he is well-fed, neither will he spit without provocation.

For he purrs in thankfulness when God tells him he's a good Cat.

For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon.

For every house is incomplete without him, and a blessing is lacking in the spirit.

For the Lord commanded Moses concerning the cats at the departure of the Children of Israel from Egypt.

For every family had one cat at least in the bag.

For the English Cats are the best in Europe.

For he is the cleanest in the use of his forepaws of any quadruped.

For the dexterity of his defense is an instance of the love of God to him exceedingly.

For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature.

For he is tenacious of his point.

For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery.

For he knows that God is his Saviour.

For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.

For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion.

For he is of the Lord's poor, and so indeed is he called by benevolence perpetually—Poor Jeoffry! poor Jeoffry! the rat has bit thy throat.

For I bless the name of the Lord Jesus that Jeoffry is better.

For the divine spirit comes about his body to sustain it in complete cat.

For his tongue is exceeding pure so that it has in purity what it wants in music.

For he is docile and can learn certain things.

For he can sit up with gravity, which is patience upon approbation.

For he can fetch and carry, which is patience in employment.

For he can jump over a stick, which is patience upon proof positive.

For he can spraggle upon waggle at the word of command.

For he can jump from an eminence into his master's bosom.

For he can catch the cork and toss it again.

For he is hated by the hypocrite and miser.

For the former is afraid of detection.

For the latter refuses the charge.

For he camels his back to bear the first notion of business.

For he is good to think on, if a man would express himself neatly.

For he made a great figure in Egypt for his signal services.

For he killed the Icneumon rat, very pernicious by land.

For his ears are so acute that they sting again.

For from this proceeds the passing quickness of his attention.

For by stroking of him I have found out electricity.

For I perceived God's light about him both wax and fire.

For the electrical fire is the spiritual substance which God sends from heaven to sustain the bodies both of man and beast.

For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.

For, though he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer.

For his motions upon the face of the earth are more than any other quadruped.

For he can tread to all the measures upon the music.

For he can swim for life.

For he can creep.

]

[Duncan]

But the poet that was taught regularly in my college courses that I just hated is Wallace Stevens. I just can't stand him. Not sure if I can explain why... he just seems... smug?

Crazy. Honestly, I wrote a 90,000 word novel that took this poem as its starting point and yet somehow amounted to less:

"Not Ideas About the Thing But the Thing Itself"

At the earliest ending of winter,
In March, a scrawny cry from outside
Seemed like a sound in his mind.

He knew that he heard it,
A bird's cry, at daylight or before,
In the early March wind.

The sun was rising at six,
No longer a battered panache above snow...
It would have been outside.

It was not from the vast ventriloquism
Of sleep's faded papier-mache...
The sun was coming from the outside.

That scrawny cry--It was
A chorister whose c preceded the choir.
It was part of the colossal sun,

Surrounded by its choral rings,
Still far away. It was like
A new knowledge of reality.

[Hugh_Grant]

I like Stevens, but my students have traditionally hated him.

Poetry in translation: Like I've mentioned, I've done research on poetry translation, and of all the fictional genres, poetry is the one that fares worst in translation. I have no problem reading translated prose or drama, but poetry is another matter. Because so much depends on connotation, sound, ambiguity, there is something lost between languages.

[Wryan]

I was trying to find a place in the Lit forum for our own writing (wasn't there a writer's thread? maybe it's further down), but then I saw this thread and figured why not. I like a few of the poets mentioned so far--several of whom I'd have to read more as I don't really know their work. Here's a simple thing I wrote.

[

Show Spoiler

"A Youth"

A youth of whim and vigor soars
Past open, cracked and russet doors.
A breath he takes to bawl at will,
He lunges at a hawk and still,
With all his cav'rnous breath he roars.

The puff of purple, black and blue
Sits high above him, wide but true.
The air will pop with heat and pain.
He knows he must go back again
But shall lament his anger, too.

The fire eye is fuming red,
And just above the heather's head.
It seems a giant on its side,
With mountain mouth and face to hide,
But one last peek afore to bed.

Now ere the youth returns and goes
To sleep amid the lightning woes,
He lays a flower underground.
The trees will keep it never found,
Defended under dark'ning rows.

]

[Sven]

Frost, whom I have always written off, is now on my Awesome List:

"Out, Out--"

The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard
And made dust and dropped stove-length sticks of wood,
Sweet-scented stuff when the breeze drew across it.
And from there those that lifted eyes could count
Five mountain ranges one behing the other
Under the sunset far into Vermont.
And the saw snarled and rattled, snarled and rattled,
As it ran light, or had to bear a load.
And nothing happened: day was all but done.
Call it a day, I wish they might have said
To please the boy by giving him the half hour
That a boy counts so much when saved from work.
His sister stood beside him in her apron
To tell them "Supper." At the word, the saw,
As if it meant to prove saws know what supper meant,
Leaped out at the boy's hand, or seemed to leap -
He must have given the hand. However it was,
Neither refused the meeting. But the hand!
Half in appeal, but half as if to keep
The life from spilling. Then the boy saw all -
Since he was old enough to know, big boy
Doing a man's work, though a child at heart -
He saw all was spoiled. "Don't let him cut my hand off -
The doctor, when he comes. Don't let him, sister!"
So. The hand was gone already.
The doctor put him in the dark of ether.
He lay and puffed his lips out with his breath.
And then - the watcher at his pulse took a fright.
No one believed. They listened to his heart.
Little - less - nothing! - and that ended it.
No more to build on there. And they, since they
Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs.

[Qrazy]

I quite like Wallace Stevens also.

[Marley]

I'm a Milton enthusiast. Although Keats and Donne would make the top of the list as well.

[D_Davis]

This has been the inspiration for the upcoming Carl Sagan's Ghost album, Especially for Them:

L'invitation au voyage

Mon enfant, ma soeur,
Songe Ã* la douceur
D'aller lÃ*-bas vivre ensemble!
Aimer Ã* loisir,
Aimer et mourir
Au pays qui te ressemble!
Les soleils mouillés
De ces ciels brouillés
Pour mon esprit ont les charmes
Si mystérieux
De tes traîtres yeux,
Brillant Ã* travers leurs larmes.

LÃ*, tout n'est qu'ordre et beauté,
Luxe, calme et volupté.

Des meubles luisants,
Polis par les ans,
Décoreraient notre chambre;
Les plus rares fleurs
Mêlant leurs odeurs
Aux vagues senteurs de l'ambre,
Les riches plafonds,
Les miroirs profonds,
La splendeur orientale,
Tout y parlerait
À l'âme en secret
Sa douce langue natale.

LÃ*, tout n'est qu'ordre et beauté,
Luxe, calme et volupté.

Vois sur ces canaux
Dormir ces vaisseaux
Dont l'humeur est vagabonde;
C'est pour assouvir
Ton moindre désir
Qu'ils viennent du bout du monde.
— Les soleils couchants
Revêtent les champs,
Les canaux, la ville entière,
D'hyacinthe et d'or;
Le monde s'endort
Dans une chaude lumière.

LÃ*, tout n'est qu'ordre et beauté,
Luxe, calme et volupté.

— Charles Baudelaire

Invitation to the Voyage

My child, my sister,
Think of the rapture
Of living together there!
Of loving at will,
Of loving till death,
In the land that is like you!
The misty sunlight
Of those cloudy skies
Has for my spirit the charms,
So mysterious,
Of your treacherous eyes,
Shining brightly through their tears.

There all is order and beauty,
Luxury, peace, and pleasure.

Gleaming furniture,
Polished by the years,
Will ornament our bedroom;
The rarest flowers
Mingling their fragrance
With the faint scent of amber,
The ornate ceilings,
The limpid mirrors,
The oriental splendor,
All would whisper there
Secretly to the soul
In its soft, native language.

There all is order and beauty,
Luxury, peace, and pleasure.

See on the canals
Those vessels sleeping.
Their mood is adventurous;
It's to satisfy
Your slightest desire
That they come from the ends of the earth.
— The setting suns
Adorn the fields,
The canals, the whole city,
With hyacinth and gold;
The world falls asleep
In a warm glow of light.

There all is order and beauty,
Luxury, peace, and pleasure.

— William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)

[B-side]

Shame this thread is so rarely touched. Anywho, I've just discovered by way of my latest film viewing of Abuladze's The Plea a Georgian poet named Vazha Pshavela, whose work is speaking to me in an incredible way right now. Here's a relatively short work of his titled A Solitary Word:

I breathed a word that grief had wrought.
It winged its flight into the air,
Then pierced the haunts and souls of men,
And left its tears and laughter there.
It was a word flung from a heart
That knew but misery and tears, —
A word that knew its lowly birth
In throes of agony and fears.
Though nursed by suffering and trial,
It spread and flourished in its flight,
And wondering I beheld it glow,
Adorned in sparkling jewels bright.
And soon upon a throne of gold
It ruled in radiance and might, —
The hope and faith of sunless hearts,
The darkened bosom's torch of light.
I marvelled at that vision fair,
The offspring of my passion's fires;
Resistless was its beauty as
It filled men's souls with strange desires.
I wondered much, and smiled to see
How over souls of men it reigned,
How it had sprung from misery
That birth with tears of blood had stained —
A solitary word of woe,
Abused, objected and profaned.

[Kurosawa Fan]

A portion of "Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám"

But leave the Wise to wrangle, and with me
The Quarrel of the Universe let be:
And, in some corner of the Hubbub
coucht
Make Game of that which makes as much of Thee.

For in and out, above, about, below,
'Tis nothing but a Magic Shadow-show,
Play'd in a Box whose Candle is the Sun,
Round which we Phantom Figures come
and go.

And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press,
End in the Nothing all Things end in-- Yes--
Then fancy while Thou art, Thou art but
what
Thou shalt be--Nothing--Thou shalt not be
less.

While the Rose blows along the River Brink,
With old Khayyám the Ruby Vintage drink:
And when the Angel with his darker
Draught
Draws up to Thee--take that, and do not
shrink.

'Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays:
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and
slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.

The Ball no Question makes of Ayes and
Noes,
But Right or Left as strikes the Player goes;
And He that toss'd Thee down into the
Field,
He knows about it all--He knows--
HE knows!

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.

And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky,
Whereunder crawling coop't we live and die,
Lift not thy hands to It for help--for It
Rolls impotently on as Thou or I.

[Kurosawa Fan]

A poem I ran into from Bukowski:

"my doom smiles at me"

there’s no other way:
8 or ten poems a
night.
in the sink
behind me are dishes
that haven’t been
washed in 2
weeks.
the sheets need
changing
and the bed is
unmade.
half the lights are
burned-out here.
it gets darker
and darker
(I have replacement
bulbs but can’t get them
out of their cardboard
wrapper.) Despite my
dirty shorts in the
bathtub
and the rest of my dirty
laundry on the
bedroom floor,
they haven’t
come for me yet
with their badges and their rules and their
numb ears. oh, them
and their caprice!
like the fox
I run with the hunted and
if I’m not the happiest
man on earth I’m surely the
luckiest man
alive.