Here's another poem, appropriate for the day.
At O'Hare, after a first jump west to California,
I thought my father was dying, as I waited
for the connecting flight. Being hungry
I ate pizza with the people eating pizza....
(Read the rest at The Writers Almanac.)
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For a guy who isn't into poetry, I post a lot about poetry, don't I?
This winter (Remember winter?) I went with my writing group to hear Philip Lopate read his poetry and prose. I really liked it.
Today's Writer's Almanac features him:
we who are
your closest friends
feel the time
has come to tell you
that every Thursday
we have been meeting
as a group
to devise ways
to keep you
in perpetual uncertainty
frustration
discontent and
torture
by neither loving you
as much as you want
nor cutting you adrift
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I had no idea that April is Poetry Month. As I've said here before, I'm no fan of poetry. But occasionally a bit of verse catches me and whispers nice things in my ear.
My friend NP pointed me to "Lines for Winter" by Mark Strand, read by Mary Louise Parker.
In the notes on that page Mexican poet Octavio Paz (whoever that is) says, "Mark Strand has chosen the negative path, ... with loss as the first step towards fullness." Awesome.
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I'm not a fan of poetry. It too often seems precious or pompous or self-important. But this I liked, from today's Writers Almanac. It begins like this:
They could
pump frenzy into air ducts
and rage into reservoirs,
dynamite dams
and drown cities,
cry fire in theaters
as the victims are burning,
but
I will find my way through blackened streets
and kneel down at your side.
Read the rest. It gets better.
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A while ago Singing the Sky posted a blog prompt I can get behind. It's about my books.
Total Number of Books Owned
Oh brother. Let's start with an unanswerable question. A bunch of books are up here in my office and a bunch are down in the living-room built-ins. There are no real rules about which live upstairs and which live down. Books about my job and how-to's are up here, as are all my short-story collections and a shelf-full of novels. Art books and some other novels are downstairs. Let's call it a couple hundred and move on.
Last Book Bought
I don't often buy books since I found Bookmooch, where I can get books for free (and give them away just for the price of postage). But a couple weeks ago I picked up Cormac McCarthy's The Road and a collection of Russell Banks' short stories.
Last Book Read
Today I finished The Road. Good, good stuff. It packs a lot of emotional punch into simple sentences. No internal monologues, no deep thoughts, just characters' words and actions.
Five Books That Mean a Lot to Me
1. John Updike's Rabbit Run and the rest of the Rabbit series is about an ordinary man's ordinary life, but is written so beautifully it's extraordinary. When I'm in a book store I often pick up a copy of Rabbit Run just to read the opening scene.
2. It was while reading Tim Robbins' Skinny Legs and All that I thought I might want to write my own stories.
3. A Prayer for Owen Meany is, if I remember right, the first book I read aloud to KR as she cooked dinner. Next was Lonesome Dove. Both are favorites.
4. I've never much liked poetry, but I do like Sietz Buning's work and John Betjeman's.
5. The short stories of Lorrie Moore make me want to write.
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Over at The Writer's Almanac we learn that today is Joe Queenan's birthday. I might have read some of Queenan's articles, but I don't remember them.
I've been keeping an eye out for writers who start writing late(r) in life, like me. There aren't many. Most well-known writers have MFA degrees or worked as journalists or wrote earnest poetry as a child. I'm looking for encouragement that someone in my situation made it big. I don't think Joe's in my situation, but he does have some advice for young writers. Here's Joe:
"Don't write until you're 25. Don't write for the high school yearbook. Don't write for the college literary magazine. Don't write that stuff - you never had any experiences, you don't know anything, just shut up."
Disclaimer: I disagree, but I take away a hope that being shut up for your first forty years doesn't prevent you from doing good work.
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Pamie's Ninth Annual Valentine's Day Poems: the clip show.
Via Ask Metafilter, here's a poem that didn't make the cut:
Four years.
Can you believe
we've been together that long?
It's hard to even remember
what things were like before you.
All I know for sure is
I had a lot more room for pizzas and ice cream.
And look at you.
You haven't aged a day.
And your make-up is still perfect.
I love you, head in my freezer.
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I don't know nothin' about poetry, but I know what I like.
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Funny - I read this morning that poetry requires more brain power to read than prose, and just wrote my very first poem last night.
My writing instructor suggested that we each try writing a poem in the style of William Carlos Williams' The Red Wheel Barrow: four stanzas, four words each.
Modern poetry is
prose
with verbs and
punctuation
and clarity left
out
and read in
monotone
No wonder it's harder to read.
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