Month: januari 2018

Philosophy doesn’t cut it
Philosophy doesn't cut it - the letters have all been combined in all possible ways Perhaps the love of wisdom is something for wet animals, the turtle, the frog, the earthworm? Cut in two, the earthworm continues to be. What is being? What wisdom can we aspire to, apart from not being cut in two?
Reading: Outbound by Greg Williamson
Greg Williamson (b. 1964) is known for his 'double exposure', a technique where poems can be read in multiple ways. I approach his verse without any theoretical pre-study though, the same way I would approach life. The following poem is beautifully crafted, it holds the lyricism of yore in a floating frame of free existentialist ...
An artist is a sort of emotional or spiritual historian [whose] role is to make you realize the doom and glory of knowing who you are and what you are - James Baldwin
Reading: Hypocrite Women by Denise Levertov
Denise Levertov (1923-1997) was a prolific British-born American writer who never received formal education. Influences are among others the Blue Mountain school, William Carlos Williams, Rilke. She was a very serious social activist who at times seemed arrogant to her readers. Here is a poem that is prettily vulgar: Hypocrite women Hypocrite women, how seldom ...
Creation
With time I understand and had courage grown from hope's weak lights, I am not on my own I sit smiling in everything that I contrive at the reader, and the odds it may survive
Reading: A prayer that will be answered by Anna Kamieńska
Anna Kamieńska (1920-1986) was a Polish poet, literary critic, translator and children's book author. I read a short elegy by her hand, in a translation by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanaugh A prayer that will be answered Lord let me suffer much and then die Let me walk through silence and leave nothing behind not ...
Te veel herinneringen
Het is mij de afgelopen donkere periode bewust geworden dat ik teveel herinneringen heb. Nu geloof ik niet dat ons geheugen een spoelbak met een vlotter is, die niet boven de maximummarkering kan worden gevuld zonder dat er lekkages optreden. In theorie, zo spreken hersenwetenschappers plechtig, kunnen we oneindig veel herinneringen 'opslaan' in onze grijze ...
Reading: Cryptozoa by James Tate
Today a 1969 poem by Missouri-born James Tate (1943-2014) who once said that "If you laughed earlier in the poem, and I bring you close to tears in the end, that’s the best." I read this poem because it shows the magic of language and absurdity that Tate handled well: Cryptozoa I wish the stone lady ...
Reading: Prayer by Carol Ann Duffy
Scottish poet Carol Ann Duffy (b. 1946) has said "poetry and prayer are very similar". Here is her 1993 poem "prayer": Prayer Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer utters itself. So, a woman will lift her head from the sieve of her hands and stare at the minims sung by a tree, a ...