Poetry

Reading: Kanheri Cave by Dom Moraes
Dom Moraes (b. 1938-2004) was an Indian poet, widely regarded as foundational figure in Indian English literature. He was Catholic and struggled with alcoholism. I read Kanheri cave, I think it gives a good impression of the man's writing: Kanheri cave Over these blunted, these tormented hills, Hawks hail and wheel, toboggan down the sky. ...
Reading: Turns by Tony Harrison
Britain's leading theater and television poet is Tony Harrison (b. 1937), who is celebrated of the twentieth century's true working class poet. He is a translator, director, playwright who says that all is implied in the job description: poet. I read 'Turn' about his passed father, where the class consciousness becomes visible: Turn I thought ...
Reading: Dawn revisited by Rita Dove
Rita Dove (b. 1952) was the youngest Poet Laureate in the nineties and well-known to the American public. She has written a lot of longer, mythology-inspired stuff, but for our bric-a-brac anthology I read a shorter verse: Dawn revisited Imagine you wake up with a second chance: The blue jay hawks his pretty wares and ...
Reading: The Way Things Work by Jorie Graham
Jorie Graham (b. 1950) is another famous North American poet with a unique style. Pulitzer Prize 1996. Here is The way things work: The way things work is by admitting or opening away. This is the simplest form of current: Blue moving through blue; blue through purple; the objects of desire opening upon themselves without ...
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 ...
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