Tag: poetry

Behind glass… a defense

Have you ever felt you were behind a pane of glass? I did once many years ago after a friend committed  suicide.It must be a protective  condition but it is painful and odd.Everyone else seems ok ,you imagine,but you are not a part..In reality many people may be feeling like you do and putting on a performance while out at work or socialising.We are probably wiser as we grow older as we know more people better and see we are not  unique in our suffering and pain; we know that feelings pass,even the worst ones and we may have become better at judging others and knowing if friends die  by suicide it’s probably not our fault

When one feels that way it has to be accepted for the time being, like all feelings,I found reading poetry helped me and also being with others in a group where I could sit and listen without pressure to speak.I like this poem from then.It was a favorite  of Simone Weil,the mystic.

LOVE BADE ME WELCOME  by George Herbert

 

 Love Bade Me Welcome – from Love (III)

Love bade me welcome: yet my soul drew back.
Guiltie of dust and sinne.
But quick-ey’d Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If I lack’d anything.

A guest, I answer’d, worthy to be here:
Love said, You shall be he.
I the unkinde, ungrateful? Ah, my deare,
I cannot look on thee.
Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,
Who made the eyes but I?

Truth Lord, but I have marr’d them: let my shame
Go where it doth deserve.
And know you not, sayes Love, who bore the blame?
My deare, then I will serve.
You must sit down, sayes Love, and taste my meat:
So I did sit and eat.

Poetry

 

Image

Poetry, I think, intensifies the reader’s experience. If it’s a humorous facet of the story, poetry makes it more exuberant. If it’s a sad facet, poetry can make it more poignant.

Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/humorous.html#DhGxIoZ7uJkpjkLP.99

I interviewed myself today

 

Pendle_Hill_above_mist_235-0004from wikipedia.Pendle Hill

Q.What made you start writing poetry?

K.I loved poetry but never believed I could write it.But then I found some old poetry I’d written and put aside.Also I was envying a young relative who was doing English Literature at college and also creative writing.That gave me an incentive to escape from envy into activity.

Q.Is it difficult to begin writing when you are older?

K.Not at all,in my case.I found it easier perhaps because one has less to lose in terms of the judgment of others.And secondly an awareness of the finiteness of life urges me to develop and enjoy my talents.And thirdly I have some visual problems which impelled me to take Art classes.I found that much,much harder than writing.

Q.Why did you find Art harder?

K.I was brought up in a working class home where the main interest outside work was music.I played two instruments and sang but we had little knowledge of Art beyond the dour portraits of local dignitaries in the Town Hall or paintings of Jesus and his Mother and other religious subjects.These did not touch me deeply.

Q,So what did move you?

A.I bought a print of a painting by Monet in of all places a small department store.I was about 20.The painting was of tulip fields.This was very different in style from the other paintings I’ve mentioned.From there I developed an interest in Impressionism and later I learned to enjoy Picasso.I had real difficulty with my first viewings of Paul Klee but he is now someone I love very much.I think Picasso affected me the most strongly.I once fell down before one of his drawings… my knees gave way.No-one else’s work has done that.Drawing,the line,seems to affect me most intensely.
The artist I like best is Cezanne.I am unsure why.

Q.Why were you in difficulty in the classes?

K.~I was the only totally ignorant person there.I knew no techniques at all.There is something difficult even for a writer to mark the blank page.For an aspiring artist it’s more,much more,problematical.

Q.So did you make progress?

K.A little.I have a strong feeling for colour.That helped.But before I got much skill I had to stop attending class and now have been exploring digital art.This has taught me what I like.I like to draw two pe ople or two objects in relation to each other.

Q.Did you realise how much poetry was in you?

K.No.I thought I’d write 6 or 7 but when I got there I was hooked on the process.I realise some if the poems were not very good but I was surprised to find a few that were and so I have kept on writing.

Q.Why writing rather than Art?

K.I believe it may be the musical quality of poetry that draws me in.

Q.which poets do you like?

K.Far too many to put here,but here are a few modern ones

Simon Armitage
Wendy Cope.
Philip Larkin.
eecummings.less
Sylvia Plath for her great technique and moulding her material,less so for her topics!
Ted Hughes.
Carol Ann Duffy

Slightly further back

Auden
McNiece
Spender
Yeats
Hopkins
Wordsworth.

Earlier

I love the metaphysical poets

I love Shakespeare’s sonnets but I am pretty ignorant of early English writing.

Q.Do you emulate any poet?

K. No,I cannot write that way.

Q.Any further points?

K.Yes,writing is a tremendous pleasure and gives me at best a link to someone or

something far beyond my self as I am usually aware of it.And also I can amuse

myself writing nonsense which saves me buying funny books.And annoys a few of my

family and friends too.C’est la vie

Q.Thank you very much.

K My pleasure…but enough now.I’ll  just mention that the internet has it’s bad side.I was once called a tart on a public forum on  poetry website… so if you write on such a place check their policy on porn,obscenity etc.If it is allowed by default then keep clear.

IMG_0290

Writing as therapy? Is writing or talking always good?

We hear now of more and more ways of living healthy lives.But I think it’s important to live a life of worth.What does it mean,to be of worth ? We must live first of all in a way that suits our nature and since we are part of a whole we must also live in ways that do not harm others and hopefully helps some of them.One problem is increasing in the affluent West and the USA and similar countries.This is the well known fact that more and more of us suffer from stress,worry and depression.Maybe the more serious psychic disturbances are also increasing.This can lead to violence

I have heard my friends say that writing poetry or keeping a journal is therapeutic.But is it not true that some forms of talking or conversing are therapeutic and some are harmful or maybe just pointless? A good friend whom we trust is a person with whom conversing may be beneficial,whereas “dumping” your problems on someone  may give only momentary relief.I feel real friend listens and may comment,may even criticize.Someone you  know less well  may react badly.You must not blame them for you are ignorant of their personal life and difficulties.
Conversation of course has the advantage that you are with the person to whom you talk and can stop or adapt your talking in the light of their nonverbal responses.To a lesser extent it is also true on the phone if you know someone well.

Just as gazing into the lighted front window of a large home filled with people and pictures and lovely furniture may make you envious so may your fantasied views of others around you.And yet it is likely they feel pain just like you ;we operate often from a view of life which is a poor fit with reality [whatever that is]
Since conversation may be good,bad or meaningless so it is with writing.
Writing comes from .your experience but must convey it in a manner by which others can feel the truth of what you are saying.As with music, poetry can say certain things not possible in other ways.And as in music there are forms developed down the centuries in which others have expressed their feelings. I have read that writing poetry in a structured form is therapeutic,But writing in free verse may not be.In either case poetry can stir up deep feelings.

Fiona Sampson, author of,The Expert Guide to writing poetry, advises that you keep the phone number of the Samaritans near when writing poetry but prose may be less stirring

I read about the value of structured writing in an article about Sylvia Plath.I am sorry I cannot find the reference as yet.Some people say writing prolonged her life,others that the kind of writing she got into at the end may have precipitated her suicide.We cannot know the answer but we should be aware that it may not be “letting it all out” that helps but the shaping and sculpting of the material into a form which pleases us and others
Alternatively writing about Nature ,other people,love, may turn our minds in a new direction away from our obsessive thoughts

Poetry formatting

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How to Prepare Poetry Manuscript Submissions

Categories: How to Publish a Book, Get Published, How to Write Poetry, Writing Poetry Tags: poetry.
March 11, 2008 | admin | Comments: 0
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What are the manuscript guidelines for poetry submission, including chapbooks?

Here’s advice from the editors of Poet’s Market:

The guidelines are slightly different for poetry manuscripts than for fiction manuscripts. Following is a brief checklist for submitting either individual poems or a poetry manuscript.
For individual poems:

  • Send only three to five poems at one time, positioning your best poems on top. Most editors don’t have time to read more than five poems and less than three doesn’t provide a sufficient sample of your work.
  • Type one poem to a page, single-spaced with double-spacing between stanzas. (Haiku may be an exception here.) Leave at least a one-inch margin on all sides of the page.
  • Include your name, address and telephone number in the upper left or right corner. The title of your poem should appear in all caps in initial caps about six lines underneath your address, centered or flush left. Begin the poem one line beneath the title.

For book manuscripts:

  • First, when submitting a poetry collection to a book publisher, it is best to request guidelines since press requirements vary from a query letter with a few sample poems to the entire manuscript.
  • When submitting an entire poetry manuscript, use a separate cover sheet for your name, address and telephone number. Center your book title and byline about halfway down the page. Then include your last name and page number in the top left margin of the first and each subsequent manuscript page.
  • Again, type one poem to a page, single-spaced with double spacing between stanzas. Leave at least a 1-inch margin on all sides of the page.
  • If a poem carries over to a second sheet, list your name in the top left margin. Underneath your name include a key word from the poem’s title, the page number and information on whether the lines at the top are a continuation of the same stanza or the start of a new one (e.g., continue stanza or begin new stanza).

For more submission tips, check out Poet’s Market.

Sonnet on washing day

First mew phome pics 005I love to read your poems in the night
And see each sentence frame a new born thought.
I often am in darkness not in light,
Like yours my memories are hardly caught.

The cat sits in patient joy upon her chair
The fire glows golden red ,I watch the smoke.
Some days I’m here and sometimes there.
My mind from trouble wishes to elope.

The washing gurgles in the old machine
When special christmas garments meet the soap.
Is this true life or am I but a dream?
In someone’s mind perhaps my image floats.

For nothing is so sure in life as death
Enjoy the alternations of your breath

I have no heart and so I cannot feel

  I have no teeth and uncombed I remain;

My hairs silk threads become a tangled briar..
Men gaze on me with ruthless, cold disdain
My visage does no longer light their fire.

Image

I have no mind and so I cannot think

I cannot love nor hate now I grow tired.

Yet runs my nose and do my eyes not blink?
Where is that man with care and with desire?

I have no heart,for it turns cold and hard.
Yet soul I have and spirit and my sight.
At life’s long game I fling down all my cards.
And ask for nothing but a means of flight.

For beauty withers as my wisdom grows.
And none observe the circling of the crow

Louise Glück : The Poetry Foundation

Louise Glück : The Poetry Foundation.

One of the most respected poets of our time…and with a totally different less extreme view of life than Sylvia Plath.

See here

.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Gl%C3%BCck

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The ‘Always’ and ‘Never’ Life of Sylvia Plath – Karen Swallow Prior – The Atlantic

The ‘Always’ and ‘Never’ Life of Sylvia Plath – Karen Swallow Prior – The Atlantic.

Another  piece about the poet  and novelist  Sylvia Plath… who seemed to have found post modernism in her writing before it was known and labelled

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There’s many a true word spoken to test.

Cats five

There’s many a true word spoken to test.
Was it ever true that mother knew best?
And is it wrong to begin a sentence with words such as “but”?
Or will you merely look like an ass with no foot
There’s many a slip between top and hip.
Is there time now for my daily quip?
But should you wish to start your sentence with “and”,
Make sure you study lines of the land
There’s many a lie that’s told in terror.
And many good actions are done in error.
Moreover,if you think that logic is essential for men
Never end a sentence with words such as “when.”
Rules are useless when gambling with crooks.
Never use words that are rude such as “fux.”
Thus if you are still with me at this rage of the game..
Fill out this form and set it aflame

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Where have all the cliches gone?

 Image

At the end of the day,
it all boils down to
what happens in that moment in time
in that split second.
I offer you my words of wisdom,
Don’t delay… you don’t want to be
A moment too soon or too late.
We must listen to our hearts
To find out our gut feelings,
Trust your instincts
And remember,it’s never too early or late,
Or exactly the right moment,
To start saving for a pension.
At the end of the day,
I hope you made your bed
The way you wanted to lie in it..
Though usually,love needs truth
And lying is an art
unlike survival and love;
Though love is not all you need
but love helps us roll along
gathering a little moss.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee,,
and me too.
But when we sum it all up

We can say,with hand on heart..
we were just following orders
Then the grieving will start.

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Touch me again

Hand in colorize

Art by Katherine

When he went away

He went away

Away.

I didn’t know where

where

he had gone

where had he gone?

The call came.:

call came….

Man,white,good health

Has died.

Has died alone

Died alone in an hotel room.

So a stranger would find him.

Man alone;

man alone in hotel room.

there was a man

alone

in his hotel room.

Not wanting to be any trouble.

trouble,no trouble alone

in his hotel room

not his room,you see.

not a shared room…

An hotel room.

Tall man with light brown hair

alone in a small hotel room

with no TV.

We had no smartphones

Smart

Phones

No,don’t tell , not me ,not yet.

Not me.

He was all alone.

He was behind glass

glass walls

windows

a window of glass.

I could never touch him.

I could not touch him.

not touch,no,never,

Man alone.

Solitary man.

Tall man with brown hair.

Beds for love

Beds for leaving.

Don’t you die alone

in that hotel room.

Don’t die

Don’t go

You wanted to be alone,

I thought…

you were

afraid to feel.

Thin skinned and pale like a torn petal from a wild plant.

You were alone again

And you left me all alone;

alone without you.

Now I’m alone

in my hotel room.

my room.

Someone knocks.

I’m dreaming of you

wishing you were near me.

dreaming,wishing,

lonely for you.

He was all alone,they said.

In an hotel room.

His doom

In a lonely bedroom.

Don’t leave me yet.

Yet you were never here

behind your window

I see you

but can’t touch you.

Can’t touch you.

Can’t touch.

Touch me.

Touch me again.

Love me…

You were all alone

alone.

Why did I not break the glass?

Break the glass;

The glass.

Touch me again

Touch me again

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Will I ever be a poet? No,never!

Image 

Did you ever have a lover
with long red hair?
For long red hair
seems quite unfair.

Did you ever have a lover
and then another lover?
For there's added gain
if you feel no pain.

Did you ever have a lover
who loved your eyes
and never ever lied,
and let you cry?
Whatever was the trouble.

You'll never have a lover.
if you have no time for others
for love needs care,
say,what is here.

Here and there are many lovely people
who live with their lives with scruples;
if you're scruple free,
then let it be.

Oh,let it be is fine,
Except for the divine.
I want to be involved
For I can't please all the folk,
Who touch me with their talk.
My heart has melted down...
and now I've grown a world
completely on my own.

Were you ever quite alone
Like a toad under a stone?
Did you ever hear a groan
as you wrote your poem?

For you'll never write a poem
that makes me laugh..
Because my feet are in the shower
but my body's in the bath.
My head is on the shelf...
and I've lost all of my teeth...
Yet you will love me
Evermore.
What allure!
so clear..

Evermore and evermore
You'll be standing on the shore
Watching the horizon,
wondering what she lies on.

Oh,you'll never be a poet,
Unless you learn your notes..
They take you to the limit.....
Love.whatever is it?Evermore,evermore...
The words seem like a roar...
I love your heart's deep core.
Ever more and ever more.
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English Literature: Death of the Author

Wordle: loci similes
Wordle: loci similes (Photo credit: filologanoga)
literary criticism of john ruskin
literary criticism of john ruskin (Photo credit: cdrummbks)
TCLC - Twentieth Century Literary Criticism
TCLC – Twentieth Century Literary Criticism (Photo credit: CCAC North Library)

English Literature: Death of the Author.

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Dreams may often lie

English: The photographer's wedding ring and i...
English: The photographer’s wedding ring and its heart-shaped shadow in a dictionary. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

No sight is like the rising of sun
When promises of dreams seem  clear and still
My heart ,though pained,can fancy  love has come
Without hard times and exercise of will.

No morning is without new dawn of hope
When all our conflicts shall be put aside.
Imagination is  far flung in scope,
Never  noting dreams may fraughtly lie.

No love is like my long lost love for you
Once known,once felt,it settles in the heart.

Yet I do believe love can be found anew
But only when the lost  true love  departs.

So bother me no more with reveried bliss.
Go leave me with my  life,though all’s amiss

National Poetry Month Display @ Forest Hills
National Poetry Month Display @ Forest Hills (Photo credit: mySAPL)
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Oh, my own lover!

George Boole's House and School, Lincoln, UK
George Boole’s House and School, Lincoln, UK (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Image

Loose in the fields of green…
Oh, my own lover!
He was such a bold flirt;
with his love unclaimed,
he could recite George Boole
he was one of the old Cool.
He never reached his goal.
so with my bling and some flair
I hoped he’d open the enchanted bud
To the music of his lyre.
I’ll pray this for him:
t hat he should find what he wreaks
and write it down with a stylus.
Really he is the allurement of angels
He was my epiphany
Make it up, as the clocks clang..
It’s not really you…it’s just an affliction.
I can do nothing for my calves
It’s because of all the punning I did once.
I can’t even lump a stone over a wall now.
My arms are as weak as Trojans.
I never suffer viruses to be declassified.
Like I said,just wink and say a prayer..
In God we dare.

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Irony

Richard Rorty
Richard Rorty (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingency,_Irony,_and_Solidarity

This is an interesting book by Richard Rorty,the philosopher

The nature of irony varies between societies

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Trying to recreate the world

 

The Lindens of Poissy, by Claude Monet (1882).
The Lindens of Poissy, by Claude Monet (1882). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Claude Monet, photo by Nadar, 1899. Français :...
Claude Monet, photo by Nadar, 1899. Français : Claude Monet par Nadar en 1899. Türkçe: İzlenimcilik akımının öncülerinden olan Fransız ressam Claude Monet’nin, fotoğrafçı yurttaşı Nadar tarafından 1899 yılında çekilmiş fotoğrafı. 1840 ile 1926 yılları arasında yaşayan Monet, bu fotoğraf çekildiği sırada 50’li yaşlarının sonundadır. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

The bus is late and I’m

Thinking of what you said,

trying to understand, but

I’ve never met you,so

I have nothing but written words

which,however beautiful,may not give

enough for me to truly imagine

the depths of your heart.

My legs hurt and I have a cane,

but I don’t like it.I can’t accept

my own infirmity,my troubles,

my pains,my disagreements,my mistakes.

Rain falls over me and drips down the lens

in my spectacles,as if the world is weeping

the tears I can’t shed.

If I cried now,standing at the bus stop,

for all the years of pain

noone would know,they’d

think it was just

raindrops running down my cheeks.

The bus comes,but it’s half term…

The shops are too crowded,I can’t

stand in queues…imagine how most of you

say it’s boring.Well,I’d love to do it

but I’ve decided the pain is greater

then the rewards.

The bus driver stops at a place where

the pavement has been lowered to allow

the owner of this house to drive

their car into the front garden

so they won’t need to buy

a resident’s parking permit.

It makes it a harder task to descend

from the bus and I hope he won’t

start while I’m still getting down.

In the coffee bar are exhibits from

a local museum,and I think,one day

my cane and my watch from Argos,

my shopping bag with a picture of Monet–

such vulgarity…..

they may be in a museum too…

along with my door keys

my bike lock and my spectacles

and will somebody try to conjure me up

in their imagination.

Someone who used to like Topology.

knitting,writing and holding hands with lovers

on the top deck of the bus

crossing central London without noticing

anything except their reflections in the eyes

of the other.

Light bounces to and fro.

My mind shuts down, the words

packed away in boxes,till there’s only

you and me and a few elementary particles

trying to recreate the world

with the big bang

that will end it all.

 

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A thin poem

POETRY SOCIETY POSTCARD
POETRY SOCIETY POSTCARD (Photo credit: summonedbyfells)

I have to write

these very thin poems

because

my hand hurts

So,

if I make them thin

they look longer

as if I’ve written

much more

than I really have.

And also

it’s easier to read

a short line

than a very long one like I sometimes write when I get that feeling

of

wanting to tell you

the whole story.

But now

this way

You have plenty of lines

To read between.

See what I mean?

It gives you more

chance to invent it yourself

which means

I talk to you and you

talk to me

even when we can’t hear.

What is a poem so thin called?

I got my linear poetic licence now.

So I’ll write

as best I can

and listen for an answer!

Linear or non-linear.

As we say

It’s the thought that counts.

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Share your favorite book titles/authors

I was thinking last night that I would love it if anyone wants to share their favorite authors.I suggest that you can do this by putting a comment on  the About Me page.I got one from one person which gave me the ideaImage

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Your face is map enough for me

Your face is map enough for me ,

Your gaze,your smile,your frown,your glee.

And if I want to know the rest

The shape your posture‘s made is best

For showing what your life is now.

A look,a gesture all this show.

Till whom you are is then disclosed

And I am in your arms enrobed.

Love vanishes when analyzed,

And thinking too

I Need to Be in Love
I Need to Be in Love (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Love’s despised

Use the means to fit the end

And then I’ll be what you intend

 

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Yet runs my nose and do my eyes not blink?

Blink (novel)
Blink (novel) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I have no teeth and combless I remain
My hair once silk is now  a  tangled briar..
Men gaze on me with ruthless cold disdain
My visage does no longer light their fire.

I have no mind and so I cannot think
I cannot love nor hate now I grow tired.
Yet runs my nose and do my eyes not blink?
Where is that man with   care nd with a desire?

I have no heart,or it turns cold and hard.
Yet soul I have and spirit and my sight.
At life’s long game I fling down all my cards.
And ask for nothing but a means of flight.

For beauty withers as my wisdom grows.
And none observe the circling of the crows.

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The Death Throes of Romanticism: The Poetry of Sylvia Plath – University of San Francisco (USF)

23 Fitzroy Road, London : The house where Sylv...
23 Fitzroy Road, London : The house where Sylvia Plath committed suicide. It was also W.B. Yeats’s residence for a while. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Death Throes of Romanticism: The Poetry of Sylvia Plath – University of San Francisco (USF). by J C Oates

English: Grave of Sylvia Plath The grave of po...
English: Grave of Sylvia Plath The grave of poet Sylvia Plath in Heptonstall. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is a fascinating essay by the novelist Joyce Carol Oates..so intelligent and thoughtful…not to be missed

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Sylvia Plath – Online Articles and Texts

Newnham College, Cambridge, where Sylvia Plath...
Newnham College, Cambridge, where Sylvia Plath studied. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
English: Digital image of Sylvia Plath's signature
English: Digital image of Sylvia Plath’s signature (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Joyce Carol Oates, 2006
Joyce Carol Oates, 2006 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Sylvia Plath – Online Articles and Texts.

This has  a long list of all you can find on line.I am looking for a review by Joyce Carol Oates.This is a very good resource for literature students and like minded people.

Sylvia Plath
Sylvia Plath (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
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Plath’s therapist was not actually trained as a pyschoanalyst

http://www.salon.com/2004/11/29/plath_therapist/

I know that psychoanalysts are not meant to tell patients what to do.So I was surprised this one did.. like telling her to get a divorce.Now I discover she had not even undergone her own analysis.

Make sure your therapist  is trained if you need one

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THE CAMBRIDGE INTRODUCTION TO SYLVIA PLATH

 There has more been written,probably, about Sylvia Plath than any other poet of the last century.Much of it is  various  attempts at her  biography.The focus was on her actual life and its events.I  had only read “Daddy” and “lady Lazarus” but lately I read more from her collected works and I am now impressed with her poetic gift and her hard work developing it.Perhaps she worked too hard.Who can say?
So I was ready to read some critical evaluation of her writing.This book is excellent if a little short. I found it quite easy to read even though I have no academic training in literature.

There is a summary of her life but the main focus is on each  phase of her writing For someone of  only 30  when she  died she underwent remarkable transitions and growth of her poetic mind.I am also now re ading her prose which I had dismissed.

I recommend this wholeheartedly.There is another volume “The Cambridge Companion to Sylvia Plath”

Here is a poem I like especially the last verse

Nick and the Candlestick

By Sylvia Plath

I am a miner. The light burns blue.
Waxy stalactites
Drip and thicken, tears
The earthen womb
Exudes from its dead boredom.
Black bat airs
Wrap me, raggy shawls,
Cold homicides.
They weld to me like plums.
Old cave of calcium
Icicles, old echoer.
Even the newts are white,
Those holy Joes.
And the fish, the fish—
Christ! they are panes of ice,
A vice of knives,
A piranha
Religion, drinking
Its first communion out of my live toes.
The candle
Gulps and recovers its small altitude,
Its yellows hearten.
O love, how did you get here?
O embryo
Remembering, even in sleep,
Your crossed position.
The blood blooms clean
In you, ruby.
The pain
You wake to is not yours.
Love, love,
I have hung our cave with roses,
With soft rugs—
The last of Victoriana.
Let the stars
Plummet to their dark address,
Let the mercuric
Atoms that cripple drip
Into the terrible well,
You are the one
Solid the spaces lean on, envious.
You are the baby in the barn.
 
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An article about the American poet Elizabeth Bishop.And a poem

http://www.poems-and-quotes.com/article.html?id=663

I love her work

Exchanging Hats

Unfunny uncles who insist
in trying on a lady’s hat,
–oh, even if the joke falls flat,
we share your slight transvestite twist

in spite of our embarrassment.
Costume and custom are complex.
The headgear of the other sex
inspires us to experiment.

Anandrous aunts, who, at the beach
with paper plates upon your laps,
keep putting on the yachtsmen’s caps
with exhibitionistic screech,

the visors hanging o’er the ear
so that the golden anchors drag,
–the tides of fashion never lag.
Such caps may not be worn next year.

Or you who don the paper plate
itself, and put some grapes upon it,
or sport the Indian’s feather bonnet,
–perversities may aggravate

the natural madness of the hatter.
And if the opera hats collapse
and crowns grow draughty, then, perhaps,
he thinks what might a miter matter?

Unfunny uncle, you who wore a
hat too big, or one too many,
tell us, can’t you, are there any
stars inside your black fedora?

Aunt exemplary and slim,
with avernal eyes, we wonder
what slow changes they see under
their vast, shady, turned-down brim.

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A little poem from another WP blog

I just read this on “How my heart speaks “by Katherine

https://wordscat.wordpress.com/

Just think it could be WormPress or WarmPress.Here are the books recommended by cool.wormpress.com .Meanwhile snails slowly rush in where slugs may  be filled with dread.

Some evenings,the sky turned pink
We were happy,lying in the grass
Watching the sun set.
Arms around each other.
Seemed like eternal life had come
Earlier than forecast.
Those weathermen are always wrong!
They need new training
In that timeless moment
In between two raindrops,
In between two tears.

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You so love me

Only Time... (49854383)
Only Time… (49854383) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 In the sudden hotness of the day

The bench beside the roses seemed set right.

We  talked about the flowers  so sweet  so  gay,

And whether Love is visible to sight,

 

The flowers seemed more beautiful and rare

Than any flower I’ve let  my eyes rest on.

I welcomed them with bold yet merry stare.

Ah,all too soon bright summer will be gone.

 

The sun was at the apex of the sky.

We caught the moment like a netted fish.

And as we looked the broad white clouds blew by.

All we can do is wish and wish and wish,

 

Now back to dishes,socks and “what’s for tea?”

I live so well because so  you love me

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How I wrote this poem

The subject matter of a poem must come from whatever is inside your head.So reading more poetry or any well written literature contributes.The form of the poem may determine what rises to the surface as you write.I got the idea of beginning with a negative from some poetry newsletter I get [Sorry,not kept  reference] I was reluctant to write a sonnet.Iambic pentamet sounds frightening.To help me keep in my the right structure I recite

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day

Then I have to start,I think if a first line

“Not love nor money should we seek to steal;”

I like that as there is some alliteration,it’s the right length.and I agree with the sentiment.Once I have a first line then  the next lines seem to come more easily.THe whole sonnet is a surprise to me.Did I know I thought like that?Well,in a way, but r so explicitly.I have written about five now.They do resemble poems by the Metaphysicals like Donne.So I am unsure if I have found my own voice.I think the more one write the more likely it is you will find your own voice.Check the meter.Check for cliches.Check for adverbs used to correct the meter

Read poetry in books,on blogs,on the internet.Study some guides like

Teach yourself:writing poetry.

I like

W H Auden ,,Sylvia Plath,SimonArmitage,Donne,Marvell…..,Shakespeare,Rilke,Seamus Heaney,Hopkins,W B Yeats/

but you really need to read some modern poetry,

bus stop 6

BY SOME GRACE

Not love nor money should we seek to steal;
Nor for self praise and honor be in need
For these things cannot ever truly heal.
And onto a wrong path may often lead.

Not to vice nor virtue must our wills be tied;
Yet by some grace we gently may be led
Our will directs attention which denied
May let our pride control our thoughtless head.

Not good nor bad can track the vane of God
Far from our sightless eyes are his affairs.
Yet Faith and Hope can be a dowsing rod
With Love the force to trace the Spirit bare.

Oh,come down,Spirit,take me as your wife
Fill me with holy grace and with new life

Remember any poetry

Which poetry do you remember without trying to learn it?I remember Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll…author of Alice in Wonderland and Island by W H Auden.Also the Lady of Shalott and some of Wordsworth and Shakespeare.I wonder why those?I am glad I did learn some by heart but sometimes my heart has learned them by itself!!