From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Tuesday, February 01, 2000 7:26 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 1 Rilke // The Power Within

Too often in my life I feel like I'm living my life for someone else. I go to school to accept the assignments that my teacher gives me. I go to my job to fulfill my supervisor's expectations. I go home to share my experiences with my parents hoping that they will be proud of me. Why do I do this? Why can't I live my life for just me? I think I am constantly trying to search for meaning in my life through others. I bathe in the rewards of the compliments that I receive from my teachers, my supervisor, my family and friends. I take the criticisms that they give me seriously. At the beginning of Letters to a Young Poet, we understand why Kappus is writing to Rilke: Kappus wants to receive compliments and criticisms from an outsider. However, Rilke won't criticize Kappus's work. Rilke tells Kappus that only he himself can critique his work. He must write poetry for himself, not for others. Only then will he understand the true value of writing poetry.

This is the power that I want to talk about: the power from within. I see this as a theme throughout Rilke's letters. Instead of looking for answers outside, we must look for answers inside, right under our nose! It's like when we one is madly searching for his or her glasses only to later realize that the glasses were resting on the top of his or her head. I find that this theme is useful when trying to find oneself. No one from the outside can truly tell us who each one of us is. It's something we have to figure out for ourselves. College teaches us just this. It teaches us to be independent. We begin to form our own views and our own take on the world. We must hold strong to our convictions and have the courage to follow through with them.

Rilke teaches us how to look into ourselves. Instead of hunting for answers outside, we need to realize that answers are all around us everyday in the ordinary, everyday experiences of our inside life. Rilke says that the insignificant things are the most significant things and we must learn how to see these things in this new light: "For the creative artist there is no poverty-nothing is insignificant or unimportant" (Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, p. 10). How many of our days go by with us not realizing the beauty of the ordinary. How many times do we hear ourselves saying: "I'm bored," or "There's nothing to do" ? This makes me laugh because my grandfather always used to tell us grandchildren that boring was not in the dictionary every time he heard one of us say one of these phrases. Well, he was wrong that boring is not in the dictionary because it is, but his outlook on life was correct in that nothing in life is meaningless.

I see this same theme continued in Kappus's struggle of making some big decisions. Kappus is asking Rilke for advice about whether or not he should continue his writing career. Rilke again tells Kappus to look within himself for the answer: "When considering analysis, discussion, or presentation, listen to your inner / self and to your feelings every time" (Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, p. 25-6). This is one area that I will pat myself on the back, if I may. I always listen to my inner voice and to my gut feeling inside of me. Last summer I had the opportunity to give admission tours to prospective students at CSB/SJU. We all know how big that college decision can sometimes be. My best piece of advice for them was for them to listen to their gut feeling. If the campuses did not feel like home to them, then they should be going here. I told them that the college they should choose is the one that feels like home. No one can tell you where you should go: not me, not your parents, and not the admission counselor. Only YOU can make that decision.

Rilke keeps mentioning the power of aloneness. Aloneness is an area of this theme (the power within) that I cannot comprehend too greatly. I'm hoping maybe we can clarify this point more in class. I guess I personally don't value an extended period of time of aloneness. Sure, I do feel that occasionally I need to be alone, but for the most part I believe that we are social beings and we NEED people. I can't imagine the enormous amount of time Kappus was spending alone. I would go nuts. I would have to disagree with Rilke's encouragement to Kappus of being alone. Maybe my view would change if I understood more deeply the value of aloneness. The early part of my childhood and in grade school would have to be the part of my life where I was most alone. And from that experience, I really wouldn't recommend it to others.

Finally, I was greatly touched by Rilke's interpretation that we can look for God within ourselves! Wow! This brings this theme to a climax. To think that God is within ourselves is just amazing. I have always tried to see God in OTHERS, but never really in MYSELF. Instead of searching for God outside, in the past, or in the future, Rilke believes we should find God right here and now in ourselves. The most interesting point of all this is that Rilke believes that we have to build God for ourselves. Maybe this is why I don't always see God or feel his presence in his life, because I haven't built him yet from the inside out. Rilke explains, "By extracting the most possible sweetness out of everything, just as the bees gather honey, we thus build Him" (Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, p. 59). We have been forced to listen to others our whole life: our parents, teachers, supervisors, etc. I believe that I have built myself up from the outside, now I feel that I have some major construction work that needs to take place from the inside out. Where do I begin?

Wow, I wrote a lot. I don't think my future journal entries will be as long due to time constraints! So enjoy it while you can!

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Thursday, May 11, 2000 1:57 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 26. Mitsuharu // NO, N-O

Importance: High

NO, N-O

No, I will not do this post tonite.

I won't even do it tomorrow for that matter.

Or the next day.

Consider it dead before it was even born.

I am opposed to posting.

I have better things to do. My friends are having a good conversation in

my room right now without me.

Why should I clutter this

email with thoughts and words?

I won't send you my thoughts. But here, take my silence. My high school art teacher wouldn't let us leave any white spaces left uncolored on a painting. White are these spaces that let me wander aimlessly without worrying about a cohesive structure to tie all my thoughts into one.

I oppose introducing quotes. Why can't just one quote stand alone by itself and speak without someone asking it to speak?

This I believe: to oppose

Is the only fine thing in life.

To oppose is to live.

To oppose is to get a grip on the very self.

(Mitsuharu, "Opposition," in 99 Poems, p. 55)

What? A conclusion?

Fine, take this.

The End.

What's so wrong with that?

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Tuesday, May 09, 2000 12:00 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 25. Whitman and Blake // Reality is not limited to "real" things

I Am the Poet

By Walt Whitman

I am the poet of reality

I say the earth is not an echo

Not man an apparition;

But that all the things seen are real,

The witness and albic dawn of things equally real

I have split the earth and the hard coal and rocks and the solid bed

Of the sea

And went down to reconnoitre there a long time,

And bring back a report,

And I understand that those are positive and dense every one

And that what they seem to the child they are

[And that the world is not joke,

Nor any part of it a sham].

From A Book of Luminous Things, p. 53

William Blake has a similar message in his poem "From 'Milton'" (p. 54). Blake ignores the reality of the earth's roundness and the vastness of the universe for the naivete of seeing only his limited reality of a flat horizon on his garden's mount. In both of these poems, the poet limits reality to something seen. Reality is something that one can experience and touch for oneself. For Whitman, he has ventured down into the earth and has proved its reality with the final report that he brings back. Both poets seem to objectify their reality (which is the theme of this chapter). However, I wonder if by giving a thing "center stage" (Milosz, A Book of Luminous Things, p. 53), one loses the reality of the reality that is not within the thing itself. Not that this is bad; I actually enjoy it. And not that all poetry does this. In fact, I would have to say that most poets try to use the objectivity and reality of a thing to express the reality of something greater. I, personally, think that these two poets have lost their imagination in these poems, and therefore have forgotten (or in the case of Blake-purposely forgotten) to take the reader from the reality things he or she has experienced, to a foreign experience of a much greater reality.

I have a problem with Whitman's line: "But that all the things seen are real" (p 53).

His poem's title catches my attention instantly: "I Am the Poet" (p. 53). Thinking about his poem's message and its title, I wonder if the poet is not real because I cannot see him/her? Are the images on the page not real since I cannot literally see them? Is a poem not real if it is limited to text on a page? Is a poem, therefore, not a real "thing"? In addition to Whitman calling us to see seen things as real, I think that THINGS NOT SEEN ARE REAL TOO.

There is always more than meets the eye. Just because Blake can't see the universe, doesn't mean that it does not exist. Poets must not lose sight of their imagination's limitless horizons when "objectifying" objects. The "Secret of a Thing" is not the thing itself, but the unseen reality that the thing hides.

As a final note, Blake repeatedly uses the possessive word "his" in his poem: "his dwelling-place", "his own roof", "his Universe" etc. (p. 54). We must remember that things are not just an INDIVIDUAL'S property. Things are meant to be shared by everyone. Maybe if Blake lost the use of this word "his," his poem would hint at a much greater reality shared by everyone that is not limited to the narrow reality seen through the eyes of the "Man".

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, May 03, 2000 11:21 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: how fitting!

I just looked up the definition of talismans, and to my surprise, I found this:

n., pl. talDisDmans.

1. An object marked with magic signs and believed to confer on its bearer supernatural powers or protection.

2. Something that apparently has magic power: Beauty is sometimes a most powerful talisman.

Taken from:

www.dictionary.com

I smiled. One of my talismans is "Magic Words."

jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Friday, April 28, 2000 12:12 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 24. Wagoner and Creeley // Talking About Birds

My reflection after reading David Wagoner's poem "The Author of American Ornithology Sketches a Bird, Now Extinct" (Wagoner, in A Book of Luminous Things, p. 13-14):

I haven't talked about birds for a long time. I've avoided it. In junior high (or was it more toward the end of my grade school years?) I was batty about birds. I had my own bird book and even my own bird log. Every day for maybe 4 or 5 months, I would journal about birds-what birds I found, where I found them, what they were doing, and what time of day I spotted them. I learned from my books that if I wanted to be a real "bird watcher" this is what I would have to do. Well, I thought it was just about the best project I could ever undertake. I was going to succeed and prove to myself that I could faithfully adhere to my plan. And I did-for 4 to 5 months. Only my family knew about my secret hobby. My brother laughed at me and thought I was a goon. I think my dad did too--even though he did support me and take me to some wildlife parks. Time went by, and the records of birds in my notebook kept accumulating. I felt attached to birds and also to nature in a way that I never really have before. I developed a sharp eye and a real consciousness for the other life that birds were living, right outside my window.

My passion for birds slowly died. The diversity of birds around my hometown was not the greatest. I found myself logging house sparrow after house sparrow over and over again. The tediousness and the enormity of my project became too much. I began to purposely close my eyes to nature so that I would lessen the chance of seeing a bird and in turn, feeling a need to record its presence in my notebook. My brother's scorn for my project shifted my way. I wondered exactly what I thought I was accomplishing and why. I discarded my bird journal under the kitchen cabinet back home-mixed in piles of unfinished coloring books and word puzzles. It's still there.

The theme of Wagoner's poem, which I also invoke in my reflection, seems to be not feeling at peace with or in union with nature. Wagoner's poem ends sorrowfully: "He watched it [his captured bird] die, he said, with great regret" (Wagoner, in A Book of Luminous Things, p. 14).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Reflection after reading Robert Creeley's "Like They Say" (Creeley, in A Book of Luminous Things, p. 18):

Creeley's poem seems to hold a contrasting theme: feeling at peace with one's intrusion upon nature (recognizing a degree of separateness between humans and nature):

Underneath the tree on some

soft grass I sat, I

watched two happy

woodpeckers be dis-

turbed by my presence. And

why not, I thought to

myself, why

not.

(Creeley, in A Book of Luminous Things, p. 18)

After reading, I reflected upon a moment in my past where I intruded upon nature. Instead of feeling at peace with my disturbance like Creely, I felt guilt and sadness.

There once lived a helpless,

innocent baby bird.

I killed him.

He was lost.

I found him.

I never should have

brought out my weapon.

I tried to capture him

in my little black box,

but I got too close.

He ran.

I ran after him.

I wanted a perfect picture.

He wanted his mom and dad.

He ran right out of my viewfinder,

through a gated fence,

and into the playful jaws of my

next door neighbor's puppy.

The mother robin began her search.

I fleed the scene,

and still today

I remain uncharged for my crime.

-jrm

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, April 19, 2000 2:10 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: FINAL DRAFT // Nasrin // Backbone Walking

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, April 12, 2000 4:59 PM

To: Thamert, Mark; Frerich, Stephanie G

Subject: 23. Frerich // Ashes // A Reader's Questions

Stephanie,

I liked your poem "Ashes" in our class magazine on the public folders. I think the images are great, but I also found myself questioning the poem's hidden meaning. I thought that maybe if I lay out some of my own reader's questions, it might help you to see your poem from another perspective.

"Ashes"

I think this is a powerful, short title in contrast to the very l o n g lines in the poem. Was this intentional? Why is this significant? Why aren't ashes directly mentioned in the poem? The "sh" sound in the word "ashes" is very cool. I just thought of this :-). It's almost as if someone is trying to hide something by keeping it a secret, burying it. Your poem seems to uncover the ashes. You blow on them and stir them up so that they fall back to earth from the sky, right on our faces.

From a distance the drops feel as if it snows.

Why are we placed at a distance here? The rest of your poem has us placed right in the middle of the action. Do you want to start your poem this way from afar and then somehow move the reader into the action? If we are looking from afar, how are we feeling these drops here when the snow is falling over there? Is this a commentary on how people have distanced themselves from the Holocaust when in actuality they are connected to it and somehow responsible for it? How can snow drop? Usually we think of a liquid dropping. Are these blood drops? Why are we not just seeing the snow, but feeling it? We definitely are somehow pulled into the story.

Or perhaps they are little messengers, small pieces of paper collected but shredded too soon.

I see the image of snow with bits of words on them like tiny bits of shredded paper. This is a neat image considering the fact that each snowflake is unique and each of these bits of shredded paper are unique too. Words falling from heaven. What sentences do these words form? I think it's impossible to comprehend the meaning and to put these words together in the intended places within a sentence. We can compact the snow together and form many different things---a snowman, a fort, a chair. The snow and words are lingering on the ground waiting to be molded into something. The situation is overwhelming. Untouched snow and unread words lie everywhere. Something has definitely been lost. Shredding paper is a small act that we think is final. We feel comfort that our private words on the page are utterly destroyed and gone in a paper shredder. But are they gone? Their shreds still remain, as do the ashes of those who died in the Holocaust. I question the necessity of your word choice of "messengers." Do you want these bits of paper to be personified. Hey, I guess that is clever. We need to personify the words to make what seems like such an unreal situation real.

It's also interesting to note that paper is white too, just like the snow.

A shriek in the background is the realization that hell has erupted and is merely floating down to earth. They are killing us in this camp, acting like

When I think of hell erupting from below, I see volcanic lava and fire oozing over the earth, not floating. Why is it floating down to earth? Isn't Haydes below us? Oh, I see your reasoning now. I guess I can see heaven more so floating down to earth than hell. Rather, I see an image of hell rising on earth. Why is there a realization in this person? Isn't this an instant recognition, or does it take some time for the person to think things through?

Satan's wrapped around their arms. We are cooked for breakfast, lunch and dinner but the taste does not suit them for they spit it up and out where it

I like this image of Satan wrapping his arms around the earth. I think it would be interesting if you described Satan's arms with the adjective white. This would tie into the snow image of the first line. A blanket of snow on the ground is like someone's arms hugging the earth. In this case, Satan's arms are choking the Earth. Only a suggestion. In your second sentence here, all of a sudden "we" becomes distanced again. It's not "we" who are spit up and out, it is "it." Are you suggesting that the ashes are eaten? And if so, is your snow image a metaphor for these ashes? It would be interesting if so, because then the people are spitting out words. They eat people's words and reject them.

returns to us-a ceremony to a cremated people, remembered in the stars.

Snow returns to the earth from the sky in a cyclical pattern just like the ashes of the dead.

However, snow is white and ashes are black. It's interesting that you used the same color concept that Paul Celan used in his line where he describes the drinking of "black milk."

Also, snow is wet, while ashes are dry.

Where is the color in this world? This world you paint is only black, white, and grey. How sad.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, April 05, 2000 1:50 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 22. Gonzalez // Simply Deep

"Yesterday"

Yesterday was Wednesday all morning.

By afternoon it changed:

It became almost Monday,

(A short excerpt from Gonzalez, "Yesterday," in Vintage p. 17)

I have written my post with short, simple poems. These poems try to capture the moment that I'm living right now and moments that I have lived. Through this method, I am trying to not only capture further insights into the poems of Gonzalez, but also further insights into my own life, especially important moments of my own past. Here, I find comfort in knowing that there is some permanence to my "yesterdays."

-Jeff Markwardt

"Walk"

I walk to the door of my house.

By the time I turn the doorknob,

I'm almost free.

"Second"

An email sent from a friend two seconds ago was frightening.

I run to catch the second that it was sent.

Upon arriving, I thankfully find time turning again.

The second in my inbox does not tick.

"Food"

The food on my plate is called lunch.

By evening it is already dinner.

At night it turns into a snack.

By morning I awake to brunch.

Jesus' fish fed only-how many? Five thousand.

"Story"

I wrote a story a long time ago.

By the time I grew up, it was no longer a story.

It was me.

"Time"

1:11 AM

The last I stayed for only one minute.

The I in the middle stays for ten minutes.

The first I will stay for an hour.

The AM combined with an I is permanent.

"Grass"

I mowed the grass last Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

While I was mowing on Wednesday, Monday's grass had already overgrown.

Tuesday's grass is catching up with Monday's grass.

Wednesday's grass will soon want to play in this game with me too.

"Hourglass"

An hourglass replaces an arrow on my screen.

The pixels of grey replace grains of sand.

I used to have an old hourglass.

I think I lost that one too.

Jeff Markwardt

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Tuesday, April 04, 2000 2:24 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: Memorized Poem // Li-Young Lee's "A Story" -- anyone want to do this with Jeff?

You mentioned that we might want to pair up in class to read our memorized poem.

I'm wondering if you could post this to see if anyone else would like to pair up on this poem with me.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Sunday, April 02, 2000 2:53 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 21. Ravikovitch // The Impossible Catch

This poem contains very strong images. The poem is graspable, but the contents of what the poet and the reader are trying to grasp are not. We are seeking something that is impossible to catch in every single direction. First, Ravikovitch sends us upwards as we try to catch the extinguishing smoke of coal. However, we find our limitations of flying and we fall right back to the ground with empty hands. Second, Ravikovitch takes us swimming in a direction trying to catch a boat on a river. However, we again tire and realize our limitations as we drift backwards in the water, catching a glimpse of the boat as it descends on the horizon. Third, we rest. Even resting in one spot, trying to grasp a solid object, we cannot grasp it fully:

If I could get hold of every particle of you,

If I could get hold of you like metal-

Say pillars of copper,

A pillar of purple copperā

(Ravikovitch, "Trying Again," in The Vintage Book, p. 330)

Finally, we descend downwards to the depths of the ocean, trying to grasp "the bottom of the ocean I've never seen" (Ravikovitch, "Trying Again," in The Vintage Book, p. 330). We realize that this part of the ocean we will never see as we swim back to the surface for a necessary gulp of air.

This poem is filled with the words "If" and "How." There are always too many if's in this world compared with the amount of how's. Dreams are filled with if's, but we don't live in a dream world. We live in a world that relies on how's to make the if's a reality. Her poems return me to a child-like fantasy with all of its imagination. (She has written many books for children.) The thing is, I still have this same imagination that I had as a child. Her if's take me to this child-like dream world, and her how's add my adult-like reasoning. For me, Ravikovitch's message is for us to make our child-like dreams of if's a reality. She reminds me not to forget them and encourages me to live them even as an adult.

If I could catch all of you, I would. But for now, I'll just catch as much of you that I can, and continue trying to catch more.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, March 29, 2000 9:29 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 19. Bishop // Making Absence

Usually one thinks of making something out of nothing. However, Bishop puts a new twist on this and glorifies the process of losing as an art of making something. This is interesting considering that Hirsch begins his Chapter 2 talking about the art of making as poetry: Poiesis means "making" and , as the ancient Greeks recognized, the poet is first and foremost a maker" (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p. 31). When one loses something, one would think that one has reversed this concept of making something. However, Bishop's poem looks at the art of losing on the positive side. She makes the concept of looking at a half-filled glass of water as half full apply to any situation. In this instance, Bishop sees not the loss, but the gain as a result of losing something.

The art of losing isn't hard to master;

So many things seemed filled with the intent

To be lost that their loss is no disaster.

(Bishop "One Art," from How to Read a Poem, p. 32)

I like how Bishop not only is able to laugh at her own expense, but able to realize that loss is an ordinary process of living. Without loss, there would be no gain, just as without hate there would be no love. Bishop keeps life simple and carefree. How many times have I heard a teacher use the acronym: K.I.S.S.(Keep it simple student)? I've thought about this concept as it pertains to my studies, but never my life. Losing is simple and easy, so why not take advantage of it? I agree with Bishop that some things are just too hard to keep hold of. Therefore, why not just let them go and be lost? It makes my life less complex with fewer worries.

I think we need to learn how to lose things in this society. We are too concerned with gaining and achieving more and more that when we do lose something so insignificant, it becomes a big deal to us. We lose track of what's really important in our lives and what we really need.

I like how if you take the words that rhyme in Bishop's poem and put them together, it forms a new poem within the original poem:

Intent / spent / meant / went / continent / evident

Master / disaster / master / faster / disaster / master / vaster / disaster / gesture / master / disaster

(Bishop "One Art," from How to Read a Poem, p. 31-2)

Is there a song and rhythm hiding in this poem?

I see how losing is the intent of a continent. It spent and went almost too quickly. Some higher master's vast gesture caused a disaster.

This interpretation really does extend the realm of this poem to new boundaries. Instead of the poem focusing on what Bishop lost, the poem now shows us what a whole continent of people lost by picking apart certain words. What exactly this poem makes of loss and absence might be bigger than what we think.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Thursday, March 16, 2000 3:49 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 18. Sachs // Picking Scabs on the Landscape

Nelly Sachs' "Landscape of Screams" really strikes me because of its overflowing images of the body in distress. Screaming blind eyes, bleeding throats, and hanging skeletons all add to the most erie landscape that Sach paints for us. Sach paints an image of a night for us. However, this night is not black. This night is red. Red of human blood. This contrast of colors makes me step back and remember the "black milk" in Celan's poem that we read earlier. One big difference between these two poems is that the color is not tainted by the darkness. This blood in Sachs' poem does not get darker, it gets bloodier:

At night when dying proceeds to sever all seams

the landscape of screams

tears open the black bandage,

The evening night is usually associated with a sense of quietness and calm. The day's events are covered by a "black bandage" of the night. This bandage in Sach's poem doesn't hold. The blood oozes out of the poem from the very beginning until the very last stanza associated with the morning sun. The night's bandage is broken. The sore continues to bleed, infecting the bright sun with an eclipse of a bloody eclipse. Finally, at the end, the scab begins to form: "hung up to be dried by God / in the cosmos -" (Sachs, "Landscape of Screams," in 99 Poems in Translation p.110-11).

The landscape is not the landscape of the earth. The landscape is the landscape of the human body being inflicted with injustice. Knives, shackles, grates, and arrows are just some of the weapons listed in this poem that torture the body. In a sense, these dangerous weapons do add new contours, lines, valleys, and rivers to our body. After a sever injury or a cut, the body will never be able to rid itself of some of the permanently remaining scars and cuts. The greatest of man's weapons, the nuclear bomb, Sachs saves until the second to last stanza: "from the skeletons in Hiroshima and Maidanek" (Sachs, "Landscape of Screams," in 99 Poems in Translation p.110-11).

There are many biblical references in this poem. Maybe this is supposed to allude the reader to the fact that this torture has always been happening. The tortures are written in caves in hieroglyphs and preserved in the Bible. One biblical image of a sacrifice in the Bible is the time Abraham was going to kill his only son, Isaac, for God. Since original sin, our bodies have been plagued with pain. The black bandage of the night has been ripped open and the scab just will not heal. We keep picking at the scab as the scab keeps trying to form. The ending of this poem does not convince me that the screams will cease: "hung up to be dried by God / in the cosmos -" (Sachs, "Landscape of Screams," in 99 Poems in Translation p.110-11). This line reminds me of the weekly act of some people who hang the clothes out on the clothesline. These dried clothes will be brought back into the house to be used. Once used, they will be thrown back into the washer, only to be hung once again on the clothesline drying out in the sun. The ending of this poem brings me back to the beginning. The dry clothes will be wet again, and the wet clothes will dry. The dried blood formed at the poem's end will only break to release rivers of new blood, flowing across the contour of the land (our body).

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, March 15, 2000 2:16 AM

To: Walters, Anne M; Thamert, Mark

Subject: 16.5 Celan // Response to Anne // Black Milk Secrets Unveiled

Hey Anne,

I see that we were the only two to choose this poem, and I have just had some new insight on it that I thought you might like to consider. In Ellie Wiesel's Night, the story ends with a man sucking the milk from the breasts of a woman. I think this is the image Celan is trying to provoke for us! The constant referral of drinking with the immediate image of milk at the beginning of the poem is definitely given to clue us in here. What do they drink from? They drink "You." How do you possibly drink someone? :-) Yep, you've got it. The only time in our lives where we drink of a person is during communion and as a young infant. Now, I'm going to exclude the communion possibility within this poem because I see no reference to any Christ-like symbols. That leaves me with the image of an infant being nourished through the mother's milk in her breasts. These Jews were at their life's last straw. The only possible way of surviving would be to drink of this milk at night so no one would see this evil act, hence, "black milk."

Agree or disagree?

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Walters, Anne M

Sent: Tuesday, March 14, 2000 8:39 PM

To: Thamert, Mark; Walters, Anne M

Subject: 16. Celan // the poison of black milk

Black milk of daybreak we drink it at evening

Immediately I am struck by the contrasting images: black and milk. I tend to think of milk as something pure, innocent, and childlike. What's more universal than milk and cookies? However, the milk is black, probably from the ashes of the detention camp. This imagery is dark and forbearing. When I see the word "daybreak" I think of morning of a fresh start, but the author is talking about milk in the evening. What else could the milk represent? It isn't a nourishing milk, it is the dark "milk" of nazism.

we drink it at midday and morning we drink it at night

we drink and we drink

There is not end to the drinking of this dark "milk." The repetition of the word "drink" reminds me of a constant grind and after reading some information about Celan, I see these images of him slaving away at a work camp.

we shovel a grave in the air there you won't lie too cramped

Why are they shoveling a grave in the air? Later, the same line is repeated except they are digging a grave in the "sky." Later, the Nazi character "grants us a grave in the air." The speaker is no longer preparing the graves of others, he is a victim as well. The earth and sky are not cramped places, rather they are freeing. However, the contrast the word "grave" grabs the reader into realizing these shoveling actions do not have a positive result.

A man lives in the house he plays with his vipers he writes

I a reminded of the image of the Nazi general in the movie Schindler's List. For some reason, I picture the scene where he is standing on his porch, over-looking the detention camp. All of a sudden he picks up his rifle and shoots a couple of Jews.

In this line, the word "plays" is a contrast to the image of the workers slaving away, shoveling graves. "writes"--represents some kind of civility in the mad context of the poem. Thousands of people are being killed and tortured, and yet this German? man is sitting in his house, writing his girlfriend with golden hair. He lives in a "house" which has more confinement than the "air" and "sky" mentioned throughout the poem.

Line by line analysis, I really like the first line ..

Black--dark imagery, evil, in contrast to milk. "Black milk" is used throughout the poem. It never changes. Perhaps it represents the constant ash of the burning bodies at the detention camps or the burning of coal. "Black milk" is the poison of the Nazi's that the Jews are forced to drink.

milk--such a stark contrast to "black." I tend to think of milk as creamy and white, not black. milk is a source of nurturing, as babies we drink the milk of our mothers, it is supposed to help us grow, this "black milk" has the opposite effect. it is killing the workers.

of daybreak --the "black milk" comes from the daybreak, daybreaks are supposed to be sunny and bright with the promise of a new day. for the speaker, daybreak starts dark.

we --the author is not alone, they are drinking together

drink--the author is taking it in, ingesting it ...

it at evening--all day the workers drink. this also makes me think that maybe they were given three breaks during their work days. morning/midday/and evening. during these times they were given something to drink, but it was always clouded by ash.

I like this line because of the contrasting images of the words and because of the beauty in the individual words.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Tuesday, March 14, 2000 8:52 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 17. Nasrin // Backbone Walking

Fr. Mark,

Please open my paper using the document icon. I also copied and pasted it into this e-mail, but all the formatting did not transfer correctly.

I know it's early, but I was planning on turning it in on Wednesday as I have 2 other papers to start working on.

Jeff

Jeff Markwardt

Fr. Mark Thamert

HONR 250 Great Poets

Paper on a Poet

15 March 2000

Backbone Walking

Standing orders of ABCs and 123s.

The child's square blocks

Faultlessly arranged

But hazardous to

Sight. Tension

Sideways

Stacked

Slants

To

escape

A tower of bones stand in the back

Without legs and arms

The trapped

Fluid swells and crawls

inside one line

Unyielding

Dreams of twisted curves and wild shapes

unattached and free

Separate from the

body

http://www2.art.utah.edu/cathedral/images/pisa/pisa_view4.jpg

"Hands up! Up against the wall. Anything you say can and will be used against you." Pushed firmly face-first up against a wall, a woman is frisked by a police officer for disobeying the law. A passer-by sees not the dignity lost in this woman's face but the submissiveness in the stillness on her back. Women in a male dominated society are often wedged up against a similar wall, left without a voice. Taslima Nasrin's poems visually strengthen her cry for women's rights through her careful and deliberate layout of words that begin the walk away from the wall.

Nasrin's poems rise and walk like a waking person from a bed. While most poets unconsciously rest their words against the left margin, Nasrin commands certain words to get up and walk from their resting spot. Nasrin is not afraid of breaking this unwritten rule. Nasrin creates new tension by bending poetry's natural backbone that usually rests against the left margin. Her poetry takes new shape. Analyzing this walking backbone, one finds words hidden within their placement on the page.

Nasrin's poem "Character" effectively portrays women's struggle: breaking free from male oppression. The first twelve lines, resting against the left margin, represent women's long history of being wedged up against the wall of a male dominated society. The length of the lines visually expresses how men suppress women's progress. The lengthier lines have words that move away from the left margin. This represents women's advancement away from the wall with the words themselves and with their layout: "that when you step over the threshold of your house" or "When you keep on walking down the lane" (401). The adjacent shorter lines of "men will look askance at you" or "men will follow you and whistle" (401) pull the words back toward the left margin representing the struggle of women's freedom. The words in the last line (ironically the "lucky" thirteenth line) finally break free from their placement against the left margin with hope that the future will continue to reflect the present advances in the women's movement: " as you're going now"(402).

A border is not a boundary of confinement. Borders call out to be crossed. So it is also true in Nasrin's "Border." Not only is Nasrin referring to her escape from her home country of Bangladesh into safety hiding within the boundaries of Sweden, but also her escape from male suppression. The poem visually reinforces Nasrin's inner struggle of deciding to "go against the flow" in her male dominated society. The layout of the six "I will" statements in the poem leads the reader on a visual trail through Nasrin's decision-making process to her final decision. Her first two "I will" statements, though distinct and clear (unlike the proceeding five "I will" statements that are compacted into contractions), neither convince Nasrin nor the reader of her plans. After reading "Character" with its repetition of the theme that only "men will," the reader is not so easily convinced that now suddenly "women will." The first six "I will" statements are weakly standing at, or near, the left margin. It is the final "I will" that breaks free from the left margin, sitting confidently at the right side of its line: "Why shouldn't I go? I'll go" (403). This line, unlike any other, has two complete sentences within it. The nature of a punctuation mark at the end of a sentence is a natural border between the sentence it belongs to and the proceeding sentence. The height of the question mark within this first sentence adds to this border's dividing characteristic. After the reader reads the words and sees the layout of this last sentence, he or she is convinced that Nasrin truly will go. Not only do the words "I'll go" directly answer the preceding question of "Why shouldn't I go?" but it also brings the poem full-circle with the "go" in the first "I will" statement: "āmy husband stands blocking the door, / but I will go" (402). Nasrin has analyzed this decision inside and out. She outweighs her fear with her inner need and desire to disrupt the river's current. She firmly decides to swim across the river, "going against the river's flow."

"At the Back of Progress . . ." is Nasrin's strongest visual piece. Visual elements play with the reader's awareness about women's rights in an almost comical fashion. One of the definitions that Dictionary.com provides for progress reads, "To advance toward a higher or better stage; improve steadily: as technology progresses." While each of the three stanzas in this poem advance the reader's eye to the right (representing progress), each stanza also brings the reader's eye downwards (representing a move away from progress). Therefore, Nasrin's brush stroked words cascade downward and to the right, painting a picture of irony: this progress is not progress. One interesting point is that each stanza represents the cumulating, deteriorating actions of three separate men: an employer, an employee, and a bearer. Rather than three working men progressing forward, Nasrin visually portrays each of the men contributing to their final steep decline. The poem starts off light and cool: "The fellow who sits in the air-conditioned office" (403). In contrast, the poem ends heavy and hot: "Returning home, this fellow beats his fourth wife / over a couple of green chilis [sic] or a handful of cooked rice" (404). All three men bear the common flaw of abusing women. The men seem to visually slide down to the depths of a fiery hell in the third stanza through increasingly longer lines:

The bearer who brings the tea

who keeps the lighter in his pocket

and who gets a couple of t'k' as a tip:

he's divorced his first wife for her sterility,

his second wife for giving birth to a daughter,

he's divorced his third wife for not bringing dowry.

Returning home, this fellow beats his fourth wife

over a couple of green chilis [sic] or a handful of cooked rice. (404)

At the back of this "progress" stand the women. The reader reads how women receive abuse and literally "offer their backs" (405) to their men in "Another Life." "At the Back of Progress . . ." carries one sentence that does not visually or audibly fit with the rest of the poem:

Suicide is committing suicide his mother

or his grandmother

or his great-grandmother. (404)

This is quite a jump from the preceding line where Nasrin writes about men criticizing politics, art, and literature. Visually, this line violates the flow of the poem's downward descent with its large gap. It is as if Nasrin is disassociating these three women from not only their own actions of committing suicide, but also from the men's "progress." These women hold their own ground and their own backs "at the back of progress."

Nasrin speaks out against women's injustice and women's acceptance of this injustice. Instead of relying on someone to pick out the stones piling in their hearts ("Another Life" 405), women must pick the stones out themselves. Nasrin's poetry visually shows the progressive movement that can take place when abused, submissive women begin to take control of their own lives. Nasrin calls women to be an Eve that eats of the apple because of her own decision and control, not because of a snake's trickery. Nasrin writes about the beauty and joy resulting from Eve's decision ("Eve Oh Eve" 404-05). When women take the initiative to act themselves, the backbone of Nasrin's poetry begins to move away from the comfort of the left margin. Instead of facing the wall of male oppression with the hopes of trying to climb it or break it down, Nasrin simply encourages women to turn their backs to the wall and walk away from it.

Works Cited

Nasrin, Taslima. The Vintage Book of Contemporary World Poetry. Ed. J. D. McClatchy. New York: Vintage Books, 1996. 401-05.

"Progress." Dictionary.com 11 March 2000. <http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=progress>

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Tuesday, March 14, 2000 8:42 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 16. Celan // Graves Rising

"Deathfugue"

Black milk of daybreak we drink it at evening

There is tension of opposites in the first two words. "Black milk" catches me off guard the second time I read the poem. I, for some reason, did not stop to ponder the tension here the first time around. Milk is not black and black is not milk. I can think of no drink that I have ever drunk that is black, and I can't think of describing the color black with milk. However, Celan does. Is it because it is dark outside that everything is a black color to them? Why isn't the moon shining white? They must be locked up away inside working then. Could he be signifying some sort of equality in the races? Instead of specifying the specific color of our skin, he blends the two together to the point where it is hard to distinguish between the two. Is that not what is happening today between skin color and even sexes? A "white" person today could easily be categorized as a black because of his/her ancestry. Similarly, more and more women are blending their feminine appearance to look masculine. Often it is hard to distinguish if a person is a guy or a girl.

There is also tension here in the time of the day. Having the words "daybreak" before "evening" in the same line just doesn't make sense. I suppose if this is in a concentration camp, you probably wouldn't know what day it is or even what time of day it might be. This is further supported in the next line.

We drink it at midday and morning we drink it at night

It is almost as if the reader is going backwards in time here. I suppose that is what a concentration camp might be like. There is no progress, only a moving away from progress. In this poem we move from daybreak, evening, midday, to morning. Think about this progression. It is as if we move BACKWARDS in time! This order of time must be deliberate by the poet. If we strictly look at this line, we see that we move from midday to morning to night. Hmm. This wouldn't make since. The poet, if he wanted to move forward in time, would have moved from morning to midday to night.

We drink and we drink

I have a feeling that they are not actually drinking here. This drinking must mean something else. I want to say that drinking is working, but I'm not too sure. Maybe drinking is just the want of drinking, but not actually the act of drinking. For instance, when I get really thirsty without access to water, I will literally try to drink my saliva. These Jews probably already have dry mouths. They are drinking air. They are drinking but not drinking. They are so helpless that they dream about drinking constantly. It is interesting that what they drink turns to be "you" later in the poem. They begin to drink off the people that control them. This in turn gives total power to the Nazis. The Nazis have complete control not only of their works, but their bodies too.

We shovel a grave in the air there you won't lie too cramped

This line is another line that shows up again and again in the poem. Each time that it shows up, it has a different twist to it. There is a different image to each line. This one sends the image of a gravestone hovering in the air just below the clouds. The next one is an image of a grave below the earth. The next one is a grave floating above the clouds. The final image is one of a grave floating in the clouds. Just like the order in the time of the day, the pattern here does not fit. The pattern is not familiar to me because the grave is neither ascending nor descending. It is floating down and up and back down again.

Another interesting thing about this line is the words "you won't lie too cramped." These words surface again and again in the poem. The Jews are shoveling their own graves and are being told that they will all fit. The graves that they shovel, though extending beyond the limits of the soil and into the sky, are never big enough! The reality is that they are too cramped in the grave.

The repetition in this poem is something that should be analyzed further. It is interesting to note that most all of the lines begin with the words "black, we, he, your, or a." I wonder what those last two words are in German. Could they be one of these English words?

Finally, read the line quoted above again. Do you see where the comma should be? There should be a comma before "there," but there is not one. There is something peculiar of twisting the words of "air" and "there" together. Though this was written in German, could the poet have deliberately known about the twisting that is going on here in the English language. "There" sounds just like "air." There air. Air there. There air there. Air there air.

Maybe this wasn't deliberate because there are no commas separating the parts of the earth from "there you won't lie too cramped" in the proceeding lines. There is no comma after "sky," nor a comma after "clouds."

Come on Celan, come and tell me why you didn't use the comma. Now that I think about it, there should be a period there! HEY-Celan does not use one comma or one period in his entire poem. We have to rely on the natural breaks in the lines to know where to pause. Why?

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, March 08, 2000 7:59 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 15. Hirsch Chapter 2 // Neruda // Death or death?

Since Neruda personifies death, then why doesn't he capitalize "death?" How does Neruda personify death? He personifies it by giving it life. Death becomes that person in the shoe without a foot in it. Death becomes that man in the suit with no man in it. The best passage to describe this is this:

Death is inside the folding cots:

it spend its life sleeping on the slow mattresses,

in the black blankets, and suddenly breathes out:

it blows out a mournful sound that swells the sheets,

and the beds go sailing toward a port

where death is waiting, dressed like an admiral.

(Neruda, "Solo la muerte," in How to Read a Poem, p. 37-38.)

I see our living bodies die in the bed as the sleeping and lifeless form of death feeds off of us to live. Death needs life to survive. Isn't this fascinating? It's just like the concept that their must be evil to have good. I am called to the many times where I used to fear of something UNDER my bed. I'm glad my parent's never read me this poem as a child because then I would have been afraid of something IN my bed! (I will obey William Maxwell's saying on page 36 and use only one exclamation mark in this post.) There's a passage in Edward Hirsch's How to Read a Poem that made me smile and think of something my English teacher wrote on one of my papers last semester that was overflowing with exclamation marks. Hirsch says, "William Maxwell once said that a writer gets two exclamation points in a lifetime, and Bishop [Elizabeth Bishop] has brilliantly used her quota here [in "One Art"] (Hirsch 36). Wow.

Since I'm on the theme of things that don't seem to be agreeable in Neruda's poem here's another one: Is death silent or noisy? Neruda seems so confident when he says death is silent, but then he just contradicts himself later on in the poem by giving death sound. Neruda says, "āfilled by the sound of death which is silence" (Neruda, "Solo la muerte," in How to Read a Poem, p. 37). However in the next stanza Neruda gives death sound by the walking of its steps and the hushing sound of its clothes. Wait. Maybe I just solved this conflicting tension myself. If death is dressed in shoes and the suit (physical objects) then of course death is going to make noise. There is no tension in this argument here. Death is silent. The clothes are noisy.

I have to say that some of the stanzas really caught my attention and then some of them just didn't. I'm thinking that the reason might be the language barrier. I absolutely adored the first stanza, especially "like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves, / as though we were drowning inside our hearts, / as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul" (Neruda, "Solo la muerte," in How to Read a Poem, p. 37). I think why this stanza is so powerful is because of its images. Images are about the only thing that translates across languages. The images of a shipwreck, drowning, hearts, skin, and soul are understood by everyone. Neruda might be using other techniques in the other stanzas such as sound and rhyme that just don't translate. I love that last line in that stanza especially. It's like when I'm dreaming that I'm falling. I'm not actually falling, I'm just falling within my head. It's like a near-death experience in that I almost do fall "out of the skin into the soul." I'm glad I never do though. I always wake up before I hit the ground.

I like the absence in this poem also, just like in Mallarme's "The Lace Curtain Self-Destructs." Instead of nothing being nothing though, Neruda's absence is a different type of absence. There used to be something in this absent spot. And now this absence is filled with something, but this something is still nothing (death). Whereas in Mallarme's poem, absence always was nothing and always will be nothing.

Here is my final topic of conflicting tension in this poem. Why is death's face green? Green is a symbol of new growth and life. Wait. I think I just solved my own question again. Death is receiving new growth and life in this poem. Death moves out from the black blankets of sleeping and feeds on our living bodies just so death can live. Isn't this interesting? Death is life. I guess this is the same interesting point that I brought up in my first paragraph. My post has gone full circle which is a good place to stop. And notice, I still have one more exclamation mark yet to use.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, March 06, 2000 12:11 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: Family poem // Four Corners

http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Ridge/4448/trip/four.html

I have no idea who this girl is, but it is the only picture I could find of the Four Corners spot. I have never actually been there myself.

Four Corners

Jeff Markwardt

Four states

where mountains, rivers and fields

Know no boundaries-

Lies a center tightly holding

Together four, grey, cracked

slabs of cement.

Etched in paper,

Lined with words,

And referenced by many legends,

Nature's beauty hides an invisible landmark.

Directions lead not to the horizon beyond-

But to a spot

On the ground

Making visible invisible borders

And rules.

Four people

Around one table centered around food.

Coincidence? Accident? Or Fate?

The food is ready,

Come and eat.

The food is ready,

Come and eat.

How many times do I have to call you?

Words pray in unison.

Food shares in the passing,

Until the serving bowl is left with nothing.

Who cleans the bowl that feeds us?

The one who prepared and served the meal.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Sunday, March 05, 2000 11:39 PM

To: Thamert, Mark; Schultz, Ryan M

Subject: 14. Williams // Response to Ryan // Christ Be Your Turtle

"The Turtle"

William Carlos Williams

From Rag and Bones p. 55-56

Not because of his eyes/the eyes of a bird/but because he is beaked- Williams is taking an animal and comparing it with the characteristics of another animal- a bird. A bird and turtle are very different creatures. This juxtaposition makes the turtle mystical and great, allowing it to fly and be an animal of prey. Through this imagery, the turtle gets lifted out of itself and becomes its opposite. How often do we wish we were different than what we are? Doesn't everyone at some time wish they were someone or something else? This is the plight of the lonely turtle.

I'm going to strengthen your argument Ryan with the notion that Williams is symbolizing Christ through the turtle. How do we teach our children about very complex subject matters? I think we often try to teach them about these things, like God, through something that they can relate to. In this instance, Williams is teaching his grandson about Christ through the kid's curiosity with the turtle. I agree with you that "this juxtaposition makes the turtle mystical and great" by comparing the earth-bound turtle with the freedom and grace of a bird. Isn't Christ like that bird? Besides the image of the Holy Spirit as a dove, Christ's resurrection to me is something characteristic of a bird. Christ did ascend to heaven. As earth-bound humans, we can only imagine God ascending to heaven like a bird ascending into the sky. Finally, I want to comment on "This is the plight of the lonely turtle." Though Jesus was a very social man, I think he had a very lonely life here on earth. Being rejected, persecuted, and crucified can only be lonely experiences.

birdlike, to do an injury/has the turtle attracted you- Imaging that the turtle has awesome power is an outlet to the observer. "to do an injury" is an interesting line as it describes the motive of the turtle, but who has seen a turtle that is a predator? Not I. What is the speaker in this poem seeing in this turtle?

Jesus' miracles proved that he had an awesome power to observers. This is what attracted many of his followers. Similarly, because of the awesome power of this turtle, the boy is attracted to the turtle. Jesus never injured anyone. He was not a predator and neither is the turtle. Notice how the turtle isn't attracted to the boy. Instead, the boy is attracted to the turtle. I think this is one flaw in my argument. This is something that just "doesn't fit." Our relationship with Christ is a two-way relationship. It is not a one-way. Jesus is attracted to us, and in turn we are attracted to Jesus. This poem, so far, gives no notion as to the fact that the turtle is there for us. The turtle is just another toy for us to play with as the following line indicates:

He is your only pet./When we are together you talk of nothing else- The first use of "we" in the poem. It appears as if a child's imagination is ascribing all these great traits to the turtle. If the powerful turtle is a child's pet, what does this say about the child? It makes the child great and powerful. Haven't we all had these dreams when we were young? Through this kids imagination, he is experiencing a will to power. The child is infatuated with the turtle and all the turtle symbolizes.

Contrary to what you believe here, I have to disagree with you and say that the child is NOT "ascribing all these great traits to the turtle." I think it is the grandfather that is doing the ascribing because the poem is from his perspective. However, the child could very well be in awe and wonder about these same qualities as the poem indicates.

I like this sentence: "He is your only pet." I think this could be the most powerful line in the whole poem.

"He"

This could very well indicate the male gender of the turtle, in turn hinting at the maleness of Christ.

"is"

Yahweh = "I am who I am" The power and vagueness of the verb "to be" is directly related to God.

"your"

Jesus (represented by the turtle) is YOURS. Jesus came to this life for YOU because he loves YOU. Ryan, I think that this is one of the reason why there are so many YOU's in this poem.

"only"

The first commandment specifically says that you should have one and only God. God is our ONE provider. We trust in God alone. We need nothing else. If we trust in God, we will be eternally saved.

"pet."

I love my pet. For a boy, this is a great metaphor as God as a pet. Pets are there for you when you need them the most. Pets seem to know when you are not in a good mood and when you are lonely. You can tell your pet anything and it seems like a pet will understand. God is our only pet.

ascribing all sorts of murderous motives to his least action- Another description of the power the child finds in the poem. The poet uses "you" many times to show the dichotomy between the child's magical world where the turtle is great, and the world of the father where the turtle is a second rate amphibian. The language is even accusatory at times. Is the father jealous of his son's admiration of the turtle? Is the child jealous of the role of his father? Interesting tension is building, but it is hard to say what. Williams is being ambiguous on purpose, and it is a great way of raising tension.

I'm going to ignore the word "murderous" because that is another word that just doesn't seem to fit. Everything small is BIG news to a little kid. I guess the chief priests in Jesus' time thought so too. When Jesus cured a man on a Sunday they made blew this incident up into something of a court trial case. They did in fact accuse Jesus of going against God, and I guess the exaggerated word of "murderous" might be a good description to describe this. So, in this case I guess this word does fit nicely in this poem!

you ask me to write a poem, if I have poems to write, about a turtle- This is the pivotal line in the poem. The power is given to the speaker/poet. The poet now has the ability to shape the world of the child if he pleases. Through his poem, he can crush the child's world by putting the poor turtle back into his place. The climax of the poem where the reader thinks, "what is he going to do?"

This reminds me of Lee-Young Lee's poem about when the son is asking his father to tell him a story. Here the grandson is asking his grandfather to write a poem about a turtle. Nice of the grandfather to accept his son's request, or else we wouldn't be reading this poem today. Sometimes we learn from the young! We should listen to our young! They ARE the keys to our future. I remember asking my grandfather to draw a picture of a chicken or some barn animal that was on his farm when he was growing up. I wonder where that picture is today. That was the first and only time that I saw my grandfather draw. I should've asked him again. Too late now.

The turtle lives in the mud/but is not mud-like,/you can tell by its eyes/which are clear- The first five words are full of incredible tension as it appears that the poet/speaker is going to let the child down. The second part of the line catches the attention of the reader, is a twist and provides hope that the father may put his selfish motives behind himself and recognize the importance of the turtle in the mind of the child. The poet eventually makes the right decision and sees the turtle thought the child's eyes. The poet uses a metaphor of the eyes of the turtle, which really describe his own eyes once muddied and now made clear.

Jesus lived on the earth. He was not just of the earth though. He was part spirit too. You could see this spirit probably in the twinkle of his eyes, just like in the turtle eyes. Certainly his apostles and the people most near to him knew that there was definitely something special about him. I guess I don't understand what you are trying to say here about how the father might be letting the child down, but then he doesn't.

When he shall escape/ his present confinement/ he will stride about the world/destroying all/with his sharp beak- These words are full with triple meaning. First, these are the words of a poem to a child. Second, the author is entering the world of the child and viewing the true majestic turtle. Third, the speaker/poet is associating with the turtle and uses the turtle as a metaphor of his own hopes and desires. The poet wants to break out of his "present confinement" and ravage the countryside and be like god to his grandson.

When Jesus escapes to Heaven, he will stride about the world sending those good souls to Heaven and those bad ones to Hell. I think this line is certainly alluding to not a turtle anymore, but God. Funny that Jesus is "escaping" this world. I guess we all want to escape this world of original sin for paradise, but we should want to live our lives not in dread of life! This is another part of the poem that just doesn't fit.

Whatever oppresses him

in the streets of the city

shall go down.

Cars will be overturned.

And upon his back

shall ride,

to his conquests,

my Lord,

you!

Here is definite proof of my interpretation. I think the "you!" in this line is referring to what all the other "you's" were referring to: his grandson. Williams wishes that his son will love Jesus and follow his ways so that he may enter into the kingdom of God.

You shall be master!

These lines are very powerful as the poet/speaker envisions himself being a powerful creature destroying the world for a child he loves. The turtle/man is willing to destroy cities to fulfill his own desires and to be looked upon by his grandson. Lines like these speak on many different levels.

This is one of the greatest poems I have ever read. I feel the electricity of these poems and all the meaning compacted into these two pages. I know this is not the end of the poem, but I have to go to class, or I will fail out of school! The rest of the lines increase the power of the turtle/speaker to godly proportions to live up to his grandson's expectations, fulfill his own desires to be important in the eyes of the child, and prove his unending love and friendship for the child.

Ryan

In the beginning

There was a great tortoise.

God was here since the beginning of time and even before that time period. I know that I've seen pictures of a great tortoise supporting the world on its back. Maybe someone else can supply me the information as to what culture believed this and so on.

Who supported the world.

Upon him

All ultimately

Rests.

As I'm typing this out, I wonder why Williams has such odd spacing in here. Does he want us to read this poem slower here with more pauses? I like the pause and extra spaces before the word "Rests." It's so peaceful when it's capitalized. It almost signals to me ultimate rest. If it wasn't capitalized, I don't think it would've had the same power that it has right now.

Without him

Nothing will stand.

I think we should pause in here. These are some pretty big concepts that Williams wants us to digest. We must pause and think of them. We stand because of God. We breathe because of God. We live because of God.

He is all wise

And can outrun the hare.

In the night

God can outrun the devil (the hare). Good overruns evil.

His eyes carry him

To unknown places.

He is your friend.

God is everywhere. God is omniscient and all-knowing. The eyes are again referred to here. I think the eyes are a wonderful imagery now when I place them up against an omniscient and all knowing God. God's eyes are far more seeing than our own eyes. God is in the dark of the night right by our side when we most need him. God is always there for us.

Again, we are brought back to the early lines of the poem: "He is your only pet." These are definitely the most important lines in the whole poem. Jesus is your friend. This is the entire message that the grandfather is trying to explain to the son in just four simple words.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Thursday, March 02, 2000 3:46 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 13 Madhubuti // Finding Word Clues

http://www.aalbc.com/haki.htm

IS TRUTH LIBERATING?

by Haki R. Madhubuti

if it is truth that binds

why are there

so many lies between

lovers?

if it is truth that is liberating

why

are people told:

they look good when they don't

they are loved when they aren't

everything is fine when it ain't

glad you're back when you're not.

Black people in america

may not be made for the truth

we wrap our lives in disco

and sunday sermons

while

selling false dreams to our children.

lies

are refundable,

can be bought on our revolving

charge cards as

we all catch truth

on the next go round

if

it doesn't hurt.

http://www.aalbc.com/haki.htm

Searching for some extra clues on Madhubuti, I found this poem above. I was really hoping to find his "Men and Birth: The Unexplainable," but I failed to. I wanted to see whether or not the publisher accidentally placed a few unintended spaces in his last line: "smiles occasional tears and [sic] undying commitment" (Madhubuti, "Men and Birth: The Unexplainable," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 46). I also wanted to see if "and" in that last sentence is actually supposed to be an "and" and not a "&" like all the other one's in his poem. Well, I didn't find the answer to these questions, but I did find a clue to why all the words in his poem are lowercase. In "Is Truth Liberating?" he capitalizes only ONE word: black in Black people: "Black people in americaā" (Madhubuti, "Is Truth Liberating?" from http://www.aalbc.com/haki.htm). As a black poet, I think one of the reasons he writes is to give black people a voice. In this quote, the word "Black people" rises up from not only all the other words in the poem, but also from the word "america" in the same line! I think this was very clever of him. America is usually always capitalized. This name for our country in his poem is instead subordinate to the people of the country. This makes me question why we don't capitalize who we are (people), and only what we belong to (America)? We should capitalize the word "white" in white people, just as Madhubuti capitalizes black in "Black people." Rather than the country dominating the meaning of the line, Madhubuti allows the people to dominate the line's meaning by capitalizing "Black people." Isn't that the way a country should be looked at-at its individual people and not as a superficial name for the body of its people? Rather than glorifying the country, we should be glorifying and recognizing its people.

I find this same sort of dominating presence with the many uses of "&" in his "Men and Birth: The Unexplainable." The &'s literally rise up higher than any other word or letter in his poem. I think he did this purposefully. His whole message is that men are lonely alone: "malepractice and maleabsence issue is loneliness & limiting to- / morrows" (Madhubuti, "Men and Birth: The Unexplainable," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 46). He goes on to talk about the need for men to experience the other side of humanity: the female. What better way to experience the full power of the female than through the images of the birthing experience he describes. Men are generally known to "know it all." Birth is a humbling experience for a man because men realize then and there that they don't know it all-some things are just unexplainable (as the poem's title suggests).

His combination of the words "push" and "pushing" in "push pushing" (Madhubuti, "Men and Birth: The Unexplainable," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 46) more than adequately describes for me the labor process. Instead of getting into the details of labor, the vagueness of these words sums up the entire experience. There is a tension and a feeling that arises when he collides these two very similar words together. The words, though they mean the same thing, separately ascend to new heights and meaning off the page to where the reader can actually feel the push inside one's physical body. Just saying these words gives the reader the cyclical pattern of pushing and resting and pushing again-forward and backward and forward again. When you first say "push" you think you are moving something somewhere. But the next word "pushing" seems to revert the process in a backwards direction with the repetition of the word "push" in "pushing." Finally the "ing" ending of "pushing" sends the reader forward into progress again. Where does the word "pushing" lead us? It leads us to the word "encouraging"-something that is at the driving force within the act of pushing. What makes us push? What makes us struggle? Deep down within all of us there must be something that encourages us to move forward and backward and forward again through life's struggles. The third stanza is filled with "-ing" words. This is very appropriate. As the baby is being born, new forces are created that can propel the baby and the people around the baby in many different directions. This birthing of energy is waiting to be released in so many new and exciting directions. Madhubuti encourages all men to be propelled by this new energy force to new directions of what it means to be a man.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Tuesday, February 29, 2000 7:58 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 12. McPherson // Two Names. One Person.

http://wwwenglish.ucdavis.edu/Faculty/mcpherson/mcpherson.htm

HELEN TODD: MY BIRTHNAME

They did not come to claim you back,

To make me Helen again. Mother

"They" here is referring to her birthparents. Her birthparents never reclaim her daughter's original name. I feel that she is distant from herself in these lines by referring to her original name as "you." This is an extreme distance of moving from the first to the second person! There is tension in the word "Mother" at the end of the second line. The word "Mother" hangs there with no word to attach itself to. It is as though the adopted mother is left hanging there, literally alone. This is significant in that the mother feels alone and worried so much so that she waits for the coming of her adopted daughter's real parents alone by the window (in the proceeding lines). She waits to defend what she has been given. She waits because she knows that she is NOT alone. There IS ANOTHER Mother-the birth mother-of her child still out there in the world.

Watched the dry, hot streets in case they came.

Not only are the streets hot, but could this also be signifying that the mother is hot too? Whenever I am worried, I get sweaty and perspire with fear.

This is how she found a tortoise

Crossing between cars and saved it.

There is tension not only in the names between her name and her birthname, but also there is tension within her mother's actions. Her mother really is selfishly looking out the window for the return of the birthparents. It just so happens that she stumbles upon doing good in this process. Whenever my intentions are for something else, and I happen to do a good deed and receive praise for it, I feel guilty. For example, if I see a twenty dollar bill on the ground, and I turn it in to the lost and found with the hope that no one will claim it, my intentions are in the wrong place. If the person who lost that twenty dollars thanks me, I would feel guilty because I knew that deep down inside I wanted that twenty dollars. I was secretly hoping that someone wouldn't claim it.

On a positive note, the tortoise could represent McPherson, who her adopted parents saved from parents who did not want to raise her.

It's how she knew roof-rats raised families

In the palmtree heads. But they didn't come-

McPherson's adopted mother always has this "other" family of the real birthparents in the attic of her head. Similar to the image of roof-rats' families living in the palmtree heads!

It's almost forty years.

I went to them. And now I know

Our name, quiet one. I believe you

I like the word "quiet" here. It's as though that other person inside of her is shy and reserved. This person is, contrary to opinion, NOT mute. She has a voice. It is NOW only that she begins to speak-when McPherson believes in her. It's like a magic fairy tale that you have to believe in to see the magic.

Would have stayed in trigonometry and taken up

The harp. Math soothed you; music

Made you bold; and science, completely

Understanding. Wouldn't you have collected,

ANYTHING slight difference in our past could've had HUGE impacts in who we each developed into today. It's just like science. A small change in a person's genes could drastically change a person's characteristics.

Curated, in your adolescence,

Mother Lode Pyrites out of pity for their semblance

Who is this Mother?

To gold? And three-leaf clovers to search

I like how the word gold and three-leaf clovers are in the same line. I searched for four-leaf clovers just like I would search for gold as a child.

For some shy differences between them?

Here again is that shyness-that quietness. Three-leaf clovers are a shy plant. They are close to the ground and usually blend in well with the weeds and grass around them. They don't shout out. The four-leaf clovers are especially hard to find because they are the shyest of all of them.

Knowing you myself at last--it seems you'd cut

By separating the word "cut" from Death in half, I more so see the image of Death being cut. If "cut" would have been on the same line, I would have just read over that image and read the common term "cut in half."

Death in half and double everlasting life,

She has not one life to live, but now two lives to live! What a fun concept!

Quiet person named as a formality

Again, here is another reference to shyness and those quiet three-leaf clovers.

At birth. I was not born. Only you were.

Now I am confused again. Didn't she just say her life was doubled with living two lives now? However, at the end she leaves us with the notion that her life is not doubled-only one person is born. I think she takes a stance at the end here and says that she is going to live the life of her name that she was given-the name she has always known. Though she has this road in front of her leading to a new life under her real birthname, she is not going to take it. God gives us things in life for a reason. McPherson trusts in fate and will not try to undo her past. She has no regrets and realizes that she cannot relive the past. The shyness and quietness of her poem has ended. McPherson shouts out to me at the end of the poem with confidence: "This is who I am!" It is moments like this that are truly memorable in our lives: knowing who we really are.

Jeff

Poem courtesy of:

http://www.wnet.org/archive/lol/mcpherson.html

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2000 12:04 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 11. Hayden // An Unsunny Sunday

This poem screams out to me what I feel my relationship with my dad is like. However, it seems my relationship with my dad is not as cold as the one between Hayden and his father. My dad does so much for me, and yet I kind of expect him to do so much for me. Hayden seems to have expected it too as a child, and he is only now realizing how much his dad actually did for him. Hayden almost expects his dad to make the house warm every morning in these lines: "I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. / When the rooms were warm, he'd call" (Hayden, "Those Winter Sundays," in The Rag and Bone Shop, p. 141). I think of times when I just expected my parents to feed me when I was a child. What if one day those meals just weren't there? Granted, in high school there were many times when the meal was not there. It is then when I probably first realized how much effort it takes to make a meal. Just like Hayden's father, my parents probably show marks of wear and tear from their many loving, but physically demanding duties they did for me. Hayden observes how his father's "ācracked hands that ached / from labor in the weekly weather made" (Hayden, "Those Winter Sundays," in The Rag and Bone Shop, p. 141). My mom probably has scars from child bearing that I've never seen. My dad's newly forming wrinkles probably have formed from the stress I sometimes caused him. To observe these physical qualities in a person is something that I've never really done before. Can one understand someone else and what that person is going through purely by the physical qualities in his/her face or the characteristics of his/her manner? It would be fun to ask a psychologist this. How much can a psychologist figure out about a person without the person really telling him/her? It would be kinda fun to ask Mike Ewing, our psychologist right here at SJU, this questionā I find it scary that some of my friends know exactly what mood I'm in even when I don't think I'm revealing that mood on my face!

I think the fact that the day in the poem is Sunday is really important. Sunday is a time for rest, but in this poem we see the father hard at work like it's a regular work day. There are some people at rest in this poem: the rest of the family. Because of the father's hard work, the family is allowed to rest. I had it pretty easy growing up. My parents did a whole lot for me. As I grow up, I realize how much work goes along with being more independent. Growing up sounds like such a good idea, until you're actually grown up. This poem makes Sunday seem like Darkday. I'm looking through the poem for the images, and the only positive images I see deal with the warmth of the room and the polishing of his shoes. Fitting isn't it that both of these images are created from the toils of the father? I was searching on the internet for Hayden, and I came across a page where it mentioned how Hayden's childhood wasn't so bright and gay. I think Hayden is writing this poem and thinking that his childhood really wasn't all that bad. He's now realizing all the positive things that he overlooked as a child: "What did I know, what did I know / of love's austere and lonely offices?" (Hayden, "Those Winter Sundays," in The Rag and Bone Shop, p. 141). It is in these lonely offices, somber, and graveness that Hayden finds his father's real love for him. Hayden probably didn't feel this love as a kid and regrets that he hasn't seen this love until now. There is tension within this poem between the light and the dark. Even within the title I see this tension: "Those Winter Sundays." When I think of winter I usually don't think of bright, sunny days. When Hayden thinks of his childhood, he usually doesn't see love. However both of these conclusions are wrong. There can be sunny days in winter, and Hayden does find love in his childhood.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2000 11:16 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 10. Peacock's Chapter Ten // Our Predictable Lives

Life is so unpredictable. This is how I usually tend to interpret my life. However, Peacock puts a twist on my thinking to where I have to reject my old notion and accept a new notion concerning life: life is too predictable. Peacock convinced me that my life is full of predictability. As I think about my daily routine, I see her point. Peacock says, "Our lives are not only filled with predictable combinations, they are made of them-these combinations are the fabric of our daily communication" (Peacock, How to Read a Poem, p. 137). Since our lives are so predictable, Peacock teaches us how to love the unpredictability of poetry.

Peacock taught me how to look for the syllables in the lines of poetry. By counting them and seeing the breaks in patterns, we discover the unpredictable style of the poet's style. Peacock says that by paying special attention to the short lines we might discover an "emotional shift" in the tone of the poem (Peacock, How to Read a Poem, p. 133).

Peacock shows how one should also pay attention the punctuation in a poem. For instance in Komunyaka's "Letters and Other Worlds" he only begins to use punctuation after the father dies. I did not catch that there was no punctuation in the beginning of the poem until Peacock pointed it out to me. I need to not assume that all poems have the correct punctuation. I need to pay more close attention to the unpredictable punctuation styles of poets.

Peacock reminded me to connect the end of the poem with the beginning of the poem. Usually in any novel or poem, I assume that I'm moving from point A to point B. However, some authors might try to connect the ending to the beginning. What a surprise it is to see that both of the poems we read in chapter Ten were circling back on themselves. How unpredictable!

I also found it interesting how Peacock analyzes the word "almost" in Komunyakaa's "My Father's Loveletters". I need to pay more attention to the way poets make their conscious decisions of where to break their sentences into lines. However, maybe it's sometimes an unconscious decision. In this case, I wouldn't want to fret too much time in analyzing it.

I like how Peacock showed us how the word "balled" at the end of Komunyakaa's poem sounds like "bawled." I wasn't expecting an image to sound like an action.

With eyes closed & fists balled,

Laboring over a simple word,

Opened like a fresh wound, almost

Redeemed by what he tried to say.

(Komunyakaa, "My Father's Loveletters," in How to Read a Poem, p. 127).

Finally I learned what an ampersand is. So if you here me use this word in future posts, you know who I learned it from.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2000 7:16 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 9. Komunyakaa // I Hate You Dad

http://www.poets.org/LIT/poet/ykomufst.htm

Just to be sure that Komunyakaa is a male, I checked out this site to find out that he surely is. I like how Yusef is so clever with his words. In this one poem I truly see depth in his words.

I was almost happy

She was gone, & sometimes wanted

To slip in something bad.

His carpenter's apron always bulged

With old nails, a claw hammer

Holstered in a loop at his side

& extension cords coiled around his feet.

(Komunyakaa, "My Father's Loveletters," in How to Read a Poemā, pg. 126).

In these lines I see the translation of his want to "slip in something bad" directly correlating with the images proceeding it. I see Yusef imagining himself using these carpenter tools to kill his dad. I can see him using his dad's nails and hammer to beat his dad more severely than his dad beat his mother. I can see Yusef imagining his dad's neck hanging by the extension cord coiled around his feet. The fact that he's supposed to be writing what his dad is telling him but instead is daydreaming and looking around the room tells the reader that something else is happening here.

Maybe Yusef's hate for his dad is not this severe. But there definitely is some amount of resentment to his dad seeping out of this poem. As we read on we read: "Words rolled from under / The pressure of my ballpoint:" (Komunyakaa, "My Father's Loveletters," in How to Read a Poemā, pg. 127). This is a tiny, yet important clue. A ballpoint pen should write without hardly any pressure or effort from the writer. The fact that he is applying pressure and even mentions pressure signals that Yusef is tense when writing these postcards. He's not doing this out of free-will. Repeatedly writing letters to his mother is not exactly how he wants to be spending his time.

The setting also clues us in on the tension in the room.

We lingered in the quiet brutality

Of voltage meters & pipe threaders,

Lost between sentences . . . the heartless

Gleam of a two-pound wedgeā

(Komunyakaa, "My Father's Loveletters," in How to Read a Poemā, pg. 127).

The word "brutality" just somehow doesn't fit with "quiet." The fact that he is describing the wedge on the floor as "heartless" maybe signals his relationship with his dad. Could Yusef feel lost between his mom and his dad just like he feels lost between sentences and between the voltage meters and pipe threaders? Finally, I have one other piece of evidence to support my claim that Yusef has a deep hate for his dad. Yusef never refers to his dad as "Dad." Yusef mentions his dad impersonally as "This man / who stole roses & hyacinthā" (Komunyakaa, "My Father's Loveletters," in How to Read a Poemā, pg. 127). His dad is almost a stranger to him as a thief!

The big question is why does Yusef hold all of this inside himself. Why doesn't he confront his dad and tell him his feelings? Is he scared of his dad? I suppose if he was scared of his dad that would explain why he hates him.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2000 10:30 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 8 Rumi // I want to identify...

GO TO THIS SITE!!

http://www.rumi.net/rumi_in_persian.html

It is a webpage that has a really neat "morphing" effect that morphs one of Rumi's poems from Persian to English. Just read the directions.

This webpage is a division of http://www.rumi.net/. It's a pretty cool site. There's a section on it that briefly talks about "How to Whirl." I guess whirling is based on the concept that all things in our universe are constantly spinning from atoms right on up to the planets.

I really want to identify with Rumi's "From the Beginning of My Life" but at this stage in my life right now, I can't. To me, this poem is about that concept "love at first site." Whether it's true or not, I don't know. I would like to think it is true, and Rumi's poem makes me think that it is. It makes me feel that there is something more to experience in life that I haven't yet. This is a good feeling actually. To know that you haven't accomplished/seen/experienced everything in life makes one feel that life is still worth living. A lot of poetry makes me feel this way. It's pure inspiration. That's the power of poetry. Sure poetry can touch your feelings, but powerful poetry can literally move you. It can move you up out of your chair to reach out and impact a life or the entire world. Every person likes to feel that their career they chose is making a difference in the world. A poet's poem moves silently in the world without even the poet knowing where or who it is impacting, yet the impacts can be quite large and numerous.

From the Beginning of My Life

by Jalalludin Rumi

From the beginning of my life

I have been looking for your face.

But today, I have seen it.

Today I have seen the charm,

the beauty, the unfathomable grace

of the face that I was looking for.-I like this reversal of the face from "your face" to "grace of the face." It's the same face, but read with the preposition before it, it becomes anew and bright.

Today I have found you. -I like how he waits to disclose who's face this belongs to until this line. It adds to the suspense. This line also tells me that he is not directly talking to this person. Rumi must be reflecting upon his experience at some later point in time. It would be interesting to turn this into a dialogue though as if he is telling this person face to face what he feels. Would it add a new quality to the poem? Would the poem become more rich?

And those who laughed

and scorned me yesterday

are sorry that they were not looking as I did.

I am bewildered by the magnificence of your beauty

and wish to see you with a hundred eyes. -I'm sure everyone really likes this line. But would everyone really literally like to see the world through a fly's eyes? I don't think so.

My heart has burned with passion

and has searched forever

for this wondrous beauty

that I now behold.---Is the heart different from the "I" who he refers to before? Aren't the heart and I one of the same person? Or, is their a difference and a different search between what the heart searches for and what the "I" searches for?

I am ashamed to call this love human

and afraid of God to call it divine.---Why can't Rumi call this love divine? Why must only God declare that something is "divine" or "not divine"?

Your fragrant breath,

like the morning breeze,--Since he is not talking directly to this person and not smelling this person at this exact moment, he is remembering the smell. Isn't it hard to remember smells? My brain seriously does not have a capacity for this. It does however remember the stench of the sewage plant. Therefore, since this smell was SO EXTREMELY horrible, maybe my brain will be able to remember the most BEAUTIFUL smell I will ever have smelt later in my life.

has come to the stillness of the garden.-I like this image of the garden. It's not until right now that I realize the importance of this term. A garden is full of new growth and new seeds sprouting. This is appropriate to the new love and relationship that Rumi is experiencing right now.

You have breathed new life into me.-A powerful image. This image is parallel to the creation of Adam and Eve when God breathed life into them. This is neat to consider that Rumi is being "born" again!

I have become your sunshine and also your shadow. -Rumi is by this person nite and day. He will not leave this person's side.

My soul is screaming in ecstasy. His soul is screaming, but then why isn't his mouth screaming also? Why write about this Rumi? Why not let it out? Why not scream and laugh and cry? This poem is full of emotion, but I think most of the emotion lies with the reader rather than Rumi writing about the emotional effects he experiences. For instance, why don't we hear Rumi say that he cries with joy, or jumps in excitement. His emotions are all contained within himself. I guess that's just the way some people are.

Every fiber of my being is in love with you. -I would've written "cell" instead of "fiber." Cells form fibers. Cells would've been a more powerful image. However fiber is nice too.

Your effulgence has lit a fire in my heart -I kind of was disappointed here to see the same word "effulgent" used here AND in "Die in This Love." I don't know why it bugs me, but it does. I'm looking at all the repeated words in this poem that don't bug me and I wonder why. Why doesn't the repetition of "love," "I," "today," or "heart" strike me annoyingly. Maybe because these words are familiar to me, and the word "effulgent" is not in the vocabulary of the common person. A poem that uses all familiar words seems more tangible and personal to me than maybe one that is trying to throw me a curve ball.

and you have made radiant for me

the earth and the sky. -The sun is the thing that makes the earth and sky radiant. Rumi's world must be doubly bright now.

My arrow of love has arrived at the target. -How can an arrow know where this type of target is though? I guess this isn't the right image I want to see. I want love to be unexpected and unplanned. Rumi talks about love as if it is a hunt and he knows where to discover it. Umm. Sorry Rumi. Love happens when it happens.

I am in the house of mercy

and my heart is a place of prayer.-This is the best type of love. This love recognizes the God's intervention and will.

Okay, here is my big question: Why doesn't Rumi ever say those three big words? ("I love you.")

I wouldn't say he's beating around the bush. Maybe the type of love he is experiencing is better than love itself and "I love you" just doesn't cut it. Or is this kind of love the same as what is meant in the phrase "I love you" ?

Maybe somebody else wants to try and tackle this one.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2000 9:28 PM

To: Oakland, Timothy J; Thamert, Mark

Subject: FW: Reply to Tim // The Meaning Behind a Word

OOPS! I did not title my last entry to Tim correctly! Here is the appropriate Title!

Sorry,

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2000 7:38 PM

To: Oakland, Timothy J; Thamert, Mark

Subject: RE: 5 Hirsch // I love a poem without words

Tim,

As I was digging into some old files in this public folder, your title on Hirsch's chapter caught my attention: I love a poem without words. Very cool. After reading your entry, I see that what you hate is not poetry, but the words itself. The poem, though it uses words, is much more than words. I also cannot say that I'm in love with words, but I can say that I love the meaning behind the words. I can say that I hate reading, but I love reading during those moments when as you said something "[catches] my attention and [causes] me to spend some time thinking about it." I see two ways of experiencing moments like these: real experiences and artificial experiences. Poetry is kind of like playing a video game. For example, playing a race car driving video game can be very satisfying. It is an artificial high similar to poetry is. Now actually driving a race car is an example of a real experience.

I see value in poetry, just like I see value in playing a video game. Though it is artificial, it can be FUN! Who's to say that there's no value in playing a video game. Likewise, who's to say that there is no value in reading a poem. True, a real experience is much better than an artificial experience, but sometimes an artificial experience can be just as satisfying as a real experience.

In my communications class last year, we talked a lot about the objective correlative. I hope I have this concept right. Words are a good example of this. For example, the word chair is pretty meaningless. To just smack this label on the actual object by what we know as the name "chair" is crazy! "Chair" does not describe it in any way. "Chair" does not portray how many legs it has, what shape the back of it is, or the grain of the wood (if it is made out of wood). Rather than looking at the inadequacy of words (by the way there is a whole exhibit entitled "The Inadequacy of Words" at the BAC right now), look at the meaning behind the words. Look at what the word is referring to. Look at all the numerous interpretations above that I could have driven above from the single word "chair!" Isn't that amazing? There's a freedom, a non-restrictive explorative adventure in poetry.

Ok, I'm sure you know all this, but I just thought I'd teach myself in the process what I TOO am looking for when I read poetry. I totally agree with you when you said "I've seen words as an opponent or a second-rate translator."

And I totally agree with your final statement which when I read it again, proves that you probably already knew about all this jargon that I talked about above:

I think there is something deeper to a poem than just clever line or an emotion it excites in you, and that deeper something may be what I was trying to explain in the last paragraph. I think it is that which attracts me to poems. I guess for me poems are a beast with a brilliant soul.

Yes, poetry can be a beast (words), but that brilliant soul (the true meaning) is what we must all look for in poetry. Sometimes we will find that brilliant soul easily the first time, but at other times it might just be found 3 hours later!

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Oakland, Timothy J

Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2000 11:18 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 5 Hirsch // I love a poem without words

Over the past few weeks, I seem to have developed a kind of love/hate relationship with poetry. Wow, that looks wrong; I never thought I would say I hated poetry, but this reading has helped me to narrow the source of my frustration, here it is: I spent over three hours reading the first fifteen pages of this Hirsch book. That's five pages an hour!, certainly my slowest reading ever. When I came to page 9, I began my inquiry. 'Wallace Stevens asserted, "you must love the words, the ideas and images and rhythms with all your capacity to love anything at all" ("Adagia"). Stevens lists the love of the words as the first condition of a capacity to love anything in poetry at all because it iis the words that make things happen.' (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p.9) This jumped at me because I don't love the words, I don't think I've ever loved any words. As long I can remember I've seen words as an opponent or a second-rate translator. Words have always been synonymous with awkwardness and misunderstanding for me. Writing has been particularly cumbersome since it isn't dynamic like speech and always seems slow, that is slower than thought or feeling.

Feeling is an absolute to me. Words can change your feeling and you can describe that change, but the substance is in your feeling, your resulting state. The real truth of anything seems to exist in what processes your perception, your reason, your emotion. It seems to me that words are always coming from here, and that something is almost always lost in the translation, at least for me. I realize some people have a wonderful ability for verbal expression and can transmit this truth, beautifully employing words (of course they also use other means like facial expression and body language). Further still, masterful writers can almost fully express an event or state, but it can requires several hundred pages of words to describe one moment. Poets then, can use very few words to express something much greater, they can insert more into their words. So perhaps the truth in poetry is not the words, but the result of those words on a reader. If I read poetry this way, it seems poetry should be the form of writing I like best. But then am I always reading the poem looking at the reader and not the poet? A better question: Where am I going with this? Is my real problem focus?

An answer is this: I approach things by feelings. I need to examine more than just the feeling of the poem, looking at the words and their interaction. As Hirsch put it, "Through this dynamic and creative exchange the poem ultimately engages us in something deeper than intellect and emotion." (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p.15) I think there is something deeper to a poem than just clever line or an emotion it excites in you, and that deeper something may be what I was trying to explain in the last paragraph. I think it is that which attracts me to poems. I guess for me poems are a beast with a brilliant soul.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2000 7:38 PM

To: Oakland, Timothy J; Thamert, Mark

Subject: RE: 5 Hirsch // I love a poem without words

Tim,

As I was digging into some old files in this public folder, your title on Hirsch's chapter caught my attention: I love a poem without words. Very cool. After reading your entry, I see that what you hate is not poetry, but the words itself. The poem, though it uses words, is much more than words. I also cannot say that I'm in love with words, but I can say that I love the meaning behind the words. I can say that I hate reading, but I love reading during those moments when as you said something "[catches] my attention and [causes] me to spend some time thinking about it." I see two ways of experiencing moments like these: real experiences and artificial experiences. Poetry is kind of like playing a video game. For example, playing a race car driving video game can be very satisfying. It is an artificial high similar to poetry is. Now actually driving a race car is an example of a real experience.

I see value in poetry, just like I see value in playing a video game. Though it is artificial, it can be FUN! Who's to say that there's no value in playing a video game. Likewise, who's to say that there is no value in reading a poem. True, a real experience is much better than an artificial experience, but sometimes an artificial experience can be just as satisfying as a real experience.

In my communications class last year, we talked a lot about the objective correlative. I hope I have this concept right. Words are a good example of this. For example, the word chair is pretty meaningless. To just smack this label on the actual object by what we know as the name "chair" is crazy! "Chair" does not describe it in any way. "Chair" does not portray how many legs it has, what shape the back of it is, or the grain of the wood (if it is made out of wood). Rather than looking at the inadequacy of words (by the way there is a whole exhibit entitled "The Inadequacy of Words" at the BAC right now), look at the meaning behind the words. Look at what the word is referring to. Look at all the numerous interpretations above that I could have driven above from the single word "chair!" Isn't that amazing? There's a freedom, a non-restrictive explorative adventure in poetry.

Ok, I'm sure you know all this, but I just thought I'd teach myself in the process what I TOO am looking for when I read poetry. I totally agree with you when you said "I've seen words as an opponent or a second-rate translator."

And I totally agree with your final statement which when I read it again, proves that you probably already knew about all this jargon that I talked about above:

I think there is something deeper to a poem than just clever line or an emotion it excites in you, and that deeper something may be what I was trying to explain in the last paragraph. I think it is that which attracts me to poems. I guess for me poems are a beast with a brilliant soul.

Yes, poetry can be a beast (words), but that brilliant soul (the true meaning) is what we must all look for in poetry. Sometimes we will find that brilliant soul easily the first time, but at other times it might just be found 3 hours later!

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Oakland, Timothy J

Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2000 11:18 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 5 Hirsch // I love a poem without words

Over the past few weeks, I seem to have developed a kind of love/hate relationship with poetry. Wow, that looks wrong; I never thought I would say I hated poetry, but this reading has helped me to narrow the source of my frustration, here it is: I spent over three hours reading the first fifteen pages of this Hirsch book. That's five pages an hour!, certainly my slowest reading ever. When I came to page 9, I began my inquiry. 'Wallace Stevens asserted, "you must love the words, the ideas and images and rhythms with all your capacity to love anything at all" ("Adagia"). Stevens lists the love of the words as the first condition of a capacity to love anything in poetry at all because it iis the words that make things happen.' (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p.9) This jumped at me because I don't love the words, I don't think I've ever loved any words. As long I can remember I've seen words as an opponent or a second-rate translator. Words have always been synonymous with awkwardness and misunderstanding for me. Writing has been particularly cumbersome since it isn't dynamic like speech and always seems slow, that is slower than thought or feeling.

Feeling is an absolute to me. Words can change your feeling and you can describe that change, but the substance is in your feeling, your resulting state. The real truth of anything seems to exist in what processes your perception, your reason, your emotion. It seems to me that words are always coming from here, and that something is almost always lost in the translation, at least for me. I realize some people have a wonderful ability for verbal expression and can transmit this truth, beautifully employing words (of course they also use other means like facial expression and body language). Further still, masterful writers can almost fully express an event or state, but it can requires several hundred pages of words to describe one moment. Poets then, can use very few words to express something much greater, they can insert more into their words. So perhaps the truth in poetry is not the words, but the result of those words on a reader. If I read poetry this way, it seems poetry should be the form of writing I like best. But then am I always reading the poem looking at the reader and not the poet? A better question: Where am I going with this? Is my real problem focus?

An answer is this: I approach things by feelings. I need to examine more than just the feeling of the poem, looking at the words and their interaction. As Hirsch put it, "Through this dynamic and creative exchange the poem ultimately engages us in something deeper than intellect and emotion." (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p.15) I think there is something deeper to a poem than just clever line or an emotion it excites in you, and that deeper something may be what I was trying to explain in the last paragraph. I think it is that which attracts me to poems. I guess for me poems are a beast with a brilliant soul.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 21, 2000 7:07 PM

To: Frerich, Stephanie G; Thamert, Mark

Subject: RE: Reply to Steph: Rumi // Jump in and Immerse Yourself

Steph,

Thanks for journeying in this poem with me. I was moved by your response, and I feel that I have to continue what we've begun here. Initially, I saw the first quatrain as a response against human's over-dominating control over nature. But when I read the second stanza of the quatrain, I think I like your interpretation the best: Rumi isn't telling us that we are unworthy of these things, merely that we are numb to them, thus trivializing these amazing aspects. The one theme that I do see now, after a good many looks, is the overwhelming, immersing power of love in nature. The passion is so great in this poem that it burns right off the pages: "Show me a man willing to be / thrown in the fire" (Rumi, "Four Quatrains," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 9). Rumi is waking up our numb fingers and toes in this poem and telling us to experience the awesomeness of the natural world. This power of entire immersion continues through images of death (totally giving of oneself), images of immersing oneself in the day by forbidding sleep, and images of drunkenness (a drunkenness without alcohol).

Rumi's tone throughout the entire poem is questioning and encouraging me. I feel like he's asking me to join him on this journey. His request should be an easy decision for me to make. His last quatrain refers to this immersing power of love in nature as "two strong impulses" (Rumi, "Four Quatrains," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 9). This is so true! Though we humans can act as sophisticated as we want to, we still have this inner instinctual drive inside of us that IS primitive and wild-like. The first time that I read this poem, I did not see how this poem fit into the theme of wilderness besides the relevance of the first two lines. Now I see the theme of wilderness throughout this entire poem.

Steph, I also liked your interpretation of Rumi's "dead meat" (Rumi, "Four Quatrains," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 9) metaphor. To live life without love is like living life without a soul, just like "dead meat." In my first response to this poem, I literalized this death Rumi is talking about to death. (Ha, ha.) I did not even consider that it could be a figurative analysis. I was so caught up in trying to figure out who was dying and who was left living that I missed the entire message of this quatrain: fully living. No, thank YOU Steph!

Divirging away from the wilderness topic, I really enjoyed our class discussion about how Rumi's third quatrain could represent a metaphor for talking to a friend late at night. Sharing your inner thoughts and secrets to someone is kind of like the pouring of wine. Just like Jesus shed his blood for all, we too are able to immerse ourselves in this almost divine act of sharing with others. Sharing and bonding with a friend at night is a sacred time: a time to immerse and to forget about sleep. We are like "instruments singing among [ourselves]" (Rumi, "Four Quatrains," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 9). We can keep thoughts and feelings inside of us forever, but it is not until we share these thoughts with others--in communion with others--that they make music. Instead of thinking about things within your head, you begin to hear your inner orchestra resonate out loud. The true magic of talking with someone late at night is when your friend begins to make his or her own music and slowly the two separate songs become intertwined as one. That is the moment of true bonding and meaning.

Rumi tells us that there is no risk in immersing ourselves in love, in wilderness, and in each other because that is what living should be about. We should not be worried about fire, death, sleep, or passing out from drunkenness. Rumi's message reminds me of the chuch song "Be Not Afraid." One verse goes something like this: "You may pass through raging waters, but you shall not drown. You shall pass through burning fires but you shall not be burned." Ok, I don't have the verses right, but the message is that we shouldn't be afraid of life and it's wilderness! Pass through fires and jump in raging waters! If you don't, you're missing out on a whole lot of life.

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Frerich, Stephanie G

Sent: Sunday, February 20, 2000 6:00 AM

To: Thamert, Mark; Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Subject: Reply to Jeff: 7 Rumi // Unworthy "Deservingness"

Unworthy "Deservingness"

I was really struck by what Jeff had to say about Rumi's "Four Quatrains," particularly because it was similar but also quite different than my own interpretation of the poem.

The first quatrain I was so overwhelmed by Rumi's powerful messages with the words "worthy" and "deserve"...I saw the first line, "Where is a foot worthy to walk a garden" to be very literal--think of how we crush the grass blades below us when we walk or we inhale the luscious floral scent that is buzzing around us (that reminds of the sign Erbert's and Gerbert's Sub Shop used to have up--"Free Smells"). I take these things for granted so much by my act of admiration for the beauty of the flowers! I forget that I'm walking on their home, their soil and my foot might not be worthy of that power! The same thing goes with the second line, "or any eye that deserves to look at trees?" Wow! You need to have a privilege even to look at something. Another thing I take for granted--my sense of sight. I know I will walk and ponder the beauty around me but never do I think of how I might be violating the tree's privacy by looking at it or abusing my sight because I do not deserve it! Jeff talked about how we as humans feel disconnected from the earth when it is right here in front of us. It seems to me that he gained a different insight from these lines...Rumi isn't telling us that we are unworthy of these things, merely that we are numb to them, thus trivializing these amazing aspects. I believe both Jeff and I come to the same conclusion and that is that Rumi is expressing how we need to appreciate and have the utmost respect and reverence for what surrounds us and to immerse ourselves in this world.

As far as the second quatrain goes, I was quite amused with Jeff's animated response--I feel as if he's speaking and laughing with me as we struggle to figure these lines out. From Jeff's questions and possible answers, something out of my mind grew from this. At first, I was confused by "In the shambles of love, they kill only the best," but then as I read on in the poem and Jeff's response, I thought this might be Rumi telling us to let go of our fear of loving/rejection. Embrace love ("Don't run away from this dying"--accept that you will be overcome and conquered by it) because the ruins of love "kill only the best." That is so powerful because those who are not killed/dead "for love [are] dead meat." What?! Dead meat? Initially I couldn't get beyond this point because it sounded too much like slang--dead meat. But then I thought about what dead meat is, it is without a soul or purpose and maybe you can bring in a little slang here from recent culture and think of how you'll be "dead meat" if you don't do "blah" (fill in the "blah"). So thank you, Jeff, for helping me understand those lines more fully! I hope this helped you, too!

I think I'm going to leave it at that for now and perhaps return to it later. I love this poem because I think it resonates a purely "tarnishable" message about humans and how they treat life and maybe how they should go about treating life.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2000 6:47 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: FW: SCHOLARSHIP FOR YOUR ESSAY OR POEM

Fr. Mark,

All CSB/SJU students received this as a mass e-mail. I thought you might want to promote it in class maybe?

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Davis, Johanna

Sent: Friday, February 11, 2000 10:35 AM

To: CSB/SJU Students; SJU SOT Students

Subject: SCHOLARSHIP FOR YOUR ESSAY OR POEM

RECEIVE A $1000 SCHOLARSHIP FOR YOUR

ESSAY OR POEM

CSM Education, Inc. is offering $1000 scholarships to students who write the best essays in February 2000. There will be 9 scholarships offered, one in each of nine categories, as well as a $1000 scholarship for the best poem of the month. If you will not be attending college until some time in the future, CSM hold your scholarship in a trust fund until you are accepted to a college.

Essays and poems will be carefully reviewed for spelling, punctuation and grammar, originality, creativity, and interest. All essays must contain three paragraphs only. Poems must not exceed twenty lines.

While all entries must be submitted directly on the CSM Education, Inc. website, http://www.csmeducation.com, on or before 29 February 2000, additional information is available at the External Scholarship Programs office, HAB 103 - CSB. The list of winners will be posted on the CSM website starting 5 March 2000.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, February 16, 2000 1:24 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 7 Rumi // R-U-M-I: Four Letters Ending His "Four Quatrains"

Photo courtesy of http://www.zbnet.com/rumi/

Rumi, "Four Quatrains," in Rag and Bone, p.9

"Where is a foot worthy to walk a garden,"

Ah. Isn't this nice? Walking BAREFOOT in a garden. How I would like to just kick off my shoes and walk in the black dirt. Geez, we are human and we complain about being so distant from our earth. I wonder why! We don't even walk on the earth! We walk in our shoes which walk on the earth. How many of us actually come in contact with the earth everyday? Hmm. After thinking about this I sadly really do not touch the earth everyday! I walk on sidewalks and streets. I live in buildings and this built environment we've created for ourselves. I should take the time to touch the earth: one-on-one contact. I should at least touch a tree or look at the brilliance of a single snowflake. I haven't stopped to look at a single snowflake for about a year now!

"or any eye that deserves to look at trees?"

I see that Rumi has a deeper question here. He's pondering how unworthy we are as humans to live in this most beautiful world. We are not worthy to live on earth. I see this when Rumi asks where are these things (a worthy foot and a deserved eye)? We must not have these things. Thus, we are not worthy and deserving. Is he saying that we are foreigners to earth? That we don't belong? It is true that we as humans really are quite purposeless on this earth. (We discussed this in my science class this semester.) What is our great contribution to the earth? Nothing really. When humans become extinct, the earth will keep on rotating without us. Seeing is a privilege. Without glasses, I would be one of those people who didn't deserve to see a tree in the distance.

"Show me a man willing to be / thrown in the fire"

Though we recognize our unworthiness, we do not want to give up what we are given. It's like being tempted with dessert and being told it's not for you to eat. As greedy humans, we want what we are given and MORE. Some men have willingly chosen to be thrown into the fire. Consider martyrs for example. Is Rumi forgetting about these people? They are exceptions to this poem, I'm assuming. Or were there not martyrs back then in the 13th century when Rumi was living? I'm pretty sure that there were. Why does Rumi correlate death with unworthiness? I guess if we are unworthy in this life, we will suffer the fires of Hell. Will a man willingly jump in Hell though. No. A man must be forced to jump in hell. Maybe this is what Rumi is trying to get across. Martyrs knew their fate was not Hell but Heaven. They died for a greater cause.

"In the shambles of love, they kill only the best,"

Shambles according to dictionary.com means disorder or ruin. Who are they? Why is love in shambles? Is the best implying those worthy humans? I really don't understand this line. Maybe the lines proceeding it will reveal something more.

"none of the weak or deformed."

Is he implying that the weak and deformed are unworthy? Just because you're weak and deformed on the outside doesn't mean you are on the inside too. I guess early medicine believed in this. But Rumi is talking about only external qualities of a person in the first quatrain in the images of an eye and a foot. So the weak and deformed are not killed. Those who are maybe termed worthy (true worthiness on the inside) are saved. Are "they" the gods. Rumi did believe in the Turkish religion. I tried to search for something on it, but I just came up with cultural customs and foods of the Turks. OOOhh. Look at the preceding line: "In the shambles of love." These unworthy and worst people are killed out of LOVE. Isn't that insane? Well, I guess if you want to keep what's good, you need to throw away the bad apples in order to preserve the good apples of the bunch.

"Don't run away from this dying. Whoever's not killed for love is dead meat."

WHAT??!! Now this makes me laugh to the point of real confusion. So what Rumi says here is that all those GOOD people who are saved who are running away from the dying are "dead meat." This doesn't make sense. Maybe I've got it ALL wrong.

Are we all "dead meat" then? If those who are unworthy are killed AND those who are left are killed, then everyone dies. Which is in a sense true. We all will die. Maybe I'm missing the very FEW who are saved. Yes, this is it. Those who don't run away are saved! There we go! Some people do live! Ok, so in order to live we must 1. Be worthy 2. Don't run away from the dying. Ok. So if you're going to make it to heaven this makes sense. You must not be afraid. You must stay with the dying, console them, and be at their side. Good tip Rumi.

Ok, I see I've got another error floating around up there. Rumi says, "they kill only the best." So the good people are then killed too? I think I mistakenly said the unworthy people were killedā

Could it be a Christ-like reference. We humans did kill the best. We killed Jesus Christ.

"Tonight with wine being poured / and instruments singing among themselves,"

This is a nice image. An orchestra is best when you don't see the people, but you see only the music and instruments. The instruments take on a life of their own. This reminds me of the hollow flute in the bed of Mallarme's "A Lace Curtain Self-Destructs." No person is present at all in this poem. The instrument takes on the role of the person.

"one thing is forbidden, one thing: Sleep."

Ok, so are these quatrains completely separate or what now? I need sleep right now. That's about all I can relate to. HA! But Rumi is telling me right now NOT to sleep. Oh, but Rumi, Why? Why? Why? I hear Rumi telling me to dance and sing and make the most of my life this very night. I was doing some research on Rumi (I lost the website, but it's connected to the one cited above where I took the picture from), and I found that the reference to drinking does not have connotations with alcohol! In Islam they actually frown upon drinking and getting drunk. What Rumi is trying to say here is that they are getting drunk on GOD, not alcohol!

"Two strong impulses: One / to drink long and deep,"

Yes, I do need an impulse for God. I don't think I really have one to the extent that Rumi asks of me. I need to have an impulse to God like some people have an impulse to drink. I need to forget when to say when with God. I need to drink so much that I'll have to have my stomach pumped.

"the other, not to sober up too soon."

Oh. Ok. So let's just leave me in the hospital drunk and half unconscious. Yeah. This is actually the best way to die: to be so drugged up on God that I don't have a fear of dying. Wouldn't this be a good wish? Instead of wishing my death in sleep, I should wish my death to be at a point when I'm fully at peace and at the pinnacle of love with my God.

Ok. So it looks like I've totally demolished trying to find any sort of a theme throughout this poem. My subconscious took over and I began to see the poem line by line rather than quatrain by quatrain. What would happen if I went word by word? Scary. I don't think I should go do that anytime soon yet. I think when I try breaking it up into tinnier bits and pieces, I lose sight of the whole. If I went word by word, I would just be reading MYSELF and not the poem, the world it might represent, or the work itself in which it comes from.

We must find a balance when reading our poetry: between words, lines, and the entire whole. This experiment just did not work for deriving any deeper meaning or understanding on the poem itself. I think I had a better picture about what this poem was about when I just read it straight through without stopping.

NOW I will stop.

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2000 8:29 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 6 Anacreontea // 8 glasses a Day

Isn't it a little extreme that we are supposed to drink 8 glasses of water a day? Isn't that too much? Can't one drink too much water? According to research and to Anacreontea, no. Drinking is something that we can never get too much of. Drinking an entire ocean of water would never satisfy the thirst. What is this thirst? The thirst must be a thirst for life. For getting as much as you can out of life and not satisfying for less. Sure you can probably get by with 1 glass of water a day, but why when you can drink 16 glasses of water a day?

More, more, more, isn't Anacreontea's message a little selfish? If everyone drank that much out of life, would some people not get their share? The thing is is that this water of life and fulfillment is unlimited. This poem reminds me of the biblical story where Jesus turns the water into an unlimited supply of wine. Life is something that we shouldn't fall short on. We need to give it our all and take all that we can out of our experience here on earth.

I like how not all the images are of drinking water in this poem. For instance, "The Moon and Stars drink up the Sun" (Anacreontea, "Drinking," in 99 Poems in Translation, p.4). Another image is of the plants sucking up the earth. It's like when you've finished one thing, you must go on to the next. This is the best image of all. I believe the best image of this was in another poem we read earlier. In Dante's poem he used the word satiety which means being filled to the max or gorging yourself with food. Dante stretches satiety even further saying: "That even satiety should still enhance / Between our hearts their strict community" (Alighieri, "Sonnet: Dante Alighieri to Guido Cavalcanti," in 99 Poems in Translation, p. 36). This is exactly what Anacreontea does but only in a different way. Anacreontea actually gives us an image to use when imagining satiety: water. Dante is rather vague with his description of satiety. Though I like the rhyming ring of satiety and community in Dante's poem, I have to say that Anacreontea wins the gold medal for his image of satiety with water. I am a very visual person which probably makes me biased. Does anyone disagree with me or agree with me? What do others prefer in a poem: images or sounds? This might be an awful question, because they are probably both should be equally rated. A poem is just as much a painting as it is a song. There really is no true "sister arts." These medias are all in one big family together.

I like how "Drinking" personifies the natural world. As humans, we really are just as part of the natural world as any other creature. We have the same needs (as simple as water) and the same community with one another in the natural world. We must remember that. We must remember this very simple and most basic fact. It's a fact that I keep coming to along with another very simple fact: that we are so small in comparison to the entire universe. This poem is a simple reminder that should be read again and again.

I like the last line: "Why, man of morals, tell me why?" (Anacreontea, "Drinking," in 99 Poems in Translation, p.4). I find myself asking this question to this man of morals quite often, just like a little kid. Why? Why? The man doesn't respond. Why? Because we already know. The man of morals has given us a conscience with all the answers right in it. We know what the answer is, but sometimes we just don't want to accept it. I like the answer that Eskimo gives in response to a why question: "Nobody can explain this: / That's the way it [is]" (Eskimo, "Magic Words," in The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, p. 160). In other words, don't ask why.

Why must you drink 8 glasses of water a day you ask? Just do it. In fact, why stop at 8? Drink 9 glasses. Drink 10 glasses. Drink 20 glasses. Drink up yourself. Drink up your neighbor. Drink up the ocean. Drink up the earth. Drink up the entire universe and only then will you BEGIN to answer the question that Anacreontea raises in his poem.

(Last line should remind you of Rainer Narie Rilke's passage regarding when one is able to write poetry: "āonly then can it happen that in some very rare hour the first word of a poem arises in their midst and goes forth from them" (Rilke, "For the Sake of a Single Poem" Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, p?).)

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2000 7:42 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 5 Hirsch, Chapter 1 // The Teacher Outside of the Classroom

In the Preface to the first chapter, Hirsch begins telling us that HE is not going to teach us how to read a poem, but rather the poems will. The best teacher of poetry is the poem itself. Therefore, we must "learn about poetry from the poemā" (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p. xii.). I think this is a fascinating concept. Why? Because in two years I will not be sitting in the classroom with a teacher in front of the room. I will be my own teacher. Life is a journey of learning. Learning never stops. Rather than dragging a teacher alongside of me as I head out beyond the walls of the classroom into the real world, I can more easily carry a book of poetry to be the teacher-at-my-side.

A poem is a great teacher. Like a teacher, a poem is not going to give you the answer right away. You're going to have to do a little work to find the answer. Whereas in education where a student completes the role of a teacher, in poetry a reader completes the role of the poet. A teacher never criticizes if you ask a dumb question, and neither will a poem. Both teachers and poetry teach us how to love life and how to love learning.

While being taught by Walt Whitman's poem "To You," I could relate the poem to a learning experience I had with a stranger. Here is Walt Whitman's poem:

Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me,

Why should you not speak to me?

And why should I not speak to you? (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p. 3.)

When I came back to college for spring semester, I rode the Greyhound bus from Fargo to SJU. On the bus, I was looking forward to reading a book that I had brought with me. There were only a handful of other passengers on the bus, and everyone seemed to be content in his or her own little world, except one grandfather-like man. We'll just call him Al. From the moment I stepped on the bus to the moment I got off, I always saw Al talking to a stranger. Black, white, disabled, old, or young, he talked to EVERYONE on the bus. While I sat reading a book, I observed how Al had transformed the once quiet and empty bus to a bus filled with friendships and singing. Rather than joining in, I continued to sit in the back of the bus, content with a book in my hand. I really had no desire to meet any new strangers. What I really wanted was to finish my book. We got off the bus at a rest stop at a small caf1 in Melrose. While I was reading my book and eating an apple, Al pulled up a chair next to me and began talking to me. We had a nice conversation before we got back on the bus. Even though I still filed to the back of the bus to read my book, I felt like I was in community now with the other members of the bus. Al was my teacher for the day. I learned that we all should feel that we are in community with one another even if we are strangers. There was no need for our bus to be quiet and full of strangers at the beginning of our trip together. When the Greyhound pulled into the drive in front of the SJU Abbey's Bell Banner, Al smiled and said, "Good luck," before I got off the bus to find my luggage. I replied, "Good luck to you too."

Poems teach us how the entire world is full of teachers, just like Al. Poetry forces us to view other people and things differently. By viewing these people and things differently, we are in turn being taught! This is a fascinating topic. Poems teach us how to SEE the world with different eyes: "The lyric poem defamiliarizes words, it wrenches them from familiar or habitual contexts, it puts a spell on them" (Hirsch, How to Read a Poem, p. 12.). For example, the metaphor in poetry teaches us how to see everyday objects as something more. I think I need to learn how to do this in my daily life. I need to learn how to see people, events, and things around me as something more. I need to look at these things as my teachers. It wasn't until after I stepped off the bus that I realized that Al was not just another stranger. Al was my teacher.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2000 11:06 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: Whitman // Journaling each day keeps the mind at play

How many of you keep a journal? I do. It wasn't until the beginning of my freshman year in college though that I began mine. Since then, I've found it a valuable resource as a record to my past and as a tool for my future. I find myself not only writing things in it, but including other snipets of things that I am able to tack to a page. In my art class last semester, I learned how to compose a sketchbook. A sketchbook is similar to a journal except it is composed mostly of images and not words. Both a sketchbook and a journal should be free-spirited activities of play and deep thought.

While I was doing a little research on Whitman, I found that he too kept MANY journals/notebooks in his life. In the article below, I have bolded important phrases for those of you who would just like to skim through it. I found the article inspiring. To think that something like his edition of Leaves of Grass was the product and inspiration of his random, sketchy notebooks is exciting! I wonder what I will be able to compose from my own journals and sketchbooks someday!

Jeff

About Whitman's Notebooks

Thomas Harned donated to the Library of Congress a total of forty original Walt Whitman notebooks. There are others in the Feinberg-Whitman collection in the Library of Congress and several each in collections at Duke University, Yale University, New York Public Library, and other public repositories, as well as some which are still in private hands. It is safe to estimate that Whitman created at least one hundred notebooks of greatly varying sizes and descriptions. Some are basically commercial notebooks in which he wrote with any implement at hand (pencil stub, pen, crayon) and which he amended at will by cutting out and replacing pages and pasting in clippings, photographs or scraps of manuscripts. Others are home-made notebooks which he created by folding and/or cutting sheets of paper and fastening with a pin or ribbon. A few come down to us as loose sheets.

In these typical writer's notebooks, Whitman jotted down thoughts in prose and expressions in poetry. The earliest examples include journalistic entries with ideas for articles he might write. His first trial lines for what would soon become part of the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass appear in an early notebook (LC #80) which bears an internal date of 1847; it was his habit, however, to use these notebooks over a number of years, filling in blank pages at will, and the remarkable trial flights of verse for "Song of Myself" in it are likely to date closer to 1854.

In the Civil War years, he was more apt to carry tiny notebooks in his shirt pocket in which he took notes about the needs and wants of wounded soldiers whom he visited and comforted in the hospitals in and near Washington, D.C. In these he noted what treats a soldier might like on the next visit--raspberry syrup, rice-pudding, notepaper and pencil--or notes and addresses of family to whom Whitman would then write in place of the gravely wounded or dead young man. Occasionally he would also describe scenes on the battle-field, probably from reports from others in the camps.

In later years, he used the notebooks for literary lecture notes, drafts of poems, and recording of national events, such as how New York City looked the day after Lincoln's assassination. Many notebooks have become known by their very partial contents, when in reality each book is apt to cover many subjects. The wide range of topics in the other notebooks demonstrate the great diversity of subjects included in the poet's reading and range of interests: English history and literature; Lucretius, Shakespeare and Spanish literary masterpieces; physique and the science of swimming; faith, death and organized religion; the Presbyterian Church in Jamaica, Long Island; oratory and lecturing; his 1869 trip to Boston; notes on Columbus and on Lincoln; slavery, democracy and the meaning of America.

--Alice L. Birney, American Literature Specialist, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/wwntbks.html

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Wednesday, February 09, 2000 12:27 AM

To: Lucas, Katherine M; Thamert, Mark

Subject: RESPONSE TO KATE: Overlooking Contentment

Kate,

I liked the title of your last response: "Must the artist struggle?" Life is full of struggles, and I also believe that everyone must struggle in order to improve whatever they are trying to accomplish. However, I believe that contentment is something that often is overlooked in the process. Living in a capitalistic society, we are never content. We are always struggling on the road to achieve greater heights, better things, more, more, and more. I think that we need to remind ourselves to get off this road once in awhile and spend some quality time with contentment. I remember the spring break service trip that we took together last year to live with the Navajo Indians in Ganado, AZ for a week. We visited an old woman named Martha who had practically nothing, yet she was the happiest grandmother that I have ever met. She was content with life.

During the summers, I especially find time for contentment. I am relaxed, free of most worries, and at peace with myself. I worry what will happen to me after graduation when my future employer runs his or her business on a 9 month working schedule without a 3 month break. I will definitely need to remember to find moments for contentment in my life.

In your response to John you mentioned:

These struggles make the artist never completely satisfied or content, for this contentment, as you said in class, can be harmful to the creative process. These struggles cause the move the artist to keep creating and improving.

While reading Dante's poem I heard his voice shouting in contrast to this view that contentment is harmful to the creative process. Dante's poem sweeps the reader off one's feet to a place filled with contentment on a magical ship. Even if it is just for a fleeting moment, I want to follow Dante's vision to be content with life: "āOur time, and each were as content and free / As I believe that thou and I should be" (Alighieri, "Sonnet: Dante Alighieri to Guido Cavalcanti," in 99 Poems in Translation, p. 36).

While I agree that we should still value the struggle, we must realize that this struggle is a never ending struggle. Contentment is the end that justifies the means. I would hate to see any artist, including myself, not have the opportunity to reap the benefits of contentment because he or she was too busy struggling. All artists continuously struggle, but the best artists occasionally sidetrack to be content.

Sincerely,

Jeff

-----Original Message-----

From: Lucas, Katherine M

Sent: Monday, February 07, 2000 10:08 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: RESPONSE TO JOHN: Must the artist struggle?

Must the Artist Struggle?

John, I liked the question you raised, asking why an artist must struggle with art. You say: "I can never be at one with my art unless I can truly roll up my sleeves and struggle with it. This requires me to seek out that battle between me and my art that I hold so dear." I have experienced similar struggles with my artistic endeavors--especially with my writing--and I don't foresee these struggles going away. I think they are an integral part of the process, the artist always wanting to improve and also sometimes struggling for inspiration. These struggles make the artist never completely satisfied or content, for this contentment, as you said in class, can be harmful to the creative process. These struggles cause the move the artist to keep creating and improving. They create this place which Rilke talks about (and which I highlighted before) in which "for a moment everything intimate and familiar has been taken from us," and "We stand in the midst of a transition, where we cannot remain standing" (Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, pg. 79).

As I thought about these ideas, I realized that an artist's struggles didn't have to be directly related to her creative process, either. It seems that struggles in life itself, the daily hardships one faces, are also a necessary part of an artist's life. These life struggles are very often the subject about which the author creates. The novel Brave New World expresses this idea well, I think. Forgive me, I don't remember specifics, but the novel takes place in a supposed Utopia, where life is perfect and no one struggles or is unhappy. One character, who has not been programmed well enough to live in this world, is not happy there. He wants to be a writer, to create. Finally, he is allowed to leave, and where he requests to go is a place where the weather is cold and tumultuous, where there can be sickness and where people are aware of death. The character realized that hardships are what gives life depth and what causes us to experience our emotions more fully. Hardships are also what cause us to appreciate times when they're good. It is this depth of emotion and experience that becomes the fuel for an artist's creative process. I think the struggles are really a necessary component. It is this place which Rilke talks about (and which I brought out before) where

Finally on this subject, I was thinking that some people do probably yearn for a life of contentment, without struggle. I began to think that maybe there is something unique about the artist's personality that causes them to live amidst struggle, almost flourish amidst it. Maybe there is something innate about the mind of artists and creators, something that drives them to look at the world, study it, question and explore it, and that maybe these characteristics contribute to an artist's experience of struggles. I think there is something about the creative mind that isn't willing to just accept things as they are even if it'll make life easier for them. They continue to question, to probe. So maybe this is sort of the burden of the artist--to have the qualities of intuitiveness, exploration, etc., one also will realize and understand the not-so-fun things about the world. To not being happy with one's art--to want to continue to improve--to feel a need to keep creating and not really ever feel satisfied, these hardships are somewhat unique to the creative mind. The characteristics I mentioned seem to be both the reason a person becomes an artist and the reason he/she can't be content in life. It's an interesting paradox, I think.

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 07, 2000 9:48 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 4 Buonarroti, Mallarme // Changing From the Outside-in

In a response to one of my posts, Anne agreed with me that we should all try to change from the inside-out. But she also questioned if we could not also change from the outside-in. I have thought about this for a long time, and I think Anne is right. I think the answer is (which seems to be my answer for everything in this class) is that we need to find a balance between both of them. We need to change from both the inside-out and the outside-in.

After reading Michelangelo Buonarroti's "On the Painting of the Sistine Chapel" I see how one could change from the outside-in. Looking outside at a piece of art can affect one on the inside very deeply. I especially enjoyed the following stanza:

my beard turns up to heaven; my nape falls in,

fixed on my spine: my breast-bone visibly

grows like a harp: a rich embroidery

bedews my face from brush-drops thick and thin.

(Buonarroti, "On the Painting of the Sistine Chapel," in 99 Poems in Translation, p. 76).

Why did this stanza hit me so sharply? I think it is because of this image: "āmy breast-bone visibly grows like a harp." In church there is a part in the mass where the priest says, "Lift up your hearts to the Lord." In return, the audience says, "We lift up our hearts to the Lord." Ever since I was a little child, I have taken this statement very seriously. I have felt an inner something growing inside of me when I respond with those words. So much so that I am compelled to raise my chest ever so slightly as if I am literally raising my heart up to God. From a stimulation in the outside world, I have changed from the inside-out. Maybe I haven't changed so drastically as the image of my breast-bone growing like a harp, but there is some small change taking place there, as small as it might be.

I would also like to cite Stephane Mallarme's poem "A lace curtain self-destructs" with the passage:

The concerted all-white internecine

flight of this hanging thing

dashed against a wan pane

flutters more than it lays to rest.

This poem gave me the most problems, or should I say enjoyment?! Part of the process of reading a poem is not in understanding it right away. As William Stafford would say, I think Mallarme is throwing me, the batter, one of his fast curve balls. At first I thought this "all-white internecine" object was the lace curtain as the title suggests. But then I got to thinking that this could not be ALL this poem is about. I began to do a little investigating on Mallarme and found out that he is NOT talking about a lace curtain. Rather the lace curtain must be a metaphor for something. I still don't know what that metaphor is, but I think it definitely has something to do with a baby in a mother's womb. Whether or not this baby is being born, or it is being aborted, or it is a blue baby, I have yet to decide.

On the website, www.studiocleo.com/librarie/mallarme/biography.html, I found an interview with Mallarme himself in ENGLISH. As a French poet, a lot of the sites out there are in French-ugh. In the interview he talks about his style of writing and the use of metaphor:

To name an object is to suppress three-quarters of the enjoyment of the poem, which derives from the pleasure of step-by-step discovery; to suggest, that is the dream. It is the perfect use of this mystery that constitutes the symbol: to evoke an object little by little, so as to bring to light a state of the soul or, inversely, to choose an object and bring out of it a state of the soul through a series of unravelings.

After reading this poem three times, I have seen this unraveling process and I wonder what I might begin to unravel next from this single poem. Am I unraveling myself from the inside-out, or is the poem unraveling me from the outside-in? This is a question that I don't think I can answer. Wait, maybe it is a balance of the both! :-)

Jeff

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Monday, February 07, 2000 9:09 PM

To: Williams, Scott G; Thamert, Mark

Subject: 3 REPLY TO SCOTT: THE DANGER OF POETRY?

Scott,

After reading your response to Molly Peacock's first few chapters, I felt a connection to you in that we share one of the same passions: art. Art is something that has always been apart of my life. It's something so innate in me that I find myself making art unconsciously whenever I am bored or when I have even just a few extra minutes to do something fun. Only until recently have I wondered about the negative impact of an excessive passion for art. You might ask yourself, how can something so good be so bad, right? I've learned in my life that ANYTHING in excess can have negative impacts on a person's life: drinking alcohol, taking vitamins, chocolate, exercising, etc. Should not art and the art form of poetry be included in this same list? I think it should. Would you not agree that Sylvia Plath took her poetry to excess with the negative effect shown by her suicidal death? I think Molly Peacock, so far, has avoided any discussion of this topic of the danger of poetry. Let us again read together your passage. Pay special attention to your last sentence, which I found very intriguing.

"Art allows me to connect with people who appear much different than myself. After all, on the surface, I have little in common with Toni Morrison, Ralph Ellison, and Langston Hughes. These people live (or lived) in a world much different than my own. Or do (did) they? If we listen carefully to the words of Molly Peacock, we may have found a new way to understand our existence. It is called poetry. Perhaps if I read the great poets of the world I can come to grips with my unknown human emotion. Perhaps I will find that much of human existence is the same. We all must eat, breathe, and die. And we all must suffer. I can think of no other form of expression that communicates the pain (and joy!) of life than art."

I can think of no other form of expression that communicates the pain (and joy!) of life than life. In a world that is seeing extreme advances in technology, I feel that we are accepting substitutes for the reality of things themselves. Instead of writing a hand-written letter to you, folding it, sealing it in an envelope, walking to the post office, I am substituting this personal act for the quick, easy, and impersonal method of e-mail. I believe that poetry, while it can sometimes transcend life itself, can also replace natural, raw emotions learned through the experience of living life itself. I think I could write forever about this subject! I can think of moments in an art studio that I was so engrained in my painting or sculpture that I lost touch with the reality of life, forgetting that others were in the room with me, forgetting to eat a meal. Is not this a danger? Art, including poetry, must not substitute life, art must complement life. I see Thomas Dylan's "In My Craft or Sullen Art" demonstrating his separation from the reality of life in his dark room writing by "dancing light." Why? Just look at the image of him. He is writing for "their most secret heart" alone in a room with a pen and paper. This is ridiculous. Actions are more powerful than words. Instead of producing poetry, I want to tell Dylan: Go out into the world with your love. Heal the griefs of the lovers with actions, not with words on a piece of paper. Live life, don't write about life. We must be careful not to cross over the danger line in poetry. We must be careful not to love a poem's life so much that we forget to live in the life that we are reading about.

Sincerely,

Jeff

Scott's post:

-----Original Message-----

From: Williams, Scott G

Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2000 6:23 PM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: Peacock, Thomas, Eskimo // Unknown Human Emotion

Unknown Human Emotion

I have spent countless hours pondering these questions: Why does God allow pain in the world? Why are we able to feel lonely, hurt, and abandoned? Unfortunately, I have no concrete answers. But I do know where to search for better understanding. Molly Peacock does too: "To learn about something hair-trigged and complex, complete with its own structures and therefore its own ways of knowing and conveying, is to illumine the paths of existence itself. Communing with these poems collected over years, each continuing to exhibit vitality as I look at its body...with greater consciousness and greater regard, fires in me a respect for the conscious act of living" (Peacock, How to Read a Poem, p. 11). Art allows me to connect with people who appear much different than myself. After all, on the surface, I have little in common with Toni Morrison, Ralph Ellison, and Langston Hughes. These people live (or lived) in a world much different than my own. Or do (did) they? If we listen carefully to the words of Molly Peacock, we may have found a new way to understand our existence. It is called poetry. Perhaps if I read the great poets of the world I can come to grips with my unknown human emotion. Perhaps I will find that much of human existence is the same. We all must eat, breathe, and die. And we all must suffer. I can think of no other form of expression that communicates the pain (and joy!) of life than art. That is why I took this course, and that is why I can admire Peacock's work: She has found a way to explore the many questions of the world. Through her shared passion for poetry, I realized that more is on included in a poem than I ever suspected. I too have looked at poetry and not understood what I was reading. Or, as Peacock writes, "Sometimes I feel we are restoring those wings torn from poems by bullies with low tolerance for ambiguity - the bullies perhaps we ourselves once were" (Peacock, How to Read a Poem, p. 17). I was once a bully (or perhaps I still am). But I do not want to be a bully anymore. I want to feel the words!

I enjoy the way Peacock explains the foundation of a poem: "Poetry is really the fusion of three arts: music, storytelling, and painting. The line displays the poem's music, the sentence displays its thoughts, and the image displays the vision of the poet" (Peacock, How to Read a Poem, p. 19). After reading this, I looked at one of Peacock's talismans, "Let Evening Come," by Jane Kenyon (on page 25). I really felt I could grasp the content better. It paints a beautiful picture with words, but it also contains thoughts (a message) and music as well. I do not know whether Peacock's foundation will work for all poems, but it really does seem like something worth remembering. Poetry is difficult to explain to someone else, but I think every poem has a unique sound, story, and visual. Not only that, each reader can enjoy his or her own interpretation. That said, I can see why Peacock enjoys returning to her favorite poems again and again. A fresh reading has a new sound and a new visual. Meanwhile, the story is given a new explanation.

Rag and Bone

The poem by Dylan Thomas is fascinating.

And the lovers lie abed

With all their griefs in their arms,

I labor by singing light

Not for ambition or bread

Or the strut and trade of charms

On the ivory stages

But for the common wages

Of their most secret heart. (Thomas, "In My Craft or Sullen Art," in Rag and Bone, p. 167)

For one thing, it has great music. Thomas seems to say that his labor can connect with a heart better than a physical presence can. The "lovers lie abed / With all their griefs in their arms" -- notice that lovers (most likely embracing) hold "grief" in their arms; but Thomas wants no money or fame, merely the "secret heart" of his audience (Thomas, "In My Craft or Sullen Art"). I also find it interesting that Thomas works while lovers lie. Poetry has left him alone at night, but he absolutely must share his art with others -- that is how he can connect with lovers best. Hopefully this poem will come up in class tomorrow, as I'm interested to see what everyone else took from Thomas' work.

The poem entitled "Magic Words" grabbed me immediately. It reminded me of Peacock's book, where she writes, "Each time any of us reads a favorite poem, it conjures a special sorcery of second sight, and third, and fourth, until understanding is so profound that we are returned to a state before we even had language - a prelinguistic place (Peacock, How to Read a Poem, p. 3). (Yes, that excerpt also appeared in the Great Poets course description.) The author, Eskimo, seems to convey a similar message, this time about a group of magic words: "Sometimes they were people / and sometimes animals / and there was no difference. / All spoke the same language" (Eskimo, "Magic Words," (in Rag and Bone, p 160). Peacock must feel that Eskimo is talking about poetry. Maybe he is. Maybe he is not. All I know is that Eskimo writes well.

"Easy writing makes bad reading" - Ernest Hemingway

Take care all,

Scott Williams

From: Markwardt, Jeffrey R

Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2000 1:15 AM

To: Thamert, Mark

Subject: 2 Peacock, Thomas, Shakespeare // The Poem: The Perfect Balance Between Companionship and Solitude

Our class discussion yesterday consisted of many paradoxes: solitude vs. companionship, innocence vs. the wisdom of old age, and Freud's view of the id as the dark side vs. Yung's view of the id as the light side, etc. Even though these paradoxes are conflicting and they tend to stir some heated arguments, Fr. Mark addressed that these paradoxes are OK. Sersch--I'm sure you were happy because here is a new way to look at settling these conflicts and making peace with these topics. Instead of trying to resolve the conflicts with one correct answer, we should be able to accept the paradox and find a balance between both of the sides. Where am I going with this you might ask. When I think about poetry, I tend to think of a person reading in solitude in a quiet and dark room. But then I also think about Poetry Slams where poets competitively read their poems in front of an audience. Poetry is the perfect medium that bridges the wide gap between the paradox of solitude and companionship in our world today!

I came to this realization after reading the first two chapters of Molly Peacock's How to Read a Poemāand Start a Poetry Circle. First, Molly addresses the power of solitude in poetry: "āreading poetry gives you a kind of internal message. Your organs readjust, they re-relate to one another, as you become aware of a new thought or a new feeling or more likely, of something you, too, have thought and felt all along" (Peacock, How to Read a Poemāand Start a Poetry Circle, p. 14). Second, Molly addresses the power of companionship in poetry through poetry circles. I smiled when I imagined this image of Molly and her friend Georgianna Orsini "climb[ing] into [their] jammies by SIX P.M. to read poems out loud while cooking dinner" (Peacock, How to Read a Poemāand Start a Poetry Circle, p. 16). Poetry has many things to teach me. It not only will connect me to a new form of solitude, but also deeper feelings of companionship with those around me.

"I labor by singing light / Not for ambition or bread ā But for the common wages / Of their secret heart ā But for the lovers, their arms / Round the griefs of ages,ā" (Thomas, "In My Craft or Sullen Art," in Rag and Bone, p. 167). I might be misinterpreting "In My Craft or Sullen Art," but I'm picturing Dylan Thomas writing to soothe the lovers' hearts in order to heal the lovers' outside griefs. I think this concept is neat: healing the inside in order to heal the outside. One must first heal the inside heart and body before one begins to heal the outside griefs of this troubled world we live in. A poet, who most likely has a special connection with solitude and the inner realm of the soul, must then have the key to solving the world's griefs. The poet's words alone will touch our hearts and heal us in ways that food or water cannot. Is it possible then to solve world hunger through poetry?

Again, I see this same concept of strengthening the inner self in Shakespeare's poem. "Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea, / But sad mortality o'er-sways their power, / How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea, Whose action is no stronger than a flower?" (Shakespeare, "Sonnet LXV," in Rag and Bone, p. 176). Too often in this world, we think that by healing the outside of our bodies, we will heal the inside body. By being thin, or having muscles we strive for beauty. However, no matter how much iron we pump, if the inside of our bodies is not strong, the appearance of our outside bodies is insignificant. I'm not saying that lifting weights is bad. I'm just suggesting that if one is going to lift an iron bar, I'm sure that person can also try to lift that weak little flower growing inside ourselves to the light.