“It was easier to meet a genuine Communist than someone who read poetry” (Charles Simic in a 1998 Cortland Review interview)
Stored in my phone inbox is DD’s New Year message: May you be “delighted by the size of the unimaginable/the great nowhere, the everlasting nothing/pure and serene doggedness/for the hell of it….and love” – words of Poet Laureate, Charles Simic.
Whenever I need a fix, this Simic gem makes the grade in restoring the lordship of congruity amidst the discomfiture and commotion of life. Poetry is endowed with that talisman, but not all poets wave the wand of a sorcerer.
Simic’s poems have been described by reverent critics as “incandescent, incantory, and otherwordly.” I made acquaintance with just a few of his wordcraft, I’m not sure what period these critics are describing, a younger Simic, perhaps? Because the poems I developed affinity with are downright simple and mundane, resonant of W. Auden although the comparison warrants some judiciousness, apologies to a few friends who worship Auden like no other. Here’s a sample:
“You give the appearance of listening
To my thoughts, o trees” (Evening Walk)
“Old men have bad dreams
So they sleep little” (Graveyard Schoolchildren)
Stored in my phone inbox is DD’s New Year message: May you be “delighted by the size of the unimaginable/the great nowhere, the everlasting nothing/pure and serene doggedness/for the hell of it….and love” – words of Poet Laureate, Charles Simic.
Whenever I need a fix, this Simic gem makes the grade in restoring the lordship of congruity amidst the discomfiture and commotion of life. Poetry is endowed with that talisman, but not all poets wave the wand of a sorcerer.
Simic’s poems have been described by reverent critics as “incandescent, incantory, and otherwordly.” I made acquaintance with just a few of his wordcraft, I’m not sure what period these critics are describing, a younger Simic, perhaps? Because the poems I developed affinity with are downright simple and mundane, resonant of W. Auden although the comparison warrants some judiciousness, apologies to a few friends who worship Auden like no other. Here’s a sample:
“You give the appearance of listening
To my thoughts, o trees” (Evening Walk)
“Old men have bad dreams
So they sleep little” (Graveyard Schoolchildren)
And this brave poem that I cannot, regretfully, use as a prayer-poem:
“Boss of all bosses of the universe
Mr. know-it-all, wheeler-dealer, wire-puller….
Doesn’t it give you the creeps
To hear them begging you on their knees” (To the One Upstairs)
Paging anyone who has a relative, a friend, a lover, an ex-lover, a neighbor who has Simic’s book of poetry, may I borrow even for just a day or two?
Yes, he’s a google away but I’m old school. I do not go for reading poetry or any novel, for that matter, in a computer screen. It takes away the intimacy. If there’s a word or phrase leaping with ebullience, I have this uncured habit of rubbing my fingers on it as if to sooth and absorb something in a trance. Or placing a book on my chest, hugging it for a while when the emotion is too much to bear.
E-books, they’re downloadable and free but they don’t give me the fix. It’s too, what’s the word – impersonal.
“Boss of all bosses of the universe
Mr. know-it-all, wheeler-dealer, wire-puller….
Doesn’t it give you the creeps
To hear them begging you on their knees” (To the One Upstairs)
Paging anyone who has a relative, a friend, a lover, an ex-lover, a neighbor who has Simic’s book of poetry, may I borrow even for just a day or two?
Yes, he’s a google away but I’m old school. I do not go for reading poetry or any novel, for that matter, in a computer screen. It takes away the intimacy. If there’s a word or phrase leaping with ebullience, I have this uncured habit of rubbing my fingers on it as if to sooth and absorb something in a trance. Or placing a book on my chest, hugging it for a while when the emotion is too much to bear.
E-books, they’re downloadable and free but they don’t give me the fix. It’s too, what’s the word – impersonal.
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