18 March 2017
— lots of puddles
Good Morning All,
It is not every day that one of you writes to comment on a Day Book poem or one of my own modest efforts. For that matter, it is not even every week that happens. So, I am delighted to tell you there have been two comments on poems over the past week. One was from my younger brother, not known as being an all that avid reader of poetry, who took the trouble to comment on my poem Reading Walden Near Walden. He said he especially liked the part about the words joining and flowing down the page like raindrops on a windshield. I was of course pleased, not least because although Norman is an expert in computers, both software and hardware, he is otherwise a decidedly 19th Century New Englander who would have loved nothing better than to shoot the breezes with old Henry.
I also enjoyed the comment from one of my university friends who wrote: "Judging by what you seem to think of the intelligence of your readers based on today's poetry and prose samples, I would say you could join efforts with them to produce a sampler with a title like, Our Culture's 500 Best Novels, selected by a group of Pierce's admirers who are by and large, the Illiterate."
Here, in the unlikely event you missed yesterday’s birthday poem, is the six liner that so got his dander up:
Reflections,
Jean Ingelow
What change has made the pastures sweet
And reached the daisies at my feet,
And cloud that wears a golden hem?
This lovely world, the hills, the sward—
They all look fresh, as if our Lord
But yesterday had finished them.
If those immortal lines do not bring a tear to your eye, well, I cannot blame you, for we must admit this ditty is not exactly Whose woods these are I think I know, or even Listen, my children, and you shall hear.
But the only published poet born on this day was good old Jean. (All too often it annoys the heck out of me three or four dynamite poets can be born on one day, and then none the next.) I did find two bassists, two porn stars, a bunch of actors, and a ball player, but only the one poet.
And as I keep reminding my friend, who is himself a poet, I do my best to find and celebrate poets on their birthday.
Ms Ingelow, it turns out, was a piece of work. Her first volume has the catchy title of A Rhyming Chronicle of Incidents and Feelings. No less a luminary than Alfred Lord Tennyson said he found it charming and would like to get to know the author. She also edited The Story of Doom, which is a collection of poetry for children.
In retrospect, I should have quoted her scintillating sonnet Fancy instead. I am guessing that if such lesser poets as, say, Whitman, Dickinson, Hardy, and Frost, had read this poem, they would have been discouraged enough to put away their quills and gone into the real estate, advertising, or used-car business. Just by way of incidentally, I found this treasure in The Gutenberg Project, which has gathered together all her works. Here is the sonnet in its entirety:
Thy fluttering wings are soft as love's first word,
And fragrant as the feathers of that bird,
Which feeds upon the budded cinnamon.
I ask thee not to work, or sigh—play on,
From nought that was not, was, or is, deterred;
The flax that Old Fate spun thy flights have stirred,
And waved memorial grass of Marathon.
Play, but be gentle, not as on that day
I saw thee running down the rims of doom
With stars thou hadst been stealing—while they lay
Smothered in light and blue—clasped to thy breast;
Bring rather to me in the firelit room
A netted halcyon bird to sing of rest.
Did I mention they’ll be a brief quiz on this poem tomorrow? And the first question will be something along the lines of: What on earth could this unabashed and unashamed drivel possibly mean?
Go Well and Stay Well,
Bhekaron
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