poetry - Encouragement

poetry

Lorine Niedecker, "Transition"

There are supple lines in poetry, lines with a breezy flexibility and realized grace.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "A Thought went up my mind today" (701)

Dickinson says she had a thought – "A Thought went up my mind today" – and then narrates its unique horror.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "Pain — has an Element of Blank" (650)

Dickinson claims "Pain – has an Element of Blank." I can't help but think how uncomfortable we are with that notion.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "I worked for chaff and earning Wheat" (J 1269)

The question for us is our devotion to the worthless.

poetry

Graham Foust, "The Only Poem"

I'm staring at Foust's last lines of "The Only Poem:" Even in danger, / you're a writer, liar.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "There is no Frigate like a Book"

...how to respond to someone determined to tell you everything you're reading is worthless?

poetry

Jane Hirshfield, "A Chair in Snow"

I thought I should share Jane Hirshfield's "A Chair in Snow" because it so beautifully illustrates the weight of the season.

emily dickinson

Emily Dickinson, "The power to be true to You" (464)

Dickinson does not inch toward the cosmic.

poetry

Five Short Meditations on Rae Armantrout's "Djinn"

Armantrout's first stanza, about the terrain ghosts create, brings into relief the strange world-building of lying.

poetry

Jane Hirshfield, "I sat in the sun"

Jane Hirshfield opens the sacredness of the everyday in "I sat in the sun."

poetry

Elisa Gabbert, "In Nature"

Elisa Gabbert's "In Nature," for me, remarks upon a scholarly problem, if not a philosophical one.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "Shoot the Moon"

Kay Ryan's "Shoot the Moon" is a tough poem.

poetry

A. R. Ammons, "Uppermost"

The sacred is earthly, and the earth itself the mystery.

poetry

Osip Mandelstam, "The Poem"

Knowing the most essential part of your experience can find words is freedom.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "Poetry is a Kind of Money"

"Poetry is a kind of money." I can't imagine writing that and not saying to yourself man I wish.

poetry

Mara Pastor, "Left"

I would advise you to read this poem by the prominent Puerto Rican poet Mara Pastor a few times, inhaling its ferocity.

poetry

Rae Armantrout, "Decor"

This text serves as the intersection of a few complicated themes: the cheapness of capitalism, relationships, and identity.

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "I had no time to Hate"

...this little poem starts with trying to look into a quiet, lush landscape painting and wish yourself there.

poetry

Kay Ryan, "The Elephant in the Room"

I don't want to admit I'm being squeezed. I don't want to admit I lack room. I want to pretend like everything's normal.

poetry

Robert Frost, "The Gift Outright"

"The Gift Outright" could seduce through its music alone.

poetry

Jane Kenyon, "Evening Sun"

Jane Kenyon's startling starting question, immediate and personal for us all: "Why does this light force me back / to my childhood?"

poetry

Emily Dickinson, "Experience is the Angled Road" (910)

Many have used poetry to generate lingering, meditative essays, but Dickinson is in rare form with "Experience is the Angled Road."

poetry

Jane Kenyon, "Not Writing"

Kyla Houbolt's "On Not Writing" brought back memories of this poem, "Not Writing," by the inimitable Jane Kenyon.

poetry

Kyla Houbolt, "On Not Writing"

Kyla Houbolt calls forth moments when words overwhelm.

poetry

Rita Dove, "Little Town"

This little, haiku-like poem by Rita Dove got me thinking about a lot of places I've been.