Staff Picks: Poetry
Adriene Rich (1929-2012)
Adrienne Rich is one of the few poets whose poetry I've actually purchased, and by far the one I've read the most (I own three of her books!). So when I heard her name appear on the news in March I perked up. Poets don't usually get discussed unless it is National Poetry Month and that is in April. When I heard that instead of winning a prestigious award, she had passed away it saddened me, even as I was pleased that she was such a great poet that the media felt she deserved attention.
My favorite part of Rich's poems is that what she writes about are not platitudes of love, or lofty recriminations against society--although those thoughts can be found in her poems. She creates a scene for her philosophy to shine through, whether about feminism and relationships in "The Burning of Paper Instead of Children" ("The burning of a book arouses no sensation in me. I know it hurts to burn") or war in "You were telling a story about war it is our story" ("So we are thrown together so we are racked apart in a republic shivering on its glassy lip") or even the subject of poetry itself in "Letters to a Young Poet" From Midnight Salvage:
Would it gladden you to thinkpoetry could purely
take its place beneath lightning sheets
or fogdrip live its own life
I think everyone deserves a little poetry in their lives. And if you have to choose one poet to read during National Poetry Month, I strongly urge you to read Adrienne Rich. We own many of her volumes of poetry, and you can also read 740 (!) of her poems in our 20th-Century American Poetry database (which is where I found the above poems). She's changed my life by her words.
Books to Enjoy
|
Why Modern Poetry?
I've just started to get into eBooks. One of the problems is so many of the books I've already read! And others are not my style, or are checked out. I love putting eBooks on hold, but it's nice to just grab one, which is what ended up happening last week. I just needed something to read. And while I would not have normally picked up Beautiful & Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry off of the bookshelf, it called to me in-between putting my lunch in the microwave and sitting down to eat.
And I'm so glad it did! I do love poetry. But modern poetry? With authors such as Emily Dickinson, Khalil Gibran, Dorothy Parker, Rumi and Byron, or activities such as football, knitting, baseball, or redecorating the house, why bother reading modern poetry?
This question is the reason David Orr wrote his book: "are we so sure of what poems have to offer?" His answer is not simple, and through the various chapters he explores the personal and political in poetry, as well as form and why poets seem to navelgaze so much.
The book is worth reading just for the ways he deconstructs poetry, from Shelley to Jewel. But I like that he tries to get to the deeper meaning of why poetry is important, and I enjoy that he does it not through poetry but the book form: "if you do choose to give your attention to poetry, as against all the other things you might turn to instead, that choice can be meaningful. There's little grandeur in this, maybe, but out of such small, unnecessary devotions is the abundance of our lives sometimes made evident."
Read Some Modern Poetry Today
|
|
Poetry for Toddlers and Adults
Twinkle, twinkle little star is the closest thing that my toddler recites as a poem, but he changes it up and molds it into his own--he even has a punk rock version! But I heard about the most astonishing little boy today that recites Billy Collins poems. Collins is a former U.S. Poet Laureate who has written 12 volumes of poetry. And because of this youtube video that became an internet sensation, the boy, now four, got to meet his hero this week.
What amazes me about this story is not even that the little boy was able to memorize a long poem. Its that his parents exposed him to it in the first place. This really speaks to me as a librarian. I read books when I was young that were for an older age group, and I didn't always get the adult references. But what kid does get all the adult references: the new movie Megamind has a joke about Marlon Brando in it that I'm not sure most 20 somethings would get. I hope that more parents give their second graders a chance to read a fifth grade book, at least to see if they can do it! Or I guess they can at least check out the Billy Collins books we have available at the library.
|
|
