"Ecology" by Jack Collom

Jack Collom is a contemporary poet from Chicago. He writes, like many contemporary poets, about daily happenings and observations. As one can see from this poem, he has been described as an ecological poet.

Ecology

Surrounded by bone, surrounded by cells,by rings, by rings of hell, by hair, surrounded byair-is-a-thing, surrounded by silhouette, by honey-wet bees, yetby skeletons of trees, surrounded by actual, yes, for practicalpurposes, people, surrounded by surrealpopcorn, surrounded by the reborn: Surrender in the centerto surroundings. O surrender forever, neverend her, let her blend around, surrender to the surroundings thatsurround the tender endo-surrender, thattumble through the tumbling to that blue thatcurls around the crumbling, to that, the blue thatrumbles under the sun bounding the pearl thatwe walk on, talk on; we can chalk thatup to experience, sensing the brown here that’sblue now, a drop of water surrounding a cow that’sblack & white, the warbling Blackburnian twitter that’smachining midnight orange in the light that’sglittering in the light green visible wind. That’sthe ticket to the tunnel through the thicket that’sa cricket’s funnel of music to correct & pick it outfrom under the wing that whirls up over & out.

This poem is a very interesting meditation on the title matter: ecology. The description takes many forms; environment, biology, community. Perhaps the most striking aspect of this poem is that which is heard. The language and diction that the poet chose is fascinating in an oral reading. The alliteration: "for practical / purposes, people, surrounded by surreal / popcorn"... the repetition of "that" at the end of the lines, the enjambment which forces a continued reading without much room for breath. It's as if the poem itself is living, refusing to be structured or even put down on the page. The language is hard to control - reading it aloud, you find yourself caught up in simply reading, taken away by the words trying to leave the page without regard for your voice or knowledge. What an interesting experiment.

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/238516

"Sonnet 1" by Philip Sidney

Philip Sidney was born into English nobility and was educated at Shrewsbury School and Oxford University in the mid-16th century. Like many poets, none of his poems were published during his lifetime.

Key terms: sonnet, feet, meter

Sonnet 1

Loving in truth, and fain in verse my love to show,
That the dear She might take some pleasure of my pain,
Pleasure might cause her read, reading might make her know,
Knowledge might pity win, and pity grace obtain,—
I sought fit words to paint the blackest face of woe,
Studying inventions fine, her wits to entertain,
Oft turning others’ leaves, to see if thence would flow
Some fresh and fruitful showers upon my sunburned brain.
But words came halting forth, wanting Invention’s stay:
Invention, Nature’s child, fled step-dame Study’s blows,
And others’ feet still seemed but strangers in my way.
Thus great with child to speak, and helpless in my throes,
Biting my truant pen, beating myself for spite:
“Fool,” said my Muse to me, “look in thy heart and write.”

This sonnet is the first in a sequence which actually make up a narrative entitled "Astrophil and Stella" about a nobleman's unrequited love for a taken woman. This sonnet is the exposition, where the narrator shares his deep love for the woman and his desire to let her know. He offers that "She might take some pleasure of my pain" and that "Knowledge might pity win, and pity grace obtain" - he hopes that she will take pity on him for his painful love, and that this pity will actually turn into love on her end. At the end of this sonnet, his muse tells him to "look in thy heart and write" - meaning that he is beating himself up too much about it, and that he needs only to use what is in his heart. It's an uplifting end to this particular sonnet, but it seems like it doesn't end up working in the context of the rest of the narrative. 

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/242550

"Crepuscule with Muriel" by Marilyn Hacker

From POL: "Although a traditionalist in form, Marilyn Hacker’s poetry employs contemporary speech and themes. Hacker splits her time between Paris and her native New York City."

Key terms: free verse, alliteration, consonance, assonance, personification

Crepuscule with Muriel

Instead of a cup of tea, instead of a milk-
silk whelk of a cup, of a cup of nearly six
o'clock teatime, cup of a stumbling block,
cup of an afternoon unredeemed by talk,
cup of a cut brown loaf, of a slice, a lack
of butter, blueberry jam that's almost black,
instead of tannin seeping into the cracks
of a pot, the void of an hour seeps out, infects
the slit of a cut I haven't the wit to fix
with a surgeon's needle threaded with fine-gauge silk
as a key would thread the cylinder of a lock.
But no key threads the cylinder of a lock.
Late afternoon light, transitory, licks
the place of the absent cup with its rough tongue, flicks
itself out beneath the wheel's revolving spoke.
Taut thought's gone, with a blink of attention, slack,
a vision of "death and distance in the mix"
(she lost her words and how did she get them back
when the corridor of a day was a lurching deck?
The dream-life logic encodes in nervous tics
she translated to a syntax which connects
intense and unfashionable politics
with morning coffee, Hudson sunsets, sex;
then the short-circuit of the final stroke,
the end toward which all lines looped out, then broke).
What a gaze out the window interjects:
on the southeast corner, a black Lab balks,
tugged as the light clicks green toward a late-day walk
by a plump brown girl in a purple anorak.
The Bronx-bound local comes rumbling up the tracks
out of the tunnel, over west Harlem blocks
whose windows gleam on the animal warmth of bricks
rouged by the fluvial light of six o'clock.

This poem, though difficult to decipher in many ways, is a lesson in diction and imagery. The poet begins with parallelism - "Instead of..." and throughout she messes with alliteration and rhyme: "butter, blueberry jam that's almost black, / instead of tannin seeping into the cracks." There is a fascinating use of personification and even consonance here: "Late afternoon light, transitory, licks / the place of the absent cup with its rough tongue." It is clear that the word choice in this poem was very particular and that there is meaning to be found. In first hour, we discussed the possibility that the narrator is used to having tea with Muriel, but perhaps the "crepuscule" (def. twilight) represents Muriel's death and the narrator is dealing with no longer having a companion. It is also possible that the narrator is describing a tea date with Muriel that is simply happening at twilight, or that the twilight somehow represents the tea that they have together. This is a perfect example of poetry being open to interpretation - but the tools are there to support the interpretation. This would also be an excellent poem to try and read aloud because of the intricate diction.

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/180962

"Equus Callabus" by Joel Nelson

Nelson brings a wealth of experiences to this poem. He lives in Texas on a cattle ranch and is an excellent horse trainer, although he is recognized in the area of cowboy poetry. He was at one time poet-in-residence at Rothbury, Northumberland, England.

Key terms: binary, structure, rhyme, repetition, parallel structure

Equus Callabus

Written in the Autumn of the Year of the Horse 2002

I have run on middle fingernail through Eolithic morning,
I have thundered down the coach road with the Revolution’s warning.
I have carried countless errant knights who never found the grail.
I have strained before the caissons I have moved the nation’s mail.

I’ve made knights of lowly tribesmen and kings from ranks of peons
I have given pride and arrogance to riding men for eons.
I have grazed among the lodges and the tepees and the yurts.
I have felt the sting of driving whips, lashes, spurs and quirts.

      I am roguish – I am flighty – I am inbred – I am lowly.
      I’m a nightmare – I am wild – I am the horse.
      I am gallant and exalted – I am stately – I am noble.
      I’m impressive – I am grand – I am the horse.

I have suffered gross indignities from users and from winners,
I have felt the hand of kindness from the losers and the sinners.
I have given for the cruel hand and given for the kind.
Heaved a sigh at Appomattox when surrender had been signed.

I can be as tough as hardened steel – as fragile as a flower.
I know not my endurance and I know not my own power.
I have died with heart exploded ’neath the cheering in the stands -
Calmly stood beneath the hanging noose of vigilante bands.

      I have traveled under conqueror and underneath the beaten.
      I have never chosen sides – I am the horse.
      The world is but a player’s stage – my roles have numbered many.
      Under blue or under gray – I am the horse.

So I’ll run on middle fingernail until the curtain closes,
And I will win your triple crowns and I will wear your roses.
Toward you who took my freedom I’ve no malice or remorse.
I’ll endure – This Is My Year – I am the Horse!

Although Nelson's poem is written in first person, it reads much like an ode to the horse. The poem describes various qualities of the horse, many of which would only be known to someone as familiar as Nelson. The narrator is the horse - likely not a particular horse, but "the Horse," which could represent the community of horses. The horse/narrator is arguing its worth and speaking directly to humankind in the last stanza: "Toward you who took my freedom I've no malice or remorse. / I'll endure - This Is My Year - I am the Horse!" The poem relies on binaries, which are sets of opposite descriptions. "I can be as tough as hardened steel - as fragile as a flower" is an example of this. The poem, in its structure, feels musical and elegant; it follows a quatrain form throughout with an aabb rhyme scheme. These qualities make the poem not only quite readable and enjoyable, but great for recitation. 

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/238308

"An Arundel Tomb" by Philip Larkin

Philip Larkin was an English poet who died in 1985 and wrote poems, according to POL, in a "stubbornly old fashioned manner". He focused on melancholy and dire themes, but often brilliantly (and shockingly) incorporated humor into his poetry.

An Arundel Tomb

Side by side, their faces blurred,  
The earl and countess lie in stone,  
Their proper habits vaguely shown  
As jointed armour, stiffened pleat,  
And that faint hint of the absurd—  
The little dogs under their feet.

Such plainness of the pre-baroque   
Hardly involves the eye, until
It meets his left-hand gauntlet, still  
Clasped empty in the other; and  
One sees, with a sharp tender shock,  
His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.

They would not think to lie so long.  
Such faithfulness in effigyWas just a detail friends would see:
A sculptor’s sweet commissioned grace  
Thrown off in helping to prolong  
The Latin names around the base.

They would not guess how early in
Their supine stationary voyage
The air would change to soundless damage,  
Turn the old tenantry away;
How soon succeeding eyes begin
To look, not read. Rigidly they

Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths  
Of time. Snow fell, undated. Light
Each summer thronged the glass. A bright  
Litter of birdcalls strewed the same
Bone-riddled ground. And up the paths  
The endless altered people came,

Washing at their identity.  
Now, helpless in the hollow of  
An unarmorial age, a trough
Of smoke in slow suspended skeins  
Above their scrap of history,  
Only an attitude remains:

Time has transfigured them into
Untruth. The stone fidelity
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.

The sentiment of this poem is obvious in the last stanza. It's pretty straightforward and easy to follow, but so artfully crafted in sextets with a structured rhyme scheme and wonderful diction. This poem would be beautiful on its own, but becomes so much more so when put in context: the poet wrote this reflection after seeing the real Arundel tomb in England. It is a wonderful example of ekphrasis, writing based on the emotion one gets from an image. The tomb really is there, and the poet was moved enough to story it with his words. These two were buried next to each other and the sculptor put their hands together, instead of at their sides or on their torsos in traditional form. The poem reflects on how this moment is memorialized, their tomb made to sit in a museum for viewers to see and wonder at. "Only an attitude remains" -- this expresses the sentiment that, although the tomb itself is an product of antiquity, the love that is illustrated by the sculpture and by the two persons never changes.

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/177058
The "Real" Arundel Tomb

"Machines" by Michael Donaghy

Donaghy was a contemporary American poet from New York who wrote, taught, and played Irish traditional music. He grew up in New York; his parents were Irish immigrants, and his poems "reference literature, science, and the oddities and losses of contemporary life," according to POL.

Key terms: allusion, diction, free verse

Machines

Dearest, note how these two are alike:
This harpsicord pavane by Purcell
And the racer’s twelve-speed bike.

The machinery of grace is always simple.
This chrome trapezoid, one wheel connected
To another of concentric gears,
Which Ptolemy dreamt of and Schwinn perfected,
Is gone. The cyclist, not the cycle, steers.
And in the playing, Purcell’s chords are played away.

So this talk, or touch if I were there,
Should work its effortless gadgetry of love,
Like Dante’s heaven, and melt into the air.

If it doesn’t, of course, I’ve fallen. So much is chance,
So much agility, desire, and feverish care,
As bicyclists and harpsicordists prove

Who only by moving can balance,
Only by balancing move. 

What a neat poem. I enjoyed the musicality and romance of the language that Donaghy uses. He begins with "Dearest..." as if the poem were a letter- he is explaining a comparison that he meditates on and extrapolates in the poem. He compares aesthetic creation with mechanical creation, along the way referencing figureheads from different fields- Purcell, Ptolemy, Dante. He questions how the creation of a text or song are similar in intricacy and stature to the creation of a bicycle. In the last three stanzas, he wonders about his own creation- what does he put into his poetry, his life, and does it reach the level of beauty that he sees in cycling or other aesthetic creation? It's a really interesting thing to think about. Everyone has a talent, a craft. How do they all compare? We tend to think of aesthetics as being lofty and transcendent, but when put against a machine with such intricacy and grace, what do we value? I'm reminded of Claude Levi-Strauss's distinction between engineer and bricoleur - the engineer is one who creates new purpose out of found materials and bricoleur is one who simply re-creates using the pre-conceived purposes of the materials. Of course, that understanding is not necessary for this poem, but it's something I've thought a lot about and it's an interesting distinction to make. What do we really value in our creations? Creativity? Usefulness? Aesthetic?

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/26439

"Hero" by Paul Engle

Paul Engle is a very contemporary American poet. He died in 1991, leaving behind a legacy of support for writers with his Writers' Workshop program at the University of Iowa, which became a model for many university writing programs thereafter.

Key terms: irony, parallel structure, free verse

Hero

I

I have heard the horn of Roland goldly screaming

In the petty Pyrenees of the inner ear

And seen the frightful Saracens of fear

Pour from the passes, fought them, brave in dreaming.

But waked, and heard my own voice tinly screaming

In the whorled and whirling valleys of the ear,

And beat the savage bed back in my fear,

And crawled, unheroed, down those cliffs of dreaming.

    II

I have ridden with Hannibal in the mountain dusk,

Watching the drivers yell the doomed and gray

Elephants over the trumpeting Alps, gone gay

With snow vivid on peaks, on the ivory tusk.

But waked, and found myself in the vivid dusk

Plunging the deep and icy floor, gone gray

With bellowing shapes of morning, and the gay

Sunshaft through me like an ivory tusk.

    III

I have smiled on the platform, hearing without shame

The crowd scream out my praise, I, the new star,

Handsome, disparaging my bloody scar,

Yet turning its curve to the light when they called my name.

But waked, and the empty window sneered my name,

The sky bled, drop by golden drop, each star

The curved moon glittered like a sickle's scar,

The night wind called with its gentle voices: Shame!

    IV

I have climbed the secret balcony, on the floor

Lain with the lady, drunk the passionate wine,

Found, beneath the green, lewd-smelling vine,

Love open to me like a waiting door.

But waked to delirious shadows on the door,

Found, while my stomach staggered with sour wine,

Green drunkenness creep on me like a vine,

And puked my passion on the bathroom floor.

    V

I have run with Boone and watched the Indian pillage

The log house, fought, arrow in leg, and hobbled

Over the painful ground while the warrior gobbled

Wild-turkey cry, but escaped to save the village.

But waked, and walked the city, vicious village,

Fought through the traffic where the wild horn gobbled,

Bruised on the bumper, turned toward home, hobbled

Back, myself the house my neighbors pillage.

    VI

I have lain in bed and felt my body taken

Like water utterly possessing sand,

Surrounding, seething, soothing, as a hand

Comforts and clasps the hand that it has shaken.

But waked, and found that I was wholly shaken

By you, as the wave surrounds and seethes the sand,

That your whole body was a reaching hand

And my whole body the hand that yours had taken.

I find this poem fascinating. It is at once fun, melancholy, fantastic, romantic, and musical. The poet/narrator is describing many different dreams (vivid and real-seeming dreams) and what happens when he awakes from them. Often his dreams are disappointing- the reality that he faces when he wakes up is "savage," "icy," and "drunken." His reality is brutal in comparison with his romantic, exciting, adventurous dreams. Then, at the end of the poem, there is an element of sensuality and romance. The narrator describes waking up with a partner, and the experience of being embraced rather than falling to the floor or being blinded by the light of morning, like the other stanzas suggest. This progression makes the poem feel like a song or lyric to me; it's fairly easy to follow and is summed up rather romantically with the last stanza. It's also ironic and almost funny as I read the various experiences that the narrator has with dreams- I wouldn't have expected the seemingly serious ending. This surprise is enhanced by the irony structure (parallel & numbered stanzas) coupled with the discussion throughout. I'm curious about what exactly it refers to. It seems strange to have this authentic thoughtfulness after all of the comical, negative experiences that are described. It also feels a bit like a sitcom- funny funny funny entertaining with a heartfelt moment at the end. 

http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poem/180596