Danny Shot writes:
I always carry a few poems with me, well because I teach a few classes and I don’t like to repeat myself.
This year’s collection will include:
The many poems in Danny Shot's pocket
Danny Shot writes:
I always carry a few poems with me, well because I teach a few classes and I don’t like to repeat myself.
This year’s collection will include:
Jack Wiler’s “Poetry For Fun and Profit” and “For Levi”
Sylvia Plath’s “Mad Girl’s Love Song”
Pedro Pietri’s “Telephone Booth #508”
Bukowski’s “Style”
The poem in the pocket of John McDermott
John McDermott writes:
I’ll carry about 50 copies of “A Drinking Song,” which is really a love poem, and very short, so easy to copy and give away.
A Drinking Song
Wine comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That’s all we shall know for truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift my glass to my mouth,
I look at you, and I sigh.
W.B. Yeats 1910
Andrea Carter Brown on Five Points Blog
In honor of National Poetry Month, Andrea Carter Brown’s essay on the “poem in her pocket” is featured on Five Points Blog.
Read her essay here
Today is Poem in Your Pocket Day!
We’ve been sharing poems all month from CKP writers, staff, and friends.
Want poem is in your pocket today? Leave a comment, write it on our wall, we want to know!
The poem in Florenz Eisman's pocket
Florenz Eisman, CKP’s Managing Editor, writes:
On days when a smile is called for, I turn to my favorite nonsense poem: “Jabberwocky” by Lewis Carroll.
It brings me back momentarily to childhood when a wonderful teacher introduced it to my third-grade class without explanation or analysis. Was that when I learned that words (strange or plain) strung together can be magical? I think so.
Jabberwocky
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
‘Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!’
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought —
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood a while in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One two! One two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
‘And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
Lewis Carroll
The poem in Florenz Eisman’s pocket
Florenz Eisman, CKP’s Managing Editor, writes:
On days when a smile is called for, I turn to my favorite nonsense poem: “Jabberwocky” by Lewis Carroll.
It brings me back momentarily to childhood when a wonderful teacher introduced it to my third-grade class without explanation or analysis. Was that when I learned that words (strange or plain) strung together can be magical? I think so.
Jabberwocky
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
‘Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!’
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought —
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood a while in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One two! One two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
‘And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
Lewis Carroll
Deborah Henry's "Poem in Your Pocket"
Deborah Henry writes:
I would say my daughter Sara’s awesome poem, “Train Home From Work,” which was published in England but she would be mortified that her work was being promoted by me….
So . . .
“Birthday Present” by May Sarton
Like a shooting star,
As the soul,
Unencumbered,
Alive, ageless,
Meets the pristine moment:
Poetry again.”
I love the “alive, ageless” sense of truth and passion that we often forget.
Deborah Henry’s “Poem in Your Pocket”
Deborah Henry writes:
I would say my daughter Sara’s awesome poem, “Train Home From Work,” which was published in England but she would be mortified that her work was being promoted by me….
So . . .
“Birthday Present” by May Sarton
Like a shooting star,
As the soul,
Unencumbered,
Alive, ageless,
Meets the pristine moment:
Poetry again.”
I love the “alive, ageless” sense of truth and passion that we often forget.
Three for this Tuesday: Poem in Your Pocket
Adele Kenny chose:
“Why I Wake Early” by Mary Oliver
Adele explains: This poem is a mini-lesson in gratitude, in paying attention, and in reverence. It’s a poem about waking that wakes us up (emphasis on “up”). The poem’s spiritual literacy is based in profound attention to the natural world. Accessibility and immediacy come together through the ordinary miracles of morning and invite the reader to “Watch … in happiness, in kindness.”
Adele Kenny is the author of 23 books (poetry and nonfiction) and the recipient of various awards for her poetry, including fellowships from the NJ State Arts Council. She is a former professor of creative writing, poetry editor of Tiferet, and founding director of the Carriage House Poetry Series.
Laurie Lamon chose:
“Gifts of Love” by Yehuda Amichai
Laurie Lamon is professor of English at Whitworth University in Spokane, Washington where she lives with her husband, William Siems, and their Scottish Terrier, Maude. Her two collections of poems are The Fork Without Hunger and Without Wings
Carole Stone chose:
Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art”
Carole explains: No matter how many times I read it I am so moved by the way she builds from small losses like car keys to the large one of her lover with its poignant description —Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture I love). Her vilanelle has been a great inspiration for mine.
Carole Stone’s book of poems American Rhapsody was published by CavanKerry Press in March, 2012. She has poems forthcoming in Exit Thirteen and Lips.
Nin Andrews gives us the "poem in her pocket"
Nin Andrews selected:
“Neruda’s Hat” by Kelli Russell Agodon
On a day when weather stole every breeze,
Pablo told her he kept bits of his poems
tucked behind the band in his hat.
He opened the windows to nothing
but more heat, asked her to wander with him
down to the beach, see if their bodies
could become waves.
When they returned he placed his hat,
open to sky, in the center of the table.
She filled it with papaya, figs, searched
for scraps of poems beneath the lining.
By evening, the hat was empty
and his typewriter, full
with pages that began something about ocean,
something about fruit.
And they didn’t notice the sky, full of tomorrow’s
stars or the blue and white swallow
carrying paper in its beak.
They sat outside until the edge of daylight
stretched itself across a new band of morning,
the shadow of a hat washing onto the shore.
Nin Andrews is the author of several collections of poetry including Why They Grow Wings, Midlife Crisis with Dick and Jane , The Book of Orgasms, Sleeping with Houdini, Dear Professor, Do You Live in a Vacuum, The Secret Life of Mannequins, and Southern Comfort. For more info, check out her blog at http://ninandrewswriter.blogspot.com.
Nin Andrews gives us the “poem in her pocket”
Nin Andrews selected:
“Neruda’s Hat” by Kelli Russell Agodon
On a day when weather stole every breeze,
Pablo told her he kept bits of his poems
tucked behind the band in his hat.
He opened the windows to nothing
but more heat, asked her to wander with him
down to the beach, see if their bodies
could become waves.
When they returned he placed his hat,
open to sky, in the center of the table.
She filled it with papaya, figs, searched
for scraps of poems beneath the lining.
By evening, the hat was empty
and his typewriter, full
with pages that began something about ocean,
something about fruit.
And they didn’t notice the sky, full of tomorrow’s
stars or the blue and white swallow
carrying paper in its beak.
They sat outside until the edge of daylight
stretched itself across a new band of morning,
the shadow of a hat washing onto the shore.
Nin Andrews is the author of several collections of poetry including Why They Grow Wings, Midlife Crisis with Dick and Jane , The Book of Orgasms, Sleeping with Houdini, Dear Professor, Do You Live in a Vacuum, The Secret Life of Mannequins, and Southern Comfort. For more info, check out her blog at http://ninandrewswriter.blogspot.com.
Welcoming Friday with Three "Poems in Your Pocket"
Martin Farawell chose…
“Northern Pike” by James Wright
Martin explains: The first time I read this poem, I don’t know how many years ago that was, I wanted to carry it with me. So I’ve carried it in the pocket of my memory ever since. It reminds me how powerful and evocative an apparently quiet, simple poem can be.
Martin Farawell is the Director of the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival
Diane Lockward chose…
“The Peace of Wild Things” by Wendell Berry
Diane explains: A wonderful poem to get you through the dark days of raising teenagers.
Kevin Carey chose…
“Starlight” by Phil Levine
Kevin Carey teaches writing at Salem State University. His book The One Fifteen to Penn Station, has just been released. kevincareywriter.com
Welcoming Friday with Three “Poems in Your Pocket”
Martin Farawell chose…
“Northern Pike” by James Wright
Martin explains: The first time I read this poem, I don’t know how many years ago that was, I wanted to carry it with me. So I’ve carried it in the pocket of my memory ever since. It reminds me how powerful and evocative an apparently quiet, simple poem can be.
Martin Farawell is the Director of the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival
Diane Lockward chose…
“The Peace of Wild Things” by Wendell Berry
Diane explains: A wonderful poem to get you through the dark days of raising teenagers.
Kevin Carey chose…
“Starlight” by Phil Levine
Kevin Carey teaches writing at Salem State University. His book The One Fifteen to Penn Station, has just been released. kevincareywriter.com
January Gill O'Neil's pick for "Poem in Your Pocket"
January Gill O’Neil writes…
My poem this time around will be William Carlos Williams’ poem “To Elsie.” It’s a poem I rediscovered recently, one I’ve always loved. And seems more relevant and timely than ever in our supercharged election season. How can you miss with a first line, “The pure products of America/ go crazy–” and the last lines, “No one/ to witness/ and adjust, no one to drive the car”? I believe that first line inspired Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl,” the poem that made me pay attention to poetry. Both poets were New Jersey natives.
“To Elsie”
William Carlos Williams
The pure products of America
go crazy
mountain folk from Kentucky
or the ribbed north end of
Jersey
with its isolate lakes and
valleys, its deaf-mutes, thieves
old names
and promiscuity between
devil-may-care men who have taken
to railroading
out of sheer lust of adventure
and young slatterns, bathed
in filth
from Monday to Saturday
to be tricked out that night
with gauds
from imaginations which have no
peasant traditions to give them
character
but flutter and flaunt
sheer rags-succumbing without
emotion
save numbed terror
under some hedge of choke-cherry
or viburnum-
which they cannot express
Unless it be that marriage
perhaps
with a dash of Indian blood
will throw up a girl so desolate
so hemmed round
with disease or murder
that she’ll be rescued by an
agent
reared by the state and
sent out at fifteen to work in
some hard-pressed
house in the suburbs
some doctor’s family, some Elsie
voluptuous water
expressing with broken
brain the truth about us
her great
ungainly hips and flopping breasts
addressed to cheap
jewelry
and rich young men with fine eyes
as if the earth under our feet
were
an excrement of some sky
and we degraded prisoners
destined
to hunger until we eat filth
while the imagination strains
after deer
going by fields of goldenrod in
the stifling heat of September
Somehow
it seems to destroy us
It is only in isolate flecks that
something
is given off
No one
to witness
and adjust, no one to drive the car
January Gill O’Neil is the author of Underlife (CavanKerry Press 2009) and the forthcoming Misery Islands (CavanKerry Press 2014). She is an assistant professor at Salem State University and executive director of the Massachusetts Poetry Festival.
January Gill O’Neil’s pick for “Poem in Your Pocket”
January Gill O’Neil writes…
My poem this time around will be William Carlos Williams’ poem “To Elsie.” It’s a poem I rediscovered recently, one I’ve always loved. And seems more relevant and timely than ever in our supercharged election season. How can you miss with a first line, “The pure products of America/ go crazy–” and the last lines, “No one/ to witness/ and adjust, no one to drive the car”? I believe that first line inspired Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl,” the poem that made me pay attention to poetry. Both poets were New Jersey natives.
“To Elsie”
William Carlos Williams
The pure products of America
go crazy
mountain folk from Kentucky
or the ribbed north end of
Jersey
with its isolate lakes and
valleys, its deaf-mutes, thieves
old names
and promiscuity between
devil-may-care men who have taken
to railroading
out of sheer lust of adventure
and young slatterns, bathed
in filth
from Monday to Saturday
to be tricked out that night
with gauds
from imaginations which have no
peasant traditions to give them
character
but flutter and flaunt
sheer rags-succumbing without
emotion
save numbed terror
under some hedge of choke-cherry
or viburnum-
which they cannot express
Unless it be that marriage
perhaps
with a dash of Indian blood
will throw up a girl so desolate
so hemmed round
with disease or murder
that she’ll be rescued by an
agent
reared by the state and
sent out at fifteen to work in
some hard-pressed
house in the suburbs
some doctor’s family, some Elsie
voluptuous water
expressing with broken
brain the truth about us
her great
ungainly hips and flopping breasts
addressed to cheap
jewelry
and rich young men with fine eyes
as if the earth under our feet
were
an excrement of some sky
and we degraded prisoners
destined
to hunger until we eat filth
while the imagination strains
after deer
going by fields of goldenrod in
the stifling heat of September
Somehow
it seems to destroy us
It is only in isolate flecks that
something
is given off
No one
to witness
and adjust, no one to drive the car
January Gill O’Neil is the author of Underlife (CavanKerry Press 2009) and the forthcoming Misery Islands (CavanKerry Press 2014). She is an assistant professor at Salem State University and executive director of the Massachusetts Poetry Festival.
Triple Tuesday: Poem in Your Pocket!
Baron Wormser chose:
“Low Red Moon” by Irene McKinney
Baron Wormser is the author/coauthor of a dozen books. He lives with his wife in Cabot, Vermont
Joseph O. Legaspi chose:
“Song” by Laura Kasischke
Joseph O. Legaspi is the author of Imago (CavanKerry Press) and resides in Queens, NY. Visit him at www.josepholegaspi.com.
Jeff Hale chose:
“The Children’s Year” from Life With Sam by Elizabeth Hall Hutner.
Jeff Hale is Director of Development for the Society of Arts in Healthcare.
Read Teresa Carson's pick for "Poem in Your Pocket"
Teresa Carson writes:
At this year’s Massachusetts Poetry Festival, Dawn Potter and I will be teaching a workshop called: The Dramatic Monologue: Writing the Other “I.” We will use “My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning to show how writing in the voice of someone else can teach you how to write in your own voice. It is an understatement to say that I am obsessed with this poem right now. On every re-reading of it I find something new—another layer of meaning, another perfect word choice, another place in which sound enhances meaning, another insight into the Duke’s character. Last week I marveled over the opening four words (“That’s my last Duchess”) and how the meaning of those words shifted—ever so slightly but oh so importantly— depending upon which one I chose to stress. Over the weekend I wondered why Browning, who chose words very carefully, chose “stoop” instead of “bow” and so to the OED I went. Today I’m thinking about the echo of Macbeth in “that spot” on the Duchess’ cheek. Why do new aspects of this poem keep opening to me? Because Browning, to paraphrase John Keats, loads every rift of his subject with ore; may we strive to do the same in our poems.
“My Last Duchess”
by Robert Browning
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now; Fra Pandolf’s hands
Worked busily a day, and there she stands.
Will’t please you sit and look at her? I said
“Fra Pandolf” by design, for never read
Strangers like you that pictured countenance,
The depth and passion of its earnest glance,
But to myself they turned (since none puts by
The curtain I have drawn for you, but I)
And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,
How such a glance came there; so, not the first
Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, ’twas not
Her husband’s presence only, called that spot
Of joy into the Duchess’ cheek; perhaps
Fra Pandolf chanced to say, “Her mantle laps
Over my lady’s wrist too much,” or “Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint
Half-flush that dies along her throat.” Such stuff
Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough
For calling up that spot of joy. She had
A heart—how shall I say?— too soon made glad,
Too easily impressed; she liked whate’er
She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.
Sir, ’twas all one! My favour at her breast,
The dropping of the daylight in the West,
The bough of cherries some officious fool
Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule
She rode with round the terrace—all and each
Would draw from her alike the approving speech,
Or blush, at least. She thanked men—good! but thanked
Somehow—I know not how—as if she ranked
My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name
With anybody’s gift. Who’d stoop to blame
This sort of trifling? Even had you skill
In speech—which I have not—to make your will
Quite clear to such an one, and say, “Just this
Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss,
Or there exceed the mark”—and if she let
Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set
Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse—
E’en then would be some stooping; and I choose
Never to stoop. Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt,
Whene’er I passed her; but who passed without
Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands
As if alive. Will’t please you rise? We’ll meet
The company below, then. I repeat,
The Count your master’s known munificence
Is ample warrant that no just pretense
Of mine for dowry will be disallowed;
Though his fair daughter’s self, as I avowed
At starting, is my object. Nay, we’ll go
Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,
Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,
Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me
Read Teresa Carson’s pick for “Poem in Your Pocket”
Teresa Carson writes:
At this year’s Massachusetts Poetry Festival, Dawn Potter and I will be teaching a workshop called: The Dramatic Monologue: Writing the Other “I.” We will use “My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning to show how writing in the voice of someone else can teach you how to write in your own voice. It is an understatement to say that I am obsessed with this poem right now. On every re-reading of it I find something new—another layer of meaning, another perfect word choice, another place in which sound enhances meaning, another insight into the Duke’s character. Last week I marveled over the opening four words (“That’s my last Duchess”) and how the meaning of those words shifted—ever so slightly but oh so importantly— depending upon which one I chose to stress. Over the weekend I wondered why Browning, who chose words very carefully, chose “stoop” instead of “bow” and so to the OED I went. Today I’m thinking about the echo of Macbeth in “that spot” on the Duchess’ cheek. Why do new aspects of this poem keep opening to me? Because Browning, to paraphrase John Keats, loads every rift of his subject with ore; may we strive to do the same in our poems.
“My Last Duchess”
by Robert Browning
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now; Fra Pandolf’s hands
Worked busily a day, and there she stands.
Will’t please you sit and look at her? I said
“Fra Pandolf” by design, for never read
Strangers like you that pictured countenance,
The depth and passion of its earnest glance,
But to myself they turned (since none puts by
The curtain I have drawn for you, but I)
And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,
How such a glance came there; so, not the first
Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, ’twas not
Her husband’s presence only, called that spot
Of joy into the Duchess’ cheek; perhaps
Fra Pandolf chanced to say, “Her mantle laps
Over my lady’s wrist too much,” or “Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint
Half-flush that dies along her throat.” Such stuff
Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough
For calling up that spot of joy. She had
A heart—how shall I say?— too soon made glad,
Too easily impressed; she liked whate’er
She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.
Sir, ’twas all one! My favour at her breast,
The dropping of the daylight in the West,
The bough of cherries some officious fool
Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule
She rode with round the terrace—all and each
Would draw from her alike the approving speech,
Or blush, at least. She thanked men—good! but thanked
Somehow—I know not how—as if she ranked
My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name
With anybody’s gift. Who’d stoop to blame
This sort of trifling? Even had you skill
In speech—which I have not—to make your will
Quite clear to such an one, and say, “Just this
Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss,
Or there exceed the mark”—and if she let
Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set
Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse—
E’en then would be some stooping; and I choose
Never to stoop. Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt,
Whene’er I passed her; but who passed without
Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands
As if alive. Will’t please you rise? We’ll meet
The company below, then. I repeat,
The Count your master’s known munificence
Is ample warrant that no just pretense
Of mine for dowry will be disallowed;
Though his fair daughter’s self, as I avowed
At starting, is my object. Nay, we’ll go
Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,
Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,
Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me
Today's "Poem in Your Pocket" from Kenneth Rosen
Kenneth Rosen’s “Poem in Your Pocket” pick:
Melancholy Inside Families
Pablo Neruda (tr. James Wright and Robert Bly)
I keep a blue bottle.
Inside it an ear and a portrait.
When the night dominates
the feathers of the owl,
when the hoarse cherry tree
rips out its lips and makes menacing gestures
with rinds which the ocean wind often perforates–
then I know that there are immense expanses hidden from us,
quartz in slugs,
ooze,
blue waters for a battle,
much silence, many ore-veins
of withdrawals and camphor,
fallen things, medallions, kindnesses,
parachutes, kisses.
It is only the passage of one day to another,
a single bottle moving over the seas,
and a dining room where roses arrive,
a dining room deserted
as a fish-bone; I am speaking of
a smashed cup, a curtain, at the end
of a deserted room through which a river passes
dragging along the stones. It is a house
set on the foundations of the rain,
a house of two floors with the required number of windows,
and climbing vines faithful in every particular.
I walk through afternoons, I arrive
full of mud and death,
dragging along the earth and its roots,
and its indistinct stomach in which corpses
are sleeping with wheat,
metals, and pushed-over elephants.
But above all there is a terrifying,
a terrifying deserted dining room,
with its broken olive oil cruets,
and vinegar running under its chairs,
one ray of moonlight tied down,
something dark, and I look
for a comparison inside myself:
perhaps it is a grocery store surrounded by the sea
and torn clothing from which sea water is dripping.
It is only a deserted dining room,
and around it there are expanses,
sunken factories, pieces of timber
which I alone know,
because I am sad, and because I travel,
and I know the earth, and I am sad.
Today’s “Poem in Your Pocket” from Kenneth Rosen
Kenneth Rosen’s “Poem in Your Pocket” pick:
Melancholy Inside Families
Pablo Neruda (tr. James Wright and Robert Bly)
I keep a blue bottle.
Inside it an ear and a portrait.
When the night dominates
the feathers of the owl,
when the hoarse cherry tree
rips out its lips and makes menacing gestures
with rinds which the ocean wind often perforates–
then I know that there are immense expanses hidden from us,
quartz in slugs,
ooze,
blue waters for a battle,
much silence, many ore-veins
of withdrawals and camphor,
fallen things, medallions, kindnesses,
parachutes, kisses.
It is only the passage of one day to another,
a single bottle moving over the seas,
and a dining room where roses arrive,
a dining room deserted
as a fish-bone; I am speaking of
a smashed cup, a curtain, at the end
of a deserted room through which a river passes
dragging along the stones. It is a house
set on the foundations of the rain,
a house of two floors with the required number of windows,
and climbing vines faithful in every particular.
I walk through afternoons, I arrive
full of mud and death,
dragging along the earth and its roots,
and its indistinct stomach in which corpses
are sleeping with wheat,
metals, and pushed-over elephants.
But above all there is a terrifying,
a terrifying deserted dining room,
with its broken olive oil cruets,
and vinegar running under its chairs,
one ray of moonlight tied down,
something dark, and I look
for a comparison inside myself:
perhaps it is a grocery store surrounded by the sea
and torn clothing from which sea water is dripping.
It is only a deserted dining room,
and around it there are expanses,
sunken factories, pieces of timber
which I alone know,
because I am sad, and because I travel,
and I know the earth, and I am sad.
Why Gray Jacobik chose "August 1945" for the poem in her pocket
Gray Jacobik is carrying…
“August 1945” by Hayden Carruth from his book Scrambled Eggs and Whiskey.
She writes: It’s about four young soldiers in Italy waiting for WWII to end, getting drunk and thinking about their predicament, the Atom bomb that’s just gone off over Japan, and the general misery of war. Carruth links their situation with that of Odysseus’s soldiers twenty-five hundred years earlier, and, with deft elegance, that of all soldiers at war. It is so marvelously timeless and straightforward and heartbreaking. I’m carrying it because it represents an element of the human condition that causes me to think and to cry, and because I love it (and love Carruth for writing it and for surviving that war).
Why Gray Jacobik chose “August 1945” for the poem in her pocket
Gray Jacobik is carrying…
“August 1945” by Hayden Carruth from his book Scrambled Eggs and Whiskey.
She writes: It’s about four young soldiers in Italy waiting for WWII to end, getting drunk and thinking about their predicament, the Atom bomb that’s just gone off over Japan, and the general misery of war. Carruth links their situation with that of Odysseus’s soldiers twenty-five hundred years earlier, and, with deft elegance, that of all soldiers at war. It is so marvelously timeless and straightforward and heartbreaking. I’m carrying it because it represents an element of the human condition that causes me to think and to cry, and because I love it (and love Carruth for writing it and for surviving that war).
Jeanne Marie Beaumont's answer to "Poem in Your Pocket"
Jeanne Marie Beaumont writes:
I am reading upstate that day (Poem in Your Pocket Day is April 26th), so I plan to stuff my pockets like a magician preparing for an act. One that I will carry for sure, for the sheer exuberant pleasure of it is…
Frank O’Hara’s “Today”
Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate sodas!
You really are beautiful! Pearls,
harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins! all
the stuff they’ve always talked about
still makes a poem a surprise!
These things are with us every day
even on beachheads and biers. They
do have meaning. They’re strong as rocks.
Jeanne Marie Beaumont’s answer to “Poem in Your Pocket”
Jeanne Marie Beaumont writes:
I am reading upstate that day (Poem in Your Pocket Day is April 26th), so I plan to stuff my pockets like a magician preparing for an act. One that I will carry for sure, for the sheer exuberant pleasure of it is…
Frank O’Hara’s “Today”
Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate sodas!
You really are beautiful! Pearls,
harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins! all
the stuff they’ve always talked about
still makes a poem a surprise!
These things are with us every day
even on beachheads and biers. They
do have meaning. They’re strong as rocks.
3 for the price of 1: today's "Poem in Your Pocket" results
Dawn Potter selected
Hayden Carruth’s “Emergency Haying”
Jean Churchill selected
Robert Seder, “To The Marrow”
From Jean:
I am the widow of Robert Seder, who wrote “To The Marrow” I lost him 10 years ago, right before I turned 50. Now I have turned 60 and I still miss him every day.
Carolyn Bardos selected
“Saint Judas” by James Wright
From Carolyn:
This is a poem that I read pretty much every day.
3 for the price of 1: today’s “Poem in Your Pocket” results
Dawn Potter selected
Hayden Carruth’s “Emergency Haying”
Jean Churchill selected
Robert Seder, “To The Marrow”
From Jean:
I am the widow of Robert Seder, who wrote “To The Marrow” I lost him 10 years ago, right before I turned 50. Now I have turned 60 and I still miss him every day.
Carolyn Bardos selected
“Saint Judas” by James Wright
From Carolyn:
This is a poem that I read pretty much every day.
The poem in Cat Doty's pocket
“The Two-headed Calf” by Laura Gilpin
Tomorrow when the farm boys find this
freak of nature, they will wrap his body
in newspaper and carry him to the museum.
But tonight he is alive and in the north
field with his mother. It is a perfect
summer evening: the moon rising over
the orchard, the wind in the grass.
And as he stares into the sky, there
are twice as many stars as usual.
From Cat:
I started carrying poems in my pocket when I was in sixth grade and needed to remind myself that I would survive Sister Mary DePaul. One that I carried then, love still, and gave to my own sixth-graders last week is May Swenson’s The Blind Man.
The poem in Cat Doty’s pocket
“The Two-headed Calf” by Laura Gilpin
Tomorrow when the farm boys find this
freak of nature, they will wrap his body
in newspaper and carry him to the museum.
But tonight he is alive and in the north
field with his mother. It is a perfect
summer evening: the moon rising over
the orchard, the wind in the grass.
And as he stares into the sky, there
are twice as many stars as usual.
From Cat:
I started carrying poems in my pocket when I was in sixth grade and needed to remind myself that I would survive Sister Mary DePaul. One that I carried then, love still, and gave to my own sixth-graders last week is May Swenson’s The Blind Man.
Today's "poem in the pocket" from Howard Levy and Carol Snyder
Howard Levy selected:
Auden’s “Musee des Beaux Arts”
He writes, “No poem I know captures so gracefully the moment of the artist trying to stop time, to take on the responsibility for seeing everything that happens in the world and reporting it.”
Carol Snyder, President of the Cavan Kerry Press Board, selected:
“Autopsy” by Teresa Carson
She writes, “Because of its quiet pain and vulnerability. So many have experienced these feelings totally alone. Now they don’t have to. You’ve given them a voice.”
Today’s “poem in the pocket” from Howard Levy and Carol Snyder
Howard Levy selected:
Auden’s “Musee des Beaux Arts”
He writes, “No poem I know captures so gracefully the moment of the artist trying to stop time, to take on the responsibility for seeing everything that happens in the world and reporting it.”
Carol Snyder, President of the Cavan Kerry Press Board, selected:
“Autopsy” by Teresa Carson
She writes, “Because of its quiet pain and vulnerability. So many have experienced these feelings totally alone. Now they don’t have to. You’ve given them a voice.”
Today’s “Poem in Your Pocket” from CKP Publisher and Senior Editor Joan Cusack Handler
“Without” by Donald Hall
“Otherwise” by Jane Kenyon
“Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver
No one who knows me is surprised that I came up with 3 poems instead of one for Poem in Your Pocket Day–I actually had 8 and took hours deciding on these 3 that refused to be set aside….
Today is a harsh day. I’m in my home in the East Hampton woods –the sun’s high, the plum trees are flowering and the weeping cherry and my chest caves in with the absence of my Dad to share this holiness– gone 2 and 1/2 years ago after 99 and 1/2 of life– not long enough never enough when the life is loved. Then I read Donald Hall’s “Without” -the book and the poem and the fire erupted again in my chest and someone-some deep trusted soul came in and sat beside me holding my grief in his hands.
To come back to blossom and life and every minute counts and we’re each a perfect creation, I sought out Jane Kenyon’s “Otherwise” and Mary Oliver’s “Wild Geese.”
All good things,
Joan
Today's "Poem in Your Pocket" from CKP Publisher and Senior Editor Joan Cusack Handler
“Without” by Donald Hall
“Otherwise” by Jane Kenyon
“Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver
No one who knows me is surprised that I came up with 3 poems instead of one for Poem in Your Pocket Day–I actually had 8 and took hours deciding on these 3 that refused to be set aside….
Today is a harsh day. I’m in my home in the East Hampton woods –the sun’s high, the plum trees are flowering and the weeping cherry and my chest caves in with the absence of my Dad to share this holiness– gone 2 and 1/2 years ago after 99 and 1/2 of life– not long enough never enough when the life is loved. Then I read Donald Hall’s “Without” -the book and the poem and the fire erupted again in my chest and someone-some deep trusted soul came in and sat beside me holding my grief in his hands.
To come back to blossom and life and every minute counts and we’re each a perfect creation, I sought out Jane Kenyon’s “Otherwise” and Mary Oliver’s “Wild Geese.”
All good things,
Joan
Today’s bonus “poem in the pocket” from Michael Miller
To My Daughters, Asleep
Surrounded by trees I cannot name
that fill with birds I cannot tell apart
I see my children growing away from me;
the hinges of the heart are broken.
Is it too late to start, too late to learn
all the words for love before they wake?
–Robin Robertson
A note from Michael:
With our son and his pregnant wife arriving on April 2nd from New Orleans, this seems like the poem I should be carrying.
Today's bonus "poem in the pocket" from Michael Miller
To My Daughters, Asleep
Surrounded by trees I cannot name
that fill with birds I cannot tell apart
I see my children growing away from me;
the hinges of the heart are broken.
Is it too late to start, too late to learn
all the words for love before they wake?
–Robin Robertson
A note from Michael:
With our son and his pregnant wife arriving on April 2nd from New Orleans, this seems like the poem I should be carrying.
