it's all about the layers around here {poetry thursday}
happy poetry thursday to all!
i didn't have time to bring my pen to paper and write my own words this week (too busy editing the words of others), but i did venture out into the web to find some poems that got my mind turning a bit.
for my post at PT today, i talked about layers. i feel like poetry is all about the layers of our lives, but i think this is because poetry is really about the journey that is life. this is why poetry has plopped itself down into the middle of my world. and why my response was simply "you are welcome to stay" when i realized it wasn't going to leave.
as i read this poem, "Persimmons" by Li-Young Lee, the words wrapped around me like a blanket and i settled into the poet's memories as he peeled them back, layer by layer. i admit to letting the tears just fall as i read the last lines again this evening. not that it is sad so much as gorgeous. it is as though the lines have reached inside of me. inside of my heart. i breathe them in.
i love poetry.
and then i visited "True Love" by Sharon Olds. over the last few months, she keeps stopping by for tea. and how lucky am i to read her words when she does. this poem speaks to a piece of the reality of married sex. how it is to feel so very comfortable with another person. to be yourself with this person. to love one another. but to also venture down the hallway to the bathroom in the middle of the night together after you have made love...
and finally...i discovered a delightful podcast about sex, weddings, and wrestling at poetryfoundation.org. click over to this page and scroll down to the May 24, 2006 edition. sit back with your tea, or wine, or coffee, or ice cream....and enjoy.
poetry
Reader Comments (18)
"Persimmons" is one of my favorite poems ever.
Thank you - beautiful and inspiring. Love the Hope photos too! Hope is one of my favouite things - I love the Emily Dickinson poem Hope is the thing with feathers.
You will know it I know you will ... but here it is anyway.
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
Sharon Olds says it like no one else I've found.
Love Olds and this one is beautiful, but "Persimmons" is my new favorite. Thanks for the links!
beautiful choice of poems, esp. the olds...one of my favorites.
Remarkable poems, I love poetry Thursday. It's true, poetry is in us all, because it is in the layers of our lives. BTW, I really like your layout and pictures
Just catching up on your last few posts & Liz, I'm so moved by your writings. You are SUCH an inspiring, genuine soul and that does make you a beacon of hope in the world, that soul searching, giving, real souls like you still exist and seek to thrive and bloom. Shirley MacClaine said, "The most important relationship we'll ever have is the one with ourselves." I've definitely felt, feel many of the same things as you describe, and it is such a beautiful relief when another expressed as eloquently as you do whats happening inside your own self.
Love the Sharon Olds' poem. So true.
that first poem gave me chills...it was almost stream of conscious and yet it all connected...it was layers peeled away to reveal that the core is the very same stuff as the skin...i loved it!
Oh my god, what beautiful poems. I think Persimmons is the most beautiful thing I have ever read.
You share such treasures my love!!!
This is alwayss such an inspiring and soothing place to come. Such a reflection of you my dear!!
XOXO
I'm going to read Persimmons in a sec, but just had to say that Madeleine and I read True Love today, sitting in a cafe by the sea, drinking a glass of champagne (only way to do it when contemplating sex) and we both agreed that the poem summed up what we were looking for. sigh.... love to you, inspiring woman x
okay, Persimmons made me want to cry with the beauty of his words. phenomenal. thank you for giving me this gift today x
thank you for sharing these great poems.
Thank you for sharing this ("Persimmons" by Li-Young Lee). It was so touching. So beautiful. I forget how life even without the pictures is amazingly alive ...to the touch, from scents and the sounds. I will have to come back to read the other two. For now this one really filled my hearts
Li-Young Lee's poems are divine! Thanks for sharing this one in particular.
Thank you for sharing Li-Young Lee and Sharon Olds today.
what a perfect choice of poems....yesterday i was with Susannah reading this exact poem and it made me sigh deeply then as well......i really really really love this......it gives me faith that people can be happy together even after years of marriage and children......
:)