Number 125: George Pope Morris "Woodman, Spare That Tree!"

The Oak

Woodman, spare that tree!

Touch not a single bough!

In youth it sheltered me,

And I'll protect it now.

'Twas my forefather's hand

That placed it near his cot;

There, woodman, let it stand,

Thy axe shall harm it not.

That old familiar tree,

Whose glory and renown

Are spread o'er land and sea--

And wouldst thou hew it down?

Woodman, forebear thy stroke!

Cut not its earth-bound ties;

Oh, spare that aged oak,

Now towering to the skies!

When but an idle boy,

I sought its grateful shade;

In all their gushing joy

Here, too, my sisters played.

My mother kissed me here;

My father pressed my hand--

Forgive this foolish tear,

But let that old oak stand.

My heart-strings round thee cling,

Close as thy bark, old friend!

Here shall the wild-bird sing,

And still thy branches bend.

Old tree! the storm still brave!

And, woodman, leave the spot;

While I've a hand to save,

thy axe shall harm it not.

Hap Notes: Just thought I'd show a bit of what American poetry was like around the same time period with Keats and Shelley and Byron et. al. This poem by George Pope Morris (1802-1864) was published in 1837 (a good 15 years after the deaths of the three English Romantic poets) and it sort of shows you why, in spite of American poetry's dear thoughts, English teachers taught all that British poetry for so many years. Morris was 35 when he wrote this poem – Keats was about 24 when he wrote yesterday's "Grecian Urn."

Now, this poem of Morris was almost immediately turned into a song, as many of his poems were. Here's the first one if you'd like to hear it: www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjyD5wZjZ-U
Here's a hipper version from the inimitable Phil Harris: www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwcYPCpIIkY&feature=related
In fact, no less than Edgar Allen Poe pronounced Morris one of the great song writers/poets of America. Some consider this the first "environmental protest song" but I think that's gilding the lily a bit, don't you? Morris' poem was originally titled "The Oak."

Morris was not primarily a poet, although he wrote a good lot of it. He was an editor and publisher. He founded the New York Evening Mirror with Nathan Parker Willis and the Mirror first published Poe's "The Raven". (Willis, a famed travel writer, was a friend to both Poe and Longfellow.) In fact the paper published lots of poetry and criticism and was successful at it.

In 1846 Morris and Willis left the Mirror to start the Home Journal magazine. The Home Journal reviewed a lot of poetry also, including women poets, and reviewed Thoreau's Walden and Hawthorne's Blithedale Romance. The Home Journal, by the by, eventually turned into Town and Country magazine in 1846. It is the oldest continually published general interest magazine in the United States- you can find it on the news stand today. (Breaking off briefly to say that if you were reading Town and Country and eating a roll of Necco Wafers you would be doing what folks did in 1860, sorta.)

Morris says he based this poem on an actual incident that happened with a friend of his. While they were traveling around together, his friend noticed that a man was going to chop down a tree that had been outside of his old home (and was now owned by the "woodsman") and the friend begged the man not to chop down the tree. In the end, the "woodsman" was given $10 to let it stand in perpetuity (which sort of strikes me as more of a story of a man who needed the money and was selling fire wood (which is why he was cutting down the tree) and a guy who actually had $10- a lot of money in 1846. However, this does not diminish the nobility of the sentiment and a tree is a noble creature.)

This is another of the poems my mother and grandfather could recite on cue. I'll bet someone older in your family knows of it, also. Just as an aside, oaks can grow to be huge. There's one in Nottinghamshire, England that's estimated to be at least 800 years old – Robin Hood was supposedly sheltered by it.

You can find and entire book of Morris' work here: readbookonline.net/books/Morris/330/

Here's a little extra Morris poem bonus:

The Miniature

William was holding in his hand
The likeness of his wife!
Fresh, as if touched by fairy wand,
With beauty, grace, and life.
He almost thought it spoke:--he gazed
Upon the bauble still,
Absorbed, delighted, and amazed,
To view the artist's skill.

"This picture is yourself, dear Jane--
'Tis drawn to nature true:
I've kissed it o'er and o'er again,
It is much like you."
"And has it kissed you back, my dear?"
"Why--no--my love," said he.
"Then, William, it is very clear
'Tis not at all LIKE ME!"

-- George Pope Morris

Number 124: John Keats "Ode On a Grecian Urn"

Ode On a Grecian Urn

Thou still unravished bride of quietness,

Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,

Sylvan historian, who canst thus express

A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:

What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape

Of deities or mortals, or of both,

In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? 

What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?

What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? 

What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;

Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared,

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:

Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave

Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;

Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal — yet, do not grieve;

She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,

Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed

Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;

And, happy melodist, unwearied,

Forever piping songs forever new; 

More happy love! more happy, happy love!

Forever warm and still to be enjoyed,

Forever panting, and forever young;

All breathing human passion far above,

That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed,

A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.

Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,
And all her silken flanks with garlands dressed?
What little town by river or sea shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell
Why thou art desolate, can e'er return.

O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede 

Of marble men and maidens overwrought,

With forest branches and the trodden weed; 

Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought

As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!

When old age shall this generation waste,

Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe

Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,

"Beauty is truth, truth beauty, — that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

--John Keats

Hap Notes: It's hard to believe that Keats wrote six of the greatest English Romantic odes in a period of 3-6 weeks, isn't it? They were all written around this time of year in 1819. Keats wrote poetry for a total of about 6 years, he died when he was 25 – it's almost too extraordinary to contemplate. How did this young man, whose work, in his time, was highly criticized as "uncouth" and "raw" ever write these wonderful poems? This is one of those six odes.

When I read this poem as a kid, I thought the ode was written ON the urn- like a label. This silly thought has a bit of merit – the urn IS telling us something about life on earth, its transitive quality. But it isn't actually written on the urn- I suppose you knew this already. (Come on, I was 12 years old – I was guessing.)

Whether Keats is talking about a specific urn (I don't know that he was) or not, the poem is describing an antique urn, the pictures on it, and then telling us something about the nature of love, life, truth and beauty. Not bad for 50 lines or so, eh?

First some vocabulary: Tempe and Arcady are places, Tempe is in Thessaly (Greece) and Arcady is a region in Greece. These places are used to indicate the pastoral ideal.
The "little town" he's talking about is not pictured on the urn but is "emptied" of its residents as the figures on the urn are running around in fields and making sacrifices.
Brede means braiding or embroidery.
Loth is reluctant.
Attic shape means Attica in Greece- he's just saying it's a Grecian urn. (I won't tell you what I thought this meant when I was a kid but you can guess, I'm sure. And it makes sense, too – maybe they kept the urn in the attic... just sayin'.)

Okay, now to the poem. Keats calls the urn an "unravished bride" because it is intact. It has existed down through the ages in its solitude. It is a "foster child" of silence and time because time has left it in its pristine condition and it is well, silent. So, like any child, it exhibits qualities of its parents, it has "adopted" them.

The poet says the music being played on the urn, because we are just seeing pictures of people playing music, is all the sweeter because the music is for the spirit, the artist created the music players for us to see that music exists, is being played, is part of the scene. The piper will always play happy songs. The young man can never touch his fair maiden, but they will always be, on the urn, in love, always beautiful, always in the blush of romance.

Okay, you're getting the drift now, I suppose. The urn is a frozen bit of blissful time that reminds us of the beauties and joys of life that drift down through the ages. We know and understand what is going on in the pictures and future generations will contemplate the same things as they stare at the urn. This beauty, this frozen time, this understanding of the joys of everyday life (oops I'm sliding into MY interpretation now) is the only truth we can all understand. It means something to us as we see happy pipers, lovers, worshipers, going about their lives on this silent piece of pottery (or marble- I'm never sure on that).) This beauty fills us, we know its truth. And this, Keats says, is all we know and all we need to know. This filling up of life – the urn reminds us of the precious gift of life (uh, that's my interpretation again.)

I have to admit that I used to hate the last two stanzas of the poem because I thought (in my youth) they sounded rather facile and shallow. But Keats isn't really talking about only physical beauty here, he's talking about the beauty of life itself, in all its happiness. (I suppose I should mention to NOT use my interpretation of this poem for a term paper. Keats is certainly saying that youth and beauty are fleeting and love eventually leads to sorrow and the body ages. But he was 25 years old and I think the beauty and truth he feels are those one feels as a youth. As one ages, one sees the great beauty in aged beat-up urns, as well. And the spirit of Keats in the poem makes me think he'd have known this as he aged. And of course, he's saying that art will live on as generations fade.)

Keats has always seemed to me to be like a sort of angel that left poetry for us and then disappeared – which is a sort of sappy way to look at it when you consider his last days which were filled with smelly suffering.

Think on this – the poor guy is sick with tuberculosis (which they haven't figured out yet), he's bled (a common medical practice. Even George Washington was pretty much bled to death to "cure" him) and his friends think a trip to the warm sunny climes of Italy will help cure him. So this pallid, sickly poet and his physician and his friend Joseph Severn get on a ship. It's a rough crossing with big storms and then days of no wind or ship movement. Imagine you are that weak and ill and stuck on a sailing ship in the middle of the ocean. Sheesh! When they finally get to Italy, no one is allowed to leave the ship because there was an outbreak of cholera in England and the Italian authorities didn't want it to spread. By they time they get off the ship they had been on it for a month.

By the time they get off the ship it's November and it's not all that warm in Italy really. Keats had asked for some tincture of opium (he was in pain) and Severn had some for him but Keats may have seen the drug as a way to commit suicide (at least it seemed that way) so Severn finally ended up giving it to the doctor to hold. Keats was never given the drug again (this is sad as his pain increases.) Instead the physician prescribed a "diet" because he though Keats' trouble was stomach related. So now we have this thin, weak, pale guy on a diet of one anchovy and one piece of bread a day!! (I'm not particularly blaming the doctor here – the medical profession is littered with as much idiocy as it is heroism.) Three months later (!!!!) Keats died. Severn held him through the "death rattling" breathing and he passed on. Keats knew he was going and was somewhat relieved. He is said to have said, "I shall die easy; don't be frightened—be firm, and thank God it has come."

Now, go have a hearty breakfast or lunch or supper. Take a good long walk. Enjoy the trees and the weather, whatever it may be. Thank your stars no doctor will bleed you to death if you get sick and on top of all that Keats left you some lovely verses to read. Don't wallow in sorrow, now – be glad that Keats left some of his best thoughts with us to enjoy. Death will come to us all. And his beautiful words hold some truth. Our beauties are transitory – rejoice in living in them. That's the gift we get from Keats' life – and that, is a lot really. It's universes full of sad joys.

The pictures are Severn's sketch of Keats while he was tending him in Italy and Keats' sketch of an urn he'd seen. Isn't it marvelous that people drew things then?

Here's where we've talked about Keats before: happopoemouse.blogspot.com/2011/01/number-37-john-keats-on-first-looking.html

P.S. Over the years I have loved this poem, written parodies of it ("Ode to Grecian Formula", "Ode to Greasy Earnings" (about a waitress), despised it and, after all these years, have come back to cherishing its youth and warmth. The poem can take a lot of abuse and still stand as a truth – just like the urn in the poem. Now, off for a good walk and a hearty lunch and a more than a bit of thanks to Keats!

Number 123: Samuel Taylor Coleridge "Kubla Khan"

Kubla Khan

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:
And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw:
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight 'twould win me
That with music loud and long
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

-- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Hap Notes: Where to start?
Should we talk about Coleridge (1772-1834) and his friend Wordsworth starting the English Romantic movement in poetry (of which Byron, Keats and Shelley were the second generation)?

Should we talk of his immense knowledge of literature (he single-handedly got Shakespeare's Hamlet out of the critical dustbin where it had been moldering for years as a "bad play"), philosophy (he was familiar with Kant long before anyone else knew who he was), German (he was assigned to translate Goethe's Faust- which is still a controversy since he reputedly never finished it- yet in 2007 Oxford University Press published what is supposedly his finished translation), and metaphysics?

Or do we talk about his monumental addiction to tincture of opium (some call it laudanum- and it was far cheaper than a bottle of gin in those days) and his recurring debilitating depressions?

I suppose we have to face the opium since Coleridge said that this poem came to him in an opium dream. First off, yes, it's a tad disjointed and Coleridge knew this and had a reason for it which is pretty famous. He said, while in the heat of writing it all down in an opiate furor, someone came to the door, a "person from Porlock," and the visitor ( a bill collector or something) took up an hour of his time and when he got back to the manuscript, the fire of creativity had burned out and he could only vaguely recall the rest of the dreamy scene. Forever after a "person from porlock" is sort of the British equivalent of "the dog ate my homework." (Breaking off briefly to say that Stevie Smith wrote a wonderful poem about this- we'll get to it later, I hope.) Coleridge claims the poem was going to be 300 lines or so but when he got back to the manuscript he had to dimly recall the vivid vision.

Some vocabulary: Athwart means "from one side to the other." "Cedarn" just means composed of cedars- the tree. "Chaffy grain" is the seed husks of wheat or some other grain- he's just saying that the fountain erupts like watching a thresher with the stuff spitting out everywhere.

Now, what's this poem about save for the obvious description of a place built by the Mongolian leader (or Khan) Kublai, the grandson, by the by, of Genghis Khan. Coleridge had been reading about the great Mongol conqueror who invaded pretty much everywhere: China, Japan, Vietnam, Burma, Mesopotamia, Tibet, Russia. It was Kublai Khan that Marco Polo visited and stayed with for more than 15 years. Shangdu (Xanadu) was Kublai's "summer capital." The Mongols had two goals- conquest and trade- and they were very very good at it.

However, there's more to the poem than just ice domes and incense trees. Coleridge is saying something about the writing of poetry and contrasting the man-made with the imaginative. The last stanzas have the poet creating lasting domes in the air through inspiration and imagination.

The more one reads about the poem, the more one wants to throttle that guy from Porlock – there are explications aplenty about this seminal work of Coleridge. I think I'm going to let you enjoy the dreamy drama of the poem and not weigh it down with a lot of literary theory. When I was a kid, I loved the poem because of its dreamy, exotic imagery and while I know Coleridge saw more in the vision than just that, the poem is easily enjoyable as a good read. Read it aloud with lots of drama- it's fun.

Here's a good Coleridge quote: That willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith." (That's right, Coleridge coined the term.)

And another: "The happiness of life is made up of minute fractions - the little, soon forgotten charities of a kiss or a smile, a kind look or heartfelt compliment."

and again: "Works of imagination should be written in very plain language; the more purely imaginative they are the more necessary it is to be plain."

One more: "I wish our clever young poets would remember my homely definitions of prose and poetry; that is, prose = words in their best order; - poetry = the best words in the best order."

You can find more Coleridge here: www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/292

P.S. I have NO idea what kind of drugs were used in the making of the movie Xanadu with Olivia Newton John and Andy Gibb.

(For those of you who are Carrol fans, I've often thought that the Caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland was Coleridge and that maybe the Mad Hatter was a Coleridge benefactor, Richard "Conversation" Sharp... just a random thought)

Number 122: e.e. cummings "Chansons Innocentes: I"

Chansons Innocentes: I

in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles far and wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it's
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far and wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's
spring
and
the
goat-footed

balloonMan whistles
far
and
wee

--e.e. cummings

Hap Notes: I suppose it's almost obligatory to use this poem in the spring. It's probably the first poem that occurs to me when I think of the season (I was going to say "springs to mind" but didn't want the spontaneous thought to seem too cute.) Cummings (1894-1962), in spite of his "tricksy" orthographics, wrote many poems without changing the traditional case work of the letters. His poems with the run-together words and interesting punctuations were often intended to be seen as a word sculpture in addition to being read as a poem.

Cummings (born Edward Estlin Cummings) was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts to Edward and Rebecca Cummings and was always called Estlin at home. His dad was a professor of political science and sociology at Harvard (and was later a Unitarian minister) and his mom was an unconventional mother who read poetry aloud to the children (he had a younger sister, Elizabeth) and eschewed the "typical" "feminine" role of housewife. (I use the quotation marks to make clear my snide aversion to the idea that there can be such a thing. I don't believe femininity has much to do with daily house chores.) She encouraged him to write a poem every day – he wrote his first poem at the age of three. He pretty much hit the ground running as far as becoming a poet is concerned.

Cummings went to Harvard and majored in English and Classics studies where he graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor's and went on to get his master's there as well. While at Harvard he roomed with John Dos Passos (there's a pair, eh?) While in the Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps, he was stationed in Paris awaiting assignment and fell in love with the place. He would return to Paris many times in his life. He was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1918. Cummings had an outspoken aversion to war throughout his life.

Edward Cummings, the poet's father, was an extraordinarily capable man who was both well-educated and could repair things- a potent mix. Cummings always said his dad could do anything and he admired him tremendously. His father was always one of his greatest fans so it was mutual.

Cummings spent some travel time in Russia and I think that's why he supported Joseph McCarthy's "red scare" shenanigans. Cummings was a Republican back in the day when a Republican is what a Democrat is, politically, today. Republicans in contemporary culture could not even tolerate the national programs that even Richard Nixon developed today (the EPA, the school lunch programs, tax incentives for the poor etc.) Just sayin'.

Okay, let's get to the poem, yes? The old balloon man changes in each description, gradually becoming Pan, the god of rustic music and shepherds and flocks and wild nature. The expression "far and wee" sounds very much like the sounds a "pan pipe" would make. The world is full of colorful balloons, temptingly splashy puddles and fudgey muds. The children are running and dancing like the lambs of the season. The poem is filled, the way much of cummings' work is, with joy and sensuality. Remember too, that he avidly studied Greek and Roman works and mythology.

Cummings major influences are probably imagists Amy Lowell and Gertrude Stein. One can see the mix of influences with cummings and Dos Passos a bit too, I think.

By the by, I don't know that cummings preferred his name to constantly be spelled in lower case letters. I believe he did it as a form of modesty and humbleness. I just followed along with the traditional spelling- very un-cummings-like of me, really. Except then I get to explain why I did it. Cummings took a certain amount of critical disparagement for his orthographics in his day. I think it's pretty obvious why he used them now, but at the time they were refreshingly revolutionary (and still seem so, sometimes.)

I suppose it's also worth mentioning that cummings has been enormously influential to modern poets, artists and fontographers for the last 50 years or so.

If you have never heard cumming's distinctive voice, here he is reading the poem: www.youtube.com/watch?v=NA836Ax7scw

Here's a good cummings quote:

“We do not believe in ourselves until someone reveals that deep inside us something is valuable, worth listening to, worthy of our trust, sacred to our touch. Once we believe in ourselves we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight or any experience that reveals the human spirit.”

You can find more cummings here: famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/e__e__cummings/poems

Number 121: Gerard Manley Hopkins "Spring"

Spring

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring –
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;
The glassy pear tree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush
With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.

What is all this juice and all this joy?
A strain of the earth’s sweet being in the beginning
In Eden garden. – Have, get, before it cloy,
Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning,
Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy,
Most, O maid’s child, thy choice and worthy the winning.

-- Gerard Manley Hopkins

Hap Notes: Here's Hopkins again, still sounding fresh and new, in a sonnet about spring. The octave (the beginning eight lines) describes the beauty of spring in Hopkins' inimitable perspective. The sestet ( the last six lines) ask and answer a question about spring- what does it mean, all this new life?

First of all, let's pause for a second to enjoy the feel and sounds of the words; "weeds, in wheels" not only sounds good but makes you pause for moment. Have you ever driven by a field and noticed that when it is full of vegetation, it almost looks as if it's rotating? Also, weeds tend to cluster –one can see the "wheel" like pattern of their proliferation. Weeds, in the spring, often seem to be moving, they grow so quickly. See how packed Hopkins' words are? He chooses his words for sound and meaning very artfully.

The "rinse and wring" of a thrush's call is not likening it to a wash cloth but, it's close – the latin root of rinse is akin to the word "fresh" and "wring" means to extract the sound by pressure or compression. The birds song is so sharp and vivid that it strikes the ear like sound "lightning.' You've probably heard a sharp, sweet bird call that did something like this to your ear – sort of bursts in on your hearing. The eggs of the thrush are so blue they look like "little heavens." The "glassy pear tree" is referring to the shine of new leaves and buds. They "brush" the "descending" blue (of the sky) and isn't it interesting that the sky is coming down to us....

Now, Hopkins asks, what is all this juicy, joyous beauty about?

He equates it with paradise, Eden, and says it's a metaphor for innocence. I've read interpretations of the sestet in which the reader says Hopkins is appealing to Christ to save the little children. I respectfully disagree. Remember Jesus says in Luke anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it. He's asking for Christ to preserve the child in us all and for us to remember this innocence. THAT'S what all this "juice and joy" is about– Christ saves us with rebirth and innocence.

Here's where we've seen Hopkins before:happopoemouse.blogspot.com/2011/02/number-67-gerard-manley-hopkins.html

And here: happopoemouse.blogspot.com/2011/01/number-30-gerard-manly-hopkins-thou.html

Number 120: Roald Dahl "Television"

Television

The most important thing we've learned,
So far as children are concerned,
Is never, NEVER, NEVER let
Them near your television set --
Or better still, just don't install
The idiotic thing at all.
In almost every house we've been,
We've watched them gaping at the screen.
They loll and slop and lounge about,
And stare until their eyes pop out.
(Last week in someone's place we saw
A dozen eyeballs on the floor.)
They sit and stare and stare and sit
Until they're hypnotised by it,
Until they're absolutely drunk
With all that shocking ghastly junk.
Oh yes, we know it keeps them still,
They don't climb out the window sill,
They never fight or kick or punch,
They leave you free to cook the lunch
And wash the dishes in the sink --
But did you ever stop to think,
To wonder just exactly what
This does to your beloved tot?
IT ROTS THE SENSE IN THE HEAD!
IT KILLS IMAGINATION DEAD!
IT CLOGS AND CLUTTERS UP THE MIND!
IT MAKES A CHILD SO DULL AND BLIND
HE CAN NO LONGER UNDERSTAND
A FANTASY, A FAIRYLAND!
HIS BRAIN BECOMES AS SOFT AS CHEESE!
HIS POWERS OF THINKING RUST AND FREEZE!
HE CANNOT THINK -- HE ONLY SEES!
'All right!' you'll cry. 'All right!' you'll say,
'But if we take the set away,
What shall we do to entertain
Our darling children? Please explain!'
We'll answer this by asking you,
'What used the darling ones to do?
'How used they keep themselves contented
Before this monster was invented?'
Have you forgotten? Don't you know?
We'll say it very loud and slow:
THEY ... USED ... TO ... READ! They'd READ and READ,
AND READ and READ, and then proceed
To READ some more. Great Scott! Gadzooks!
One half their lives was reading books!
The nursery shelves held books galore!
Books cluttered up the nursery floor!
And in the bedroom, by the bed,
More books were waiting to be read!
Such wondrous, fine, fantastic tales
Of dragons, gypsies, queens, and whales
And treasure isles, and distant shores
Where smugglers rowed with muffled oars,
And pirates wearing purple pants,
And sailing ships and elephants,
And cannibals crouching 'round the pot,
Stirring away at something hot.
(It smells so good, what can it be?
Good gracious, it's Penelope.)
The younger ones had Beatrix Potter
With Mr. Tod, the dirty rotter,
And Squirrel Nutkin, Pigling Bland,
And Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle and-
Just How The Camel Got His Hump,
And How the Monkey Lost His Rump,
And Mr. Toad, and bless my soul,
There's Mr. Rat and Mr. Mole-
Oh, books, what books they used to know,
Those children living long ago!
So please, oh please, we beg, we pray,
Go throw your TV set away,
And in its place you can install
A lovely bookshelf on the wall.
Then fill the shelves with lots of books,
Ignoring all the dirty looks,
The screams and yells, the bites and kicks,
And children hitting you with sticks-
Fear not, because we promise you
That, in about a week or two
Of having nothing else to do,
They'll now begin to feel the need
Of having something to read.
And once they start -- oh boy, oh boy!
You watch the slowly growing joy
That fills their hearts. They'll grow so keen
They'll wonder what they'd ever seen
In that ridiculous machine,
That nauseating, foul, unclean,
Repulsive television screen!
And later, each and every kid
Will love you more for what you did.

--Roald Dahl

Hap Notes: Nobody probably needs an introduction to Dahl (1916-1990) with his myriad extraordinary books (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, The BFG, The Witches-- just to name a few.) Even if you've never read them (and do read them–they are wonderfully written) you've seen the countless movies based on them. He was also a short story writer in addition to his "children's" fiction.

Dahl himself was a sweet and salty character who did a bit of "spy" work during WWII (which mostly involved women and I'm not sure he was all that great at the "spy" part) and he was a flying ace who cut a very handsome and dashing figure then. He was severely beaten (with a cane– it left him bloody) when he was eight, at private school, for a prank of which he'd been a part (he and three other kids put a dead mouse in a jar of jawbreakers at a local candy store.) The incident passes but one can surely see that this could form a vivid part of childhood memories. Dahl was born in Wales to Norwegian parents– there's certainly a mix of cultures one doesn't see every day, eh?

Everybody probably also knows that he was married to actress Patricia Neal and he nursed her back to health (speaking and walking) after a debilitating stroke she suffered in 1965. One can read gossipy stories about Dahl's sex life, his drinking, his bitter talk but underneath it all beat the heart of a 7-year-old prankster who loved candy and had a sense of humor and intrigue.

He's quite serious in the poem about television, you know. Kurt Vonnegut said that nobody ever learned anything from the television and there's certainly a large grain of truth in that. You don't have to mentally visualize anything when watching the screen and this seems to do more harm than good. In the poem he's referencing books you've probably read– Mr. Tod, Squirrel Nutkin, Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle and Pigling Bland are all Beatrix Potter, the stories about the camel and the monkey are from Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories, and Mr. Toad, Mr. Rat and Mr. Mole are from (an especial favorite of mine) Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Children's literature is usually a mighty good read since the book has to appeal to a limited attention span- they get to it and they're rousing and fun and full of amazing things. Have you ever seen a movie that could equal a good book? They are rare – very rare.

I know it seems impossible now but when I was growing up there were kids who were NEVER allowed to watch television- there were families who didn't even own a television set (not from poverty, from choice.) In my family our rules were strict about it- one hour per day, at MOST and we were allowed to watch cartoons on Saturday morning. My mother always let me watch old movies with her. If one wanted to watch football with my father, one could- but it was hardly a lot of fun what with all the cigar smoke and tense cursing. Television, like soda pop, was a treat doled out very sparingly. O Tempora! O Mores! eh?

Here's a good Dahl quote: "I have a passion for teaching kids to become readers, to become comfortable with a book, not daunted. Books shouldn't be daunting, they should be funny, exciting and wonderful; and learning to be a reader gives a terrific advantage."

Dahl wrote quite a bit of verse. You can find some here: www.roalddahlfans.com/poems.php

Number 119: Kim Addonizio "Eating Together"

Eating Together

I know my friend is going,
though she still sits there
across from me in the restaurant,
and leans over the table to dip
her bread in the oil on my plate; I know
how thick her hair used to be,
and what it takes for her to discard
her man’s cap partway through our meal,
to look straight at the young waiter
and smile when he asks
how we are liking it. She eats
as though starving—chicken, dolmata,
the buttery flakes of filo—
and what’s killing her
eats, too. I watch her lift
a glistening black olive and peel
the meat from the pit, watch
her fine long fingers, and her face,
puffy from medication. She lowers
her eyes to the food, pretending
not to know what I know. She’s going.
And we go on eating.

--Kim Addonizio

Hap Notes: Kim Addonizio (born 1954) has a rock-star image; her website is littered with pictures of her younger days in hip garb, she can play the blues harmonica (and does at many of her readings), she is tattooed and hip. In spite of this meandering through the confusing facades of pop culture, she often writes a vulnerable and sensitive poem. She has written several volumes of award-winning poetry and novels.

Now before you tell me that its okay to be hip and a good poet I'll tell you that you cannot be both. Poetry, in spite of its sorta hip cousin rap, is about dorky stuff like the passage of time, love, hope, hate, loss, anger, sorrow – you know, real life. Real life ain't hip, if it were we wouldn't need advertising copywriters. We, as a culture, keep saying it is, or it should be, but it really isn't- it's full of clumsiness, insecurity and fear. The truest things a person can say are not hip, they expose the raw humanity underneath. Our culture is all about running away from this, being cool, being young, being cavalier and clever and glib. When someone erupts with real feeling, we want to comfort them and then shove them aside; we have a tendency to piss on a fire and hope it will go out. It's clever, it just can't stop forest fires. And only YOU can prevent forest fires! (ten points if you know where that line is from- and it ain't poetry.) Everywhere we look we see aching empty souls just treading water, wanting something deep and nourishing to the spirit; see what I mean? Not hip. Not hip to say it, either. Poetry can help this if it's not too hip or glib. Just sayin'.

Addonizio's mom was tennis champ Pauline Betz and her dad was the awesome Robert Addie who covered baseball for the Washington Post and the Washington Herald. He was one of those "old school" journalists who never skipped a beat; i.e. he wrote clean and sharp stuff and was always on the job. She went to went to Georgetown University and San Francisco State and while she has done some teaching she has wisely commented that it would suck the soul out of her writing. She's in her 50s now so her best stuff is just beginning to form. (ahem...being in your 50s and 60s= not hip.) She's very talented.

In the poem today we see friends eating a meal together while one is suffering the ravages of cancer. Cancer eats what you eat, takes the food's nutrients and starves you as it grows, weakening you twice. Her friend bravely takes off her cap exposing her head of considerably less hair due to cancer treatments. She pulls the flesh off of that black olive and I immediately think of her trying to do the same to the cancer- or the cancer doing it to her. Cancer always seems to be black to me, do you think so, too? It's a wonderful, vulnerable poem from the standpoint of the cancer sufferer; and always there's the hint of the guilty sorrow we feel when someone else is suffering. All we can do is write about it.

You can find more Addonizio here: www.poemhunter.com/kim-addonizio/


Here's a good quote from Addonizio:

"What I've learned is simple: if you nurture it, it will expand, and it will nurture you in return. I have also learned that it is a kind of salvation. Sometimes it's more than enough and sometimes it's not enough -- by that I mean one's own creativity. If you can truly tap in to the creative process, you know it's there all the time, and then you probably don't need saving."

You can see the whole interview here: about-creativity.com/2007/07/an-interview-with-kim-addonizio.php

And her website is here: www.kimaddonizio.com/Site/Site/_welcome.html