"Poetry" by Don Paterson

Why this poem? Why so many poems about poetry? Because it's National Poetry Month and because this is a poetry blog. That's why.

Poetry
by Don Paterson

In the same way that the mindless diamond keeps
one spark of the planet's early fires
trapped forever in its net of ice,
it's not love's later heat that poetry holds,
but the atom of the love that drew it forth
from the silence: so if the bright coal of his love
begins to smoulder, the poet hears his voice
suddenly forced, like a bar-room singer's -- boastful
with his own huge feeling, or drowned by violins;
but if it yields a steadier light, he knows
the pure verse, when it finally comes, will sound
like a mountain spring, anonymous and serene.

Beneath the blue oblivious sky, the water
sings of nothing, not your name, not mine.

Found at: http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/027.html

"The Poet" by Tom Wayman

Despite the world feeling like it's falling to pieces (or at least the government), National Poetry Month continues without a pause. Our search for poets writing about poetry (reading it, writing it, and everything in-between ) never rests. I post this poem today for anyone who is or knows a poet…

The Poet
by Tom Wayman

Loses his position on worksheet or page in textbook
May speak much but makes little sense
Cannot give clear verbal instructions
Does not understand what he reads
Does not understand what he hears
Cannot handle “yes-no” questions

Has great difficulty interpreting proverbs
Has difficulty recalling what he ate for breakfast, etc.
Cannot tell a story from a picture
Cannot recognize visual absurdities

Has difficulty classifying and categorizing objects
Has difficulty retaining such things as
addition and subtraction facts, or multiplication tables
May recognize a word one day and not the next

Found at: http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/015.html

"Introduction to Poetry" by Billy Collins

"Let Me Count the Waves" by Sandra Beasley

Well, for my Poetry Month search I was looking for poems about poetry and this one certainly fits the bill. Ha! (once you read the poem you’ll understand how lame a pun that is…) Anyway, this poem is a fun way to get your brain moving on this Monday morning. I think what I love most about it is how it unfolds in its complexity and pulls you deeper into the poem without you realizing it until the end. But read it and see what you think…


Let Me Count the Waves
by Sandra Beasley

We must not look for poetry in poems.
—Donald Revell

You must not skirt the issue wearing skirts.
You must not duck the bullet using ducks.
You must not face the music with your face.
Headbutting, don’t use your head. Or your butt.
You must not use a house to build a home,
and never look for poetry in poems.

In fact, inject giraffes into your poems.
Let loose the circus monkeys in their skirts.
Explain the nest of wood is not a home
at all, but a blind for shooting wild ducks.
Grab the shotgun by its metrical butt;
aim at your Muse’s quacking, Pringled face.

It’s good we’re talking like this, face to face.
There should be more headbutting over poems.
Citing an 80s brand has its cost but
honors the teenage me, always in skirts,
showing my sister how to Be the Duck
with a potato-chip beak. Take me home,

Mr. Revell. Or make yourself at home
in my postbellum, Reconstruction face—
my gray eyes, my rebel ears, all my ducks
in the row of a defeated mouth. Poems
were once civil. But war has torn my skirts
off at the first ruffle, baring my butt

or as termed in verse, my luminous butt.
Whitman once made a hospital his home.
Emily built a prison of her skirts.
Tigers roamed the sad veldt of Stevens’s face.
That was the old landscape. All the new poems
map the two dimensions of cartoon ducks.

We’re young and green. We’re braces of mallards,
not barrels of fish. Shoot if you must but
Donald, we’re with you. Trying to save poems,
we settle and frame their ramshackle homes.
What is form? Turning art to artifice,
trading pelts for a more durable skirt.

Even urban ducklings deserve a home.
Make way. In the modern: Make way, Buttface.
A poem is coming through, lifting her skirt.

Found at: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=236984

"A Poet's Poem" by Brenda Shaughnessy

Yesterday at work I wished someone "Happy National Poetry Month!" and they asked if that was an April Fools joke. Oh, I'm so happy you all know that Poetry Month is no joking matter. But since it's the weekend and while celebrating poetry may be no joke, it's not all serious either so today we move forward with our month's theme (poems about poetry) and look at somewhat humorously at the frustrations of writing a poem...

A Poet’s Poem
by Brenda Shaughnessy

If it takes me all day,
I will get the word freshened out of this poem.

I put it in the first line, then moved it to the second,
and now it won’t come out.

It’s stuck. I’m so frustrated,
so I went out to my little porch all covered in snow

and watched the icicles drip, as I smoked
a cigarette.

Finally I reached up and broke a big, clear spike
off the roof with my bare hand.

And used it to write a word in the snow.
I wrote the word snow.

I can’t stand myself.

Found at: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=182964

"Eating Poetry" by Mark Strand

HAPPY NATIONAL POETRY MONTH!!! Even though you should read poetry all year long, Poetry Month is a great time to really celebrate poetry. I hope you take this month as an excuse to revisit some of your favorite poets or find some new ones. I love poetry month (though I'm sure that as a keeper of a poetry blog, that doesn't surprise you) and making time to look at back at some of my favorites like "Eating Poetry". Even though I’ve read it a million times, I get such a kick out of this poem by Mark Strand and it seems like the perfect way to get Poetry Month started. Oh, and just so you know, our theme for the month of April will be poems about poetry. Poems about writing it, reading it, loving it, hating it, eating it…

Eating Poetry
By Mark Strand

Ink runs from the corners of my mouth.
There is no happiness like mine.
I have been eating poetry.

The librarian does not believe what she sees.
Her eyes are sad
and she walks with her hands in her dress.

The poems are gone.
The light is dim.
The dogs are on the basement stairs and coming up.

Their eyeballs roll,
their blond legs burn like brush.
The poor librarian begins to stamp her feet and weep.

She does not understand.
When I get on my knees and lick her hand,
she screams.

I am a new man.
I snarl at her and bark.
I romp with joy in the bookish dark.

Found at: http://www.poetryoutloud.org/poems/poem.html?id=237702

"Delta" by Adrienne Rich

How could we get to the end of Women's History Month without looking at Adrienne Rich? The answer is, we couldn't. She has many, many poems worth sharing but "Delta" is one of my very favorites. Enjoy!

Delta
by Adrienne Rich

If you have taken this rubble for my past
 raking through it for fragments you could sell
 know that I long ago moved on
 deeper into the heart of the matter

If you think you can grasp me, think again:
 my story flows in more than one direction
 a delta springing from the riverbed
 with its five fingers spread

 Found at: http://www.literary-arts.org/pim/poems/1997/8/