“For now he was awake and knew No one is ever spared except in dreams” W. H. Auden
Tag: Poetry
On losing a dog
Unfortunately, as Kipling and (even) Ogden Nash knew, a recurrent event given our disparate life spans. Tom McIntyre’s Kaycee died suddenly at four last week, after a joyous bout of play. Tom reflects: ” P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; }The death of a dog teaches what a tenuous, suspended by a silk thread thing life is. …
Poetry Quote for Reid
In response to his quote on geese below: “Already now the clanging chains Of geese are harnessed to the moon…” – Roy Campbell, Autumn
Another Quote
From Sean Sexton’s Blood Writing, attributed to “Anon.”, in a small seafood restaurant in the Yucatan: Ama la vida a la frontala, porque buena y mala, sola tenemos una. (Love life and face it, because good or bad, we have only one)
Quote
…a step ahead of the banker, a moment behind convention, putting off heaven and hell as long as possible. –from Blood Writing, by Sean Sexton UPDATE: The poet sends his picture, in his Querencia, and a painting. I’d love to see that place. Meanwhile, get his book!
One more on Plum
… To thank everyone; I will not belabor the point or fill the blog. Jameson Parker sent Robinson Jeffers’ wonderful tribute to his bulldog Grip. In part: I hope than when you are lying Under the ground like me your lives will appear As good and joyful as mine. No, dear, that’s too much hope: …
Hunting Quotes
Teddy Moritz sends two lovely ones from a German hunting site— her translations I think: “Who denies that love and hunting are related passions, has never hunted.” She likes this one even better: “Who never hunted, and never loved, never sought the scent of flowers, never trembled at the sound of music, is not a …
Quote
From the Medieval French poet Francois Villon: Ce monde n’est perpetuel Quoy que pense riche pillart; Tous sommes soubz mortel coustel…” (The world is not everlasting/ despite what rich robbers think/ We are all beneath a mortal blade…)
Far Away and Long Ago
Me “teaching” at Wildbranch Writing Workshop, Sterling College, in Craftsbury Common, Vermont; 1990- what? Dark(ish) hair anyway! Janisse Ray (right of me, black vest) and Kansas poet H C Palmer (balding head toward camera) needed little but encouragement…
Fenton, Light
James Fenton is a serious poet and has written some chilling ones (Tom McIntyre remarked that being in Cambodia in the bad days might give you a rather chilly view of human nature). His new collection Yellow Tulips: Poems 1968- 2011 (available only from the UK so far) has plenty of those, and melancholic and …