“The Deluded” hope fails us often grief never. that’s why some think that known grief is better than unknown grief. they believe that hope is illusion. they are deluded by grief. Juan Gelman (1930-2014) from Unthinkable Tenderness: Selected Poems, ed, and trans. Joan Lindgren, Berkeley University of California Press, 1977 Many years ago riding […]
Monthly Archives: December 2017
The Bigness of Small Poems – # 35 in a Series – To Grieve, Yet Credit Marvels – Gelman, Berger & Heaney
December 31, 2017 – 10:51 am
What’s in a Hyphen – Poet Anne Michaels Tells Us
December 22, 2017 – 12:15 pm
Later, What I Saw There – After Reading Anne Michael’s ‘All WE SAW’ — for Anne Michaels Sometimes, a skipping stone on water, my eye skips off pages of poems and does not enter in. Sometimes, a mistake then, I shut the book. Say it’s too hard. But sometimes, later, I go back and force […]
The Bigness of Small Poems # 34 in a Series – Winter Solstice – Winter Poems by Sarah, MacLeod, Lane, Crozier
December 21, 2017 – 11:24 pm
Solstice A sly gift it is, that on the year’s shortest day, the sun stays longest in this house – extends the wand of its slow slant and distant squint farthest into the long depths of our wintry rooms – to touch with tremulous light, interior places it has not lit before. Robyn Sarah […]
A Tribute to John Berger (1926-2017) – The Laid-On Blacks Are All Man Made
December 17, 2017 – 5:27 pm
I’m writing on the paper with black ink. And blacks (as distinct from dark greys, dark blues or greens or browns) have acquired more weight, are heavier. Other colours flare or recede or penetrate but blacks look as though they have been deposited. Laid on top of. And this connects with their weight. The black […]
Difficult Gifts – Jane Hirschfield’s Shining White Bull
December 1, 2017 – 8:42 am
Each Moment a White Bull Steps Shining into the World If the gods bring to you a strange and frightening creature, accept the gift as if it were one you had chosen. Say the accustomed prayers, oil the hooves well, caress the small ears with praise. Have the new halter of woven silver embedded with […]