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Since I stayed up late last night catching up on the blog, I thought I'd try to see if I could do this whole
"advance" thing. I'd like to see if I could get a day ahead, so that this thing isn't always in the past tense.
Sort of cheating I know, but hey - it saves you an extra step of having to click back to yesterday.
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This is one of the many reasons I absolutely love the Internet.
Big thanks to Knevel for finding this gem of a video.
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Ok - where has my head been? Ted Kooser has been our
Poet Laureate since last August, and I've been oblivious this whole time. Jebus.
And the only reason I know this? He recently won
the Pulitzer for his collection Delights and Shadows.
And I'd like to take a brief pause here, to point this
blog entry out. That's right - I think somebody around here has some decent taste in poetry!
Seriously - I first encountered Kooser through one of my first poetry professors (Richard
Cecil), who had
Weather Central as part of his syllabus. I didn't really get into it in undergrad, and it wasn't until I was in
grad school, studying poetry that I really read Kooser for the first time. And ever since, I've been
totally taken with his work. I'm a big fan.
And I have to say - the man has a surprising amount of
content on his website. Make sure to check out the Audio/Video section, in particular.
And even though Delights and Shadows won the Pulitzer, I've already cited a poem from that collection. So I want to
step back to Weather Central, as that's the one that I think of when I think of Kooser.
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by Ted Kooser
Today my ducks are eating windfalls
under the broken Jonathan tree—
nine white Pekins laughing like nuns
on a picnic, rolling the apple around
in the grass with their orange bills,
having the time of their lives.
Nothing escapes them. Near them,
a red leaf rides the long grass
with a papery rattle. A sweat-bee
deep in an apple sucks
the tart cider. A lacy elm leaf
sifts the wind. Their black eyes sparkle.
There is already ice in the reeds
at the edge of the pond. I have built
a cage in the dark garage, for tomorrow
they go to a hard young farm wife
easy with killing. They will be
packaged like gifts, heavy as hearts.
Their cage is sturdy, quick to close.
As my hammer tapped, they arched their necks
to hear better the tick of scales
as a bull snake passed. Above the cry
of my table saw, they heard a hawk's wings
dust the blue bowl of the sky.
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Felt like staying in tonight, and just pulling the hermit thing again. From the sounds of it, Justin's got some
bad ex-girlfriend mojo going on right now. And I wonder if that's not the thing that had its hand on my shoulder
last night.
We were talking a bit on the phone, and I found out he's going out to a show. I half-meant to ask if he needed an ear
to bend afterwards, but his phone died out and I couldn't reach him after that. Part of me wanted to go out and
commiserate, but a bigger part of me wanted to stay in, and be quiet. I half-expect to see him on my doorstep,
later on this evening.
Most of tonight, I've been sipping on scotch and reading poetry. For a good while, I was just standing in front of
my poetry bookshelf, pulling random books, reading
a poem or two, and putting it back before grabbing another. After that, I've been at my desk, reading some
Ted Kooser, some Sharon
Olds. I've looked over old stuff I've written, and I've debated trying to scribble something
new down.
I thought about posting a few poems I had written a while back, but then remembered that I just made an entry
today about the Poet Laureate of the
United States, for chrissakes. What kind of egotistical maniac am I that I'd throw some of my
own work up here, in this context?
I doubt I'll do much of anything productive tonight. But in looking back, I'm really happy to have been reminded of
Kooser's work again - it's really like a breath of fresh air.
In many ways, I admire Kooser in much the same way I admire
Billy Collins - the clarity of language, the
overall accessibility of their writing, the friendly voice that makes the poem sound like a conversation, like
someone telling a story. I want very much, I hope very much that my writing someday attains these qualities.
The poets I admire the most make poetry normal. Their work is not pretentious, and the poems emphasize clarity over
glamour. In my mind, I'd like to think I'm always writing poems for people who don't necessarily like (or read)
poetry.
I really need to start writing again. I want to, but something just hasn't clicked yet. I love my job and all, but
I really need to start writing again.
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