The Outgoing US Poet Laureate

The outgoing US Poet Laureate is Californian Kay Ryan who served two terms that ended in May 2010. In commenting on Ryan's poetry, Librarian of Congress, Dr. James H. Billington stated, “She takes you through little images to see a very ordinary thing or ordinary sentiment in a more subtle and deeper way.”

I find in Ryan's poems a sense of observation in the process of illumination. Eminently accessible, the poems are refined and disciplined. Ryan's figurative language is rich and dense, and the sonic impressions she creates are are frequently enhanced by internal rhyme. She explores ideas with a unique lyrical intelligence and genuine inventive intensity.

From "Patience"

By Kay Ryan

Who would

have guessed

it possible

that waiting

is sustainable—

a place with

its own harvests.

Read Kay Ryan Poems & Bio:

http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/352

New Oxford Professor of Poetry

Geoffrey Hill, often called the greatest living English-language poet, was recently named Professor of Poetry at Oxford University. The 78-year-old poet's victory follows last year's scandal involving winner Ruth Padel, who resigned after less than two weeks when it became public that she made journalists aware of sexual harassment allegations against Derek Walcott, her rival in the Oxford contest. Despite last year's "messiness," the post remains one of the most prestigious in poetry. More than 2,500 votes were cast in person and online to elect a successor to Christopher Ricks. Professor Hill, an Oxford alumnus, is the 44th poet to become Oxford Professor of Poetry, a five-year post that was established in 1708.

Read Geoffrey Hill's Poem, "September Song"

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=178126

Geoffrey Hill Bio:

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=3152

Articles:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/19/books/19arts-AFTERROUGHCA_BRF.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jun/18/geoffrey-hill-oxford-professor-poetry

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/harrymount/100044066/geoffrey-hill-becomes-oxfords-new-professor-of-poetry-and-quite-right-too/

Poetry Prompt #10 - What the Camera Sees

“The camera doesn’t make a bit of difference.

All of them record what you are seeing.

But, you have to SEE.” (Ernst Haas)

Write a poem from the perspective of a surveillance or security camera that’s “watching” you. Where are you? What are you doing? What does the camera see? This isn’t just the average “spy camera” or “nanny cam.” This camera sees your feelings, records your moods, shows you as you really are. Remember that the camera sees everything: smiles, tears, guilts, griefs, boredom, happiness, excitement – not to mention loves, wishes, lies, and dreams.

“The heart and mind are the true lens of the camera.”

(Yousuf Karsh)

The Future of Poetry

I came across this article from The Guardian (June 18, 2010) and thought you might find it interesting.

From the article:

The Hungarian-born poet George Szirtes, who teaches poetry at the University of East Anglia, says poems try to capture a reality that is deeper than language. "You're trying to say: I know what this thing is called," he says. "It's called a chair, and that thing is a table. I've got this word 'chair' and I've got this word 'table', but there's something peculiar about this chair and table which using the words chair and table will not actually convey." Readers, he says, may race through novels because they want to know what happens, but they should look to inhabit poems. "Nobody reads a poem to find out what happens in the last line. They read the poem for the experience of travelling through it."

I ask Szirtes whether he thinks "What is poetry for?" is a valid question. To my surprise – because plenty of poets think it's an absurd question and that no art form should worry about its function – he believes it is far from academic. "It's a question that does preoccupy you the longer you do it," he says. "When you first do it, you never ask that question. But as time goes on, you begin to be conscious of it. My sense now is that when people begin to speak, when language develops, there are two essential instincts: one of the instincts says, 'What is this?'; the other one says, 'So what happens?' So what happens is the beginning of syntax, of storytelling. The other feeling, where you are confronted by some aspect of reality for which language is always inadequate, is the instinct that goes into poetry." Poetry, he suggests, "begins with a cry" – of anguish, fear or frustration. Szirtes quotes Emily Dickinson's maxim that "a poem is a house that tries to be haunted". A poem should not deliver all its secrets at once, if ever; it is not there to be solved.

Read it all: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jun/18/the-future-of-poetry

Poetry Prompt #9 - What's the Answer?

Answer a question you’ve had for a long time; write about something you don’t understand; tell about a question that troubles you. What’s your answer? Is there an answer?

An alternative prompt is the "tried and true" rant poem in which you rage, seethe, fume, boil, and really let your feelings out about something, someone, or anything else you need to vent.

On the Subject of Poetry Contests

Have you ever entered a poetry contest? Are you thinking about entering one? Before you pick your poems and sign the entry fee check, you may want to read the following articles!

"Entering to Win: Poetry Contests" by Robert Casper

http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5912

An Article on Online Poetry Contests by Kurt Heintz

http://poetry.about.com/od/onlinecontests/a/heintzcontests.htm

Poetry Prompt #8 - Not What It Seems

Try writing a poem in which you describe or tell about something in terms of what it is not. This may be about anything, including a person, a place, a belief, or a relationship.

You may find it helpful to begin by listing images that describe your subject in terms of what it is, then modify those images by converting them to tell what your subject is not.

Read “Disillusionment of Ten O’Clock” by Wallace Stevens.

http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20754

A variation on this prompt is to write a poem about something you didn't do, a choice you didn't make, a love you left behind. For an example, read Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken." http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15717

Another wonderful "not poem" is the title poem from Penny Harter's book The Night Marsh (WordTech Editions, 2008).

The Night Marsh

By Penny Harter

This is not about frogs,

their rhythmic croaking

from the swampy edges of a pond,

nor is it a landscape

of the hunter and the hunt.

This marsh extends for miles,

water glittering here and there

under starlight.

The sleepers feel their way

as they stumble from wet land to dry.

There is no hand to hold,

no voice dripping like moss

from the trees, singing,

Come this way

into the darker dreaming of the day.

Copyright © 2008 By Penny Harter.

Reprinted by permission of the author.