My friend Beth sent the following poem to me. It came to her from an e-mail service called the Writer's Almanac. It is from public radio.
I especially like stanza two of the William Stafford poem below. In particular, there's something amazing about the use of the preposition "at" instead of the expected "to." That creative choice startles me! "At" feels much more intimate for a reason I can't quite explain.
Of course, I love the idea of living our dreams into stories.
Stanza three reminds me again of why I love the Icarus myth and why I believe there's something laudable in Icarus' venture.
Poem: Poem: "An Introduction To Some Poems" by William Stafford, from The Way It Is: New and Selected Poems © Graywolf Press, 1998. Reprinted with permission.
An Introduction to Some Poems
Look: no one ever promised for sure
that we would sing. We have decided
to moan. In a strange dance that
we don't understand till we do it, we
have to carry on.
Just as in sleep you have to dream
the exact dream to round out your life,
so we have to live that dream into stories
and hold them close at you, close at the
edge we share, to be right.
We find it an awful thing to meet people,
serious or not, who have turned into vacant
effective people, so far lost that they
won't believe their own feelings
enough to follow them out.
The authentic is a line from one thing
along to the next; it interests us.
strangely, it relates to what works,
but is not quite the same. It never
swerves for revenge,
Or profit, or fame: it holds
together something more than the world,
this line. And we are your wavery
efforts at following it. Are you coming?
Good: now it is time.
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“If you don't write your books, nobody else will do it for you. No one else has lived your life." Jose Saramago
2 comments:
I think that "at" signifies a face to face encounter with the stories, a requirement to acknowledge them and work with them, rather than a burying them unto yourseld such as "to" would suggest. Yes, it is a very powerful image.
I caught the end of this poem on NPR yesterday morning. How strange, since I rarely hear The Writer's Almanac. It was only because my usual NPR station was running a pledge drive and I had turned to another.
As for the wavery efforts to follow the line of authenticity - surely that is what Icarus was doing. I used to think him foolish and filled with hubris, but a dash of hubris ain't a bad thing, and the desire to spread your wings and fly high is natural, especially in youth. I say go for it, for soon you may be too hobbled by your day to day responsibilities. There is time enough in youth to crash and burn and then pick yourself up again. And as for those of us who aren't quite youths anymore, well, what the heck - let's see how far we can get. I'm off to accompany Mr. Stafford in his nice woolly sweater.
Love the quote.
V
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