This is plenty. This is more than enough.

[moireach]

I just wrote a ridiculous and unnecessarily long email about poetry to an undergraduate professor and it's so rare that I write anything lately that's not work-related, I thought perhaps I should save it somewhere for posterity.  (Also: POETRY!  Oh yeah!  That's that thing I love!)

Comments

[pene]

Some kind of... Found poetry write in thing where all your readers create a sestina together??

[moireach]

OOH, sestinas!! My best beloveds.

[interminable]

I'm not sure what you should do, but I thought I would mention a couple of things: In 2005, my grandmother was in the hospital. I was staying in her apartment in JP, making twice-daily trips to see her, and writing nightly updates to the rest of the family with what the doctors told me. I felt so alone there, staying in her apartment without her, and I was so afraid that she would never come back. My grandmother was the adult I looked up to most in the world. You posted What the Living Do, and I remember sitting on my little fold-away cot in the entryway, reading it out loud over and over. That poem will always mean that for me now

[moireach]

This is hands down the best LJ comment I've ever received. Gonna save it forever. (Is there any connection like loving the same piece of writing? I don't think so.) I don't even know what to say. Except thank you thank you. (And it's been way too long since I read that Lisa Sewell poem.)

Also now I'm thinking of William Carlos Williams:

My heart rouses
thinking to bring you news
of something
that concerns you
and concerns many men. Look at
what passes for the new.
You will not find it there but in
despised poems.
It is difficult
to get the news from poems
yet men die miserably every day
for lack
of what is found there.

[ke_rose_ne]

NAPOMOOOOO! Gawd, M., I am knee-deep in my thesis/manuscript now & veering back & forth between being wildly sick of it, all of it, but then I remember to go to my shelf (or your archives!) & just fucking read a beautiful poem & it all becomes lovely again. Poetry! That heartbreaker.

Also, love this small canon of witness poetry. Ooooof.

[moireach]

I have a new habit I'm trying to make myself keep, which is READ A POEM EVERY DAY because it makes life better in every way. So thanks for reminding me!!

[cheapmetaphor]

This is wonderful. The worst part of delicious going under was that I lost track of your poetry bookmarks, though on the other hand I am spoiler free for April :) LOVE your April poems, and I love introducing people to the mailing list. There's nothing like it.

[moireach]

Uhoh -- should I or should I not tell you they're now over here?? https://pinboard.in/u:moireach/t:poems

Thank you thank you thank youuuuuu!

[cheapmetaphor]

[cleversimon]

What timing! I just recently read Daphne Gottlieb's "No Poetry After Auschwitz" (I got 15 Ways to Stay Alive for Christmas, it's fantastic).

Also: The ever-delightful Hannah Gamble feels it's necessary to approach "heavy" topics in poetry with a certain amount of lightness. I don't know if I've managed to internalize that in my own writing, but that article is something I think about a lot.

Also also: Ten years! Wow! I think I've only been on board since 2007, but I've got all of them archived in Gmail, and I not-infrequently take advantage of that when I'm looking for a piece I know you've sent out. (I have no ideas for the anniversary, but I will let you know if I come up with anything. :D)

[moireach]

Oh man, thank you for those links!! So relevant!