Tudor drama, false eyelashes, and a Christmas poetry haul

Tyndale faces his dissertation committee

Back when I was deep in the muck and mire of working on my dissertation I came to rely on two great escapes to keep me sane:  watching The Tudors on DVD and reading beauty blogs.  The Tudors was oddly comforting as the worst fate waiting me if I failed in my attempts to get people to reclaim their authentic voice in prayer was that my thesis wouldn't be proved.  Poor William Tyndale, he met a fiery end simply for encouraging people to claim the right to read the Bible in their own language.  With no funeral pyre in my future, I plugged along with my work.  As advisers and wives came and their heads went, as Henry grew fatter (or at least as fat as they could make the lithesome Jonathan Rhys Meyers appear) and more paranoid, I continued to research and write and when Tudor England and twenty-first century theopoetics got to be too much for me, I'd sneak a peek at posts on five ways to wear one lipstick or watch video tutorials on the easiest way to put on false eyelashes.  (I tried it once for a party.  While it was indeed easy to attach the lashes, I showed up at the door of my best gay friend who took one look at the feathery extensions and said, "I don't like them."  Oh well-- the tutorial promised it would be easy not necessarily look good.)

When the Tudors and my dissertation work came to an end, so did my foray into the world of beauty blogs. And while I can only remember one or two ways to wear my favorite lipstick, I do recall one of the things I picked up from all those nondescript beauty blogs I plowed through:  what the word "haul" means in blog/vlog terms.  a large assortment of stuff acquired at one time. Usually said bloggers/vloggers would show their haul and their first impressions of products.  

This morning as I was preparing to wedge my new poetry books I received for Christmas on my stuffed shelves, I thought, "If it's done with make up, why not with books?"  So here you have it:  samples from my first ever poetry haul.  

River Flow:  New & Selected Poems by David Whyte

I've just dipped into this a bit, rereading a few old favorites and nibbling at some new-to-me poems including this one:

THE WELL OF GRIEF

Those who will not slip beneath

     the still surface on the well of grief,

turning down through its black water

     to the place we cannot breathe,

will never know the source from which we drink,

     the secret water, cold and clear,

and find in the darkness glimmering,

     the small round coins,

           thrown by those who wished for something else.

Selected Poems by Kerry Hardie

Although I've only discovered the poetry of Kerry Hardie in the past year or so, she's been well known and much lauded in Ireland for several years.  I've posted one of her poems before on this blog  and have often thought about posting the much longer "Sheep Fair Day' which I love.  You can listen to the audio of her reading that poem, found in this book, here.  

    

feminine gospels by Carol Ann Duffy

This book is somewhat of a departure from the type of poetry I normally read.  While I admire the work of the UK's current poet laureate, the types of poems I usually read tend to be like looking at a snap shot in time through a magnifying glass and focusing on a particular moment.  This collection of poems is more narrative in structure, each telling the story of a particular woman-- Elizabeth I looking back on her long but lonely reign as queen, that prolific author Anonymous, and one of my favorites, the thin woman trapped inside the fat woman trying to get out.  

To the Moon:  An Anthology of Lunar Poems 

I have to confess that even though I'm including this book as part of my Christmas haul, I don't actually have it in my hands yet as it had to be ordered from the UK.  I was hoping it would arrive in time to read tonight by the light of the first full moon of the new year and while there's still time for our mailman to come through for me, I won't hold my breath. Instead, I'm looking forward to February's full moon when I can read lunar poetry from the likes of Ted Hughes, Denise Levertov, Philip Larkin, May Swenson, R.S. Thomas, Carol Ann Duffy (the editor) and others.  

Walking a Fine Line . . . Inspiration or Plagiarism

I hadn't intended on writing a post about inspiration or plagiarism this morning.  But there I was, going through my morning blog readings when I came across a poem that sounded familiar to me . . . very familiar.  I knew I hadn't read anything by the author before, but the more I re-read the poem, the more I was convinced I'd encountered very similar words and sentiments in the David Whyte poem below:

SELF PORTRAIT
by David Whyte from Fire in the Earth (Many Rivers Press)

It doesn't interest me if there is one God
or many gods.
I want to know if you belong or feel
abandoned.
If you know despair or can see it in others.
I want to know
if you are prepared to live in the world
with its harsh need
to change you. If you can look back
with firm eyes
saying this is where I stand. I want to know
if you know
how to melt into that fierce heat of living
falling toward
the center of your longing. I want to know
if you are willing
to live, day by day, with the consequence of love
and the bitter
unwanted passion of your sure defeat.
I have heard, in that fierce embrace, even
the gods speak of God. 

David Whyte's poem was published in 1992.  The other poem was published in 1999, by HarperOne no less.  The book in which it was published had recommendations from folks like Wayne Dyer and John O'Donohue, who also was a good friend of David Whyte's.  How, I wondered, could he not see the similarities?  Here I sit, with no personal connection to either poet, feeling conflicted about my moral duty as a reader (and writer) yet John O'Donohue called this other writer's book "remarkable."  "Yeah, remarkably similar to David Whyte," I thought to myself.

In doing more research (via the Amazon.com comments section) one particular one star reviewer said it was "watered down David Whyte."*  That prompted a comment from another reader that the author said the poem based on a writing exercise given to her by David Whyte.  And sure enough, using the Amazon's "search inside this book" tool there are a couple references (in the dedication and acknowledgements) saying that the poem upon which the book is based was inspired by David Whyte.  I didn't find this information on the author's website, where the poem is prominently placed on her home page, nor is there an acknowledgment in the title of the poem like some poets do when paying homage to another artist who has inspired their writing. 

A 21st century image of inspiration?

Which leads me to my conundrum.  Is that enough acknowledgment to move the poem across the line from plagiarism to inspiration?

 I can imagine David Whyte giving students the assignment to try writing a poem or prose piece using the formula, "It doesn't interest me . . . I want to know . . .  (the other poem follows this pattern and also includes some remarkably similar lines to David Whyte's version).  When I lead writing workshops or retreats I often ease people into putting words on paper by giving them some poems for inspiration and inviting them to use one as a trellis onto which they can graft their own images, words, ideas . . . write an ode to an everyday object como Pablo Neruda, write about what might have been "otherwise" like Jane Kenyon, or try a litany of what pleases you, like Taliesin. 

The purpose of these exercises is to get pens moving on paper, to create a sense of safety and security by offering a form as guidance.  The instruction to "write a poem" can be daunting but "write an ode about something you encounter every day" leads me to think about the way my tea mug is comforting because it's the color of Campbell's tomato soup and, even though it's a smidge too big to fit comfortably in my hand, I will hold onto it for its orangey-red hue alone.

Writing exercises are like treasure maps.  They can lead us on the path to discover our voices as writers.  They help get us to a place where we can crack open the treasure chest of images and experiences that we each have inside of us, the one that our inner critic often sits on saying that what's inside is just paste and fool's gold.

And yes, we should acknowledge those who inspired us on the way, especially if we use their work as a basis for our own.  Which is why when I write my ode to my mug later this morning I will say very clearly in the title, "After Pablo Neruda."


*Actually unnecessarily padded is the description I would give it. The other poem is much longer than the David Whyte text and not as focused which to me, makes the kernel of the poem lose its import, unlike the original text which cuts like a knife to the center of my being.

Afternoon with Irish Cows



Cows on the Mullet Peninsula, Western Ireland, 2008



AFTERNOON WITH IRISH COWS

by Billy Collins from Sailing Alone Around the Room:  New and Selected Poems (Random House)

There were a few dozen who occupied the field

across the road from where we lived,

stepping all day from tuft to tuft,

their big heads down in the soft grass,

though I would sometimes pass a window

and look out to see the field suddenly empty

as if they had taken wing, flown off to another country.

Then later, I would open the blue front door,

and again the field would be full of their munching

or they would be lying down

on the black-and-white maps of their sides,

facing in all directions, waiting for rain.

How mysterious, how patient and dumbfounded

they appear in the long quiet of the afternoon.

 

But every once in a while, one of them

would let out a sound so phenomenal

that I would put down the paper

or the knife I was cutting an apple with

and walk across the road to the stone wall

to see which one of them was being torched

or pierced through the side with a long spear.

Yes, it sounded like pain until I could see

the noisy one, anchored there on all fours,

her neck outstretched, her bellowing head

laboring upward as she gave voice

to the rising, full-bodied cry

that began in the darkness of her belly

and echoed up through her bowed ribs into her gaping mouth.

 

Then I knew that she was only announcing

the large, unadulterated cowness of herself,

pouring out the ancient apologia of her kind

to all the green fields and the gray clouds,

to the limestone hills and the inlet of the blue bay,

while she regarded my head and shoulders

above the wall with one wild, shocking eye.

Yesterday afternoon I was on the phone with a friend who was out taking a walk in a field in Virginia.  At one point during our conversation, she paused by a pond to let me hear a chorus of peepers that were deafeningly proclaiming their existence.  Later, as I drove through Rock Creek Park, I was treated to a snippet of a chorus from some Maryland peepers who were singing the same song.

It reminded me not only of this poem by Billy Collins, but also of something I heard recently in a David Whyte lecture.  He was talking about how human beings are the only animals who seem to feel at times as if they don't belong-- cows, peepers, and the rest of creation are simply what they were created to be.  The cow in the Collins poem is announcing her "unadulterated cowness," not lamenting the fact that she's not a sheep or a cloud or even a California cow.  Whyte goes on to say that rather than trying to overcome this sense of exile, perhaps we should try to embrace it as one of the "core competencies" of humanity; for it is precisely this element of being human that allows us to feel compassion for others, including the rest of creation. 

When have you experienced a sense of exile?

How have you experienced compassion?

David Whyte Wednesday - The Journey

THE JOURNEY
by David Whyte from The House of Belonging (Many Rivers Press)

Above the mountains

 the geese turn into

   the light again

painting their

  black silhouettes

    on an open sky.

Sometimes everything

  has to be

    enscribed across

      the heavens

so you can find

  the one line

    already written

      inside you.

Sometimes it takes

  a great sky

    to find that

first, bright

  and indescribable

    wedge of freedom

      in your own heart.

Sometimes with

  the bones of the black

    sticks left when the fire

      has gone out

someone has written

  something new

    in the ashes

      of your life.

You are not leaving

you are arriving.

My apologies to any early bird readers for the late posting this morning.  Although I was awakened at 6ish by the honking of geese flying over the house (and thus another geese poem for this morning), it's one of those rainy mornings in the DC area where only the need for a cup of tea drives me from the comfort of my bed.  In fact, I think an upcoming poem will celebrate staying in bed, so a bit of a teaser there . . .

But for today, an oft quoted David Whyte poem.  Yesterday thoughts of geese lingered throughout the day and I found myself wondering about the role of geese in some of these poems-- are they prophets or sacraments?  Anglican divine Richard Hooker defines sacrament as an "outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace."  While this is a theological definition my brain comprehends and I can get behind, when I read David Whyte's words, I understand it in my bones and know it to be true. 


What outward and visible signs of inward and spiritual grace are true for you? 

What is the line written inside you?

Start Close In - Ash Wednesday

START CLOSE IN

by David White from River Flow:  New and Selected Poems, 1984-2007 (Many Rivers Press)

Start close in,

don't take the second step

or the third,

start with the first

thing

close in,

the step you don't want to take.

Start with

the ground

you know,

the pale ground

beneath your feet,

your own

way of starting

the conversation.

Start with your own

question,

give up on other

people's questions,

don't let them

smother something

simple.

To find

another's voice

follow

your own voice,

wait until

that voice

becomes a

private ear

listening

to another.

Start right now

take a small step

you can call your own

don't follow

someone else's

heroics, be humble

and focused,

start close in,

don't mistake

that other

for your own.

Start close in,

don't take the second step

or the third,

start with the first

thing

close in,

the step you don't want to take.

Usually I begin the Lenten poetry collections with an often amusing yet thought provoking poem about mortality.  For many churches, the words imparted with the imposition of ashes are a memento mori-- remember from dust you came and to dust you shall return.  In recent years, some communities have begun marking Lent as the beginning of a journey of conversion and thus the ashes become the mark of a pilgrim taking the first step on a long road. 

I realize I often begin Lent more like I've been dropped from a plane into the middle of the desert where I spend forty odd days wandering around until I'm thrown the life-line of Easter that allows me to repel out.  There's no easing into the journey.  Ash Wednesday arrives and I'm pushed out of the aircraft whether or not my parachute is ready.  Rather than feeling like I've suddenly landed in the wilderness, this year I intend to take my time, walk in slowly.  As David Whyte says, start in close, take the first step. 

The questions he raises in this poem (as in all of his poems) are good ones to consider for the beginning of this season:

     What is the ground you know?
     What is your question?
     Where is your own voice leading you?

And finally . . .

     What is the first step for you, the step you don't want to take?