Tuesday 7 March 2017

It Ain't Easy Being a Poet!

Many Famous Poets had a Tough Time Overcoming Obstacles
Eadweard Muybridge, Public Domain
The poet Wallace Stevens once remarked that he liked being a poet because he could dash off a poem in the morning and have the rest of the day to himself!   Of course, Mr. Stevens had an appealingly skewed wit - and we all know it’s not as simple as that.  No, not even for distinguished poets.
A writing student recently said, ‘Until you write about something, you can't find out what you know about it. I don't even know what I'm thinking sometimes, but I'm finding out by writing. I usually have some order in mind, but I never know what's going to happen.’ 
            Writers have always faced and overcome enormous obstacles in their commitment to writing.  Many nineteenth century women even published their work anonymously to avoid censure from a narrow-minded society.  America’s Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) always listened to her mentor, critic and minister, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who actively discouraged her because he believed her poetry wasn’t good enough.  After her death her sister discovered more than one thousand poems in her room, mostly untitled and undated.  Imagine! only seven were published in her lifetime and although these were well-received, Dickinson would not have experienced the joy of a success her talent so richly deserved. 
            Stevie Smith was a poet who had a tough time.  Abandoned by her father in childhood, her mother died while she was a teenager and the initial success of her work was followed by a sharp downturn in her popularity.  Seamus Heaney said of her, ‘I suppose in the end the adjective has to be eccentric.  She looks at the world with a mental squint’, while Philip Larkin’s view was that she was a ‘feminine doodler and jotter who puts down everything as it strikes her, no matter how silly or tragic.’  It takes guts to carry on when those around you are dismissive of your talent including other writers generally held in high esteem. 

          That’s why you must stay true to yourself and take comfort from your writing as Stevie Smith did.  Take constructive criticism on board but resist destructive comments from those who don’t understand or who have a ‘hidden agenda’.

Sunday 5 March 2017

Dear March, come in! by Emily Dickinson


Dear March, come in!
How glad I am!
I looked for you before.
Put down your hat—
You must have walked—
How out of breath you are!
Dear March, how are you?
And the rest?
Did you leave Nature well?
Oh, March, come right upstairs with me,
I have so much to tell!

I got your letter, and the bird’s;
The maples never knew
That you were coming,—I declare,
How red their faces grew!
But, March, forgive me—
And all those hills
You left for me to hue;
There was no purple suitable,
You took it all with you.

Who knocks? That April!
Lock the door!
I will not be pursued!
He stayed away a year, to call
When I am occupied.
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come,
That blame is just as dear as praise
And praise as mere as blame.

Thursday 2 March 2017

The First Spring Day Brings Hope

Copyright Janet Cameron
The first day of Spring is not too far away. (Yes, I know it is incorrect to use capital first letters for the seasons, but sometimes I do what I like rather than what is correct.) Besides, I am in good company as Christina Rossetti agrees with me. Need I say more?

The first day of Spring will be 20 March. In preparation, and in addition to the image, here is a poem by Christina Rossetti. It's a sweet poem, with a lot of sadness in the words but a hint of hope in the last line. What Spring is all about really.


The First Spring Day

I wonder if the sap is stirring yet,
If wintry birds are dreaming of a mate,
If frozen snowdrops feel as yet the sun,
And crocus fires are kindling one by one.
      Sing, robin, sing,
I still am sore in doubt concerning Spring.

I wonder if the Springtide of this year
Will bring another Spring both lost and dear,
If heart and spirit will find out their Spring,
Or if the world alone will bud and sing:
      Sing, hope, to me;
Sweet notes, my hope, soft notes for memory.

The sap will surely quicken, soon or late,
The tardiest bird will twitter to a mate;
So Spring must dawn again with warmth and bloom,
Or, in this world, or in the world to come:
       Sing, voice of Spring,
Till I too blossom and rejoice and sing.