From the beach church

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

— Naomi Shihab Nye
from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems

What is poetry?

A poem
makes us see
everything for
the first time

Francisco X. Alarcón
from Laughing Tomatoes and Other Spring Poems

Gathered in the Writing Studio recently, a colleague told a group of youngsters that “poetry is not music.”

Stunned, I quietly reeled through a catalog of my favorite musician/poets: Jackson Browne, Michael Franti, Tracy Chapman, Roger Waters . . .

Over the next few days I grew indignant. Of course poetry is music! Of course music is poetry! Both share a musical language, a crafting of words and sound. I came to poetry through music — for pete’s sake! As early as second grade I was reciting Harry Chapin’s Cat's in the Cradle to my peers.

In the cooling off period since the songwriting session, I have tuned down emotion and turned up intellect. If music is not poetry, What is poetry? Through research I gathered numerous esoteric — and beautifully written — responses but a tangible answer eludes me. And if I can’t answer the question, how can I explain to others why poetry is in everything, including music?

I’m looking for answers, and I’d love to hear from you.

Venice in (unintended) verse

I haven't been to Venice. After reading the National Geographic story (Vanishing Venice, August 2009) on the Italian city wrought with tourists, I have lost desire.

But I am enamored with the writing of Cathy Newman, whose prose is poetry without the linebreaks. Every paragraph sings. Like the Found Poetry Project, I find myself breaking up blocks of text to fashion poems. For example:

Here, where everything anyone
needs to live and die must
be floated in, wrestled
over bridges, and muscled
up stairs, time is measured
by the breath of tides,
and space bracketed
by water.

The story concludes just as poetic:

Kisses end. Dreams vanish, and sometimes cities too. We long for the perfect ending, but the curtain falls along with our hearts.

Beauty is so difficult.

Skip the trip to Venice. Read Cathy Newman’s work instead.

Photograph by Jodi Cobb, for National Geographic.

first fruit

apricot in july

the first bite
is deep, past
the soft nap

of summer
inside, orange
is more than color

turns mealy, less
than expected
like this season

that grows
warm in
short bursts

turns cloudy
and quiet
this fruit with its

inviting orange
says savor
but slowly

enjoy this
palm-size treat
traveling from soil

to tree
to market
to me

There were a lot of firsts with the Seashore Summer Camp Writers last week: clam digging, poetry poker in the park, book bingo. The group of youngsters, ages 9 to 13, tried many new things, including tasting apricots for the first time, and then writing about the experience. I ate my first apricot and wrote my first fruit poem, too.

Say Yes

In addressing college graduates, University of Connecticut President Michael J. Hogan offered wise counsel. "Say yes," he urged.

His suggestion echoed that of Judyth Hill, my first poetry teacher, and applies not just to students but to all who seek to live life fully.

“My first word of advice is this: Say yes,” said Hogan. “In fact, say yes as often as you can. Saying yes begins things. Saying yes is how things grow. Saying yes leads to new experiences, and new experiences will lead you to knowledge and wisdom. . . an attitude of yes is how you will be able to go forward in these uncertain times.”