Czeslaw Milosz, Miami Bookfair International, 1986
This year marks a couple of important centenaries in poetry, which I will celebrate this week and next. The first is the Nobel Prize-winning Polish poet Czesław Miłosz, who was one of the giants of 20th-century Polish literature.
Miłosz was born in Lithuania, where his parents escaped the political upheaval in their native Poland. Late, as an adult, he fled Poland and the oppressive post-war Communist regime. He could not have picked a place of greater contrast in which to settle: Berkeley, California in the 1960s.
As Seamus Heaney wrote recently, Miłosz “was poised between lyricism and witness.” Indeed, as Miłosz himself wrote in The Witness of Poetry, “A peculiar fusion of the individual and the historical took place, which means that events burdening a whole community are perceived by a poet as touching him in a most personal manner. Then poetry is no longer alienated.”
But Heaney sums up the poet’s lasting power. “What irradiates the poetry and compels the reader is a quality of wisdom,” wrote Heaney. “Everything is carried and feels guaranteed by the voice. Even in translation, even when he writes in a didactic vein, there is a feeling of phonetic undertow, that the poem is a trawl, not just talk. And this was true of the work he did right up to his death in Kraków in 2004.”
Probably one of Miłosz’s most famous poems, “Dedication,” was written in 1945 in Warsaw at the end of World War II. That is, as Stephen O’Connor wrote in an excellent essay on sentimentality in Miłosz’s poetry, “after more than six years of Nazi occupation, after the bloody suppression of the Warsaw uprising, the subsequent deportation of the city’s more than one million inhabitants, the destruction of all its remaining buildings, and its liberation by the Soviet army… under such circumstances, the notion that poetry might help ‘save nations and people’ takes on a rather different character than it had for me when I first read ‘Dedication’ back in 1973.”
Here is Czesław Miłosz’s “Dedication,” in his own translation:
You whom I could not save
Listen to me.
Try to understand this simple speech as I would be ashamed of another.
I swear, there is in me no wizardry of words.
I speak to you with silence like a cloud or a tree.
What strengthened me, for you was lethal.
You mixed up farewell to an epoch with the beginning of a new one,
Inspiration of hatred with lyrical beauty;
Blind force with accomplished shape.
Here is a valley of shallow Polish rivers. And an immense bridge
Going into white fog. Here is a broken city;
And the wind throws the screams of gulls on your grave
When I am talking with you.
What is poetry which does not save
Nations or people?
A connivance with official lies,
A song of drunkards whose throats will be cut in a moment,
Readings for sophomore girls.
That I wanted good poetry without knowing it,
That I discovered, late, its salutary aim,
In this and only this I find salvation.
They used to pour millet on graves or poppy seeds
To feed the dead who would come disguised as birds.
I put this book here for you, who once lived
So that you should visit us no more.
— Czesław Miłosz,Warsaw, 1945
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My Poem, “The Poet Gene,” Receives Honourable Mention
January 30, 2011
My poem, “The Poet Gene,” received honorable mention in the 2011 ESRC Genomics Forum Poetry Competition announced this weekend.
The competition was co-sponsored by the Economic and Social Research Council’s Genomics Network and the Scottish Poetry Library of Edinburgh. The judges for the competition were Pippa Goldschmidt, Professor Steve Yearley, director of the ESRC Genomics Forum, Peggy Hughes, the communications officer at the Scottish Poetry Library, and poet Kona Macphee.
Writing about my poem, the judges said, “Understandably, most of the poems were serious, and so we particularly enjoyed the humour in one of the runners up, “Improving the Human: ‘The Poet Gene’,” a nicely self-referential poem which imagines the perhaps negative impact of genetic engineering upon poetry itself.”
Here is my poem
“The Poet Gene”
The gene for “poet” has likely been isolated,
somewhere in a lab in southern California.
And I wonder how close it is to the gene
that makes you crave potato chips
or the “coffee-drinker” gene, perhaps,
or the one that causes procrastination.
If they have the poet gene cornered
in a Petri dish, will they admonish it
for all the bad poems ever written,
however unwittingly?
Would it improve the human
to have the poet gene spliced
into fruit or beef – or even bacon?
Poetry-enhanced bacon. Now that’s
genetic modification one can get behind!
Perhaps it can be modified by the reader gene,
increasing the number of poetry readers.
Oh, but what if it went “aft agley”?
What if this innocent experiment turned wicked?
Think of it, more bad poems by more bad poets—
(Increased productivity isn’t always a good thing.)
Perhaps this poem is, in fact, one of them,
a mutated, altered, monster poem
waiting to grab you by the throat and…Ahem.
Think of the sheer volume of bad poetry
overtaking the world, smothering us;
entire forests decimated for paper
upon which these poems are printed
or hundreds of iPhone apps built
to accommodate a staggering number of poems
cranked out by “GMPs” (genetically modified poets)
careering and MFAing all over the place.
Undoubtedly, someone will decide to splice
the poet gene from one poet into another. Then what?
Talk about trouble: one side striving for simplicity;
the other deliberately obtuse and indirect.
No, best leave the poet gene out of even this poem;
rather, focus on how to make potato chip consumption
actually slimming to the human figure, especially
when consumed with large quantities of your favorite ale
and generous servings of bacon.
–Scott Edward Anderson
Related articles
- What do you get when you cross poets and geneticists? (newscientist.com)
A poem for Indonesia and victims of terror everywhere
July 18, 2009
I’ve had a love affair with Indonesia for a long time now. Curiously, it started with its poetry long before I ever visited the country. But the people and the place are the real magic for me. Indonesia is a land (and waters) of stunning beauty, a people of peace and wonder, and a remarkable, storied culture.
I long to go back and when something like the bombings in Jakarta this week happens, my heart sinks that Indonesia and its people may suffer.
A few years ago, after the Bali bombings that killed 20 people and injured 129 and reports of other terrorist activities surfaced, I wrote a poem called “Sons of Abraham,” which has not yet been published. It may be too difficult a subject to be published. (Of course, it also may be that it is not yet finished or polished enough for publication!)
I want to share it here in the wake of the Jakarta bombings and in honor and memory of all victims of terrorism everywhere:
SONS OF ABRAHAM
We are all strung together
by thin filaments of air,
fragments of faith and our burning desire
to please God, to engender
a kind of blessing. Time
is the fragrance of one age
evoking another; essence
is our connection on earth.
I harbor neither empathy nor anger
for people who set off bombs in Bali,
only pity. I am sorry for them,
honoring their God in this way:
beheading Christian village leaders,
decapitating young girls
on their way to school or attacking
women because they wear a burqa
or pray to Mecca.
How sad to think God can be appeased
by such actions, that He wants
such a fate for you—
As for God, I forgive His negligence
or lack of supervision, all leaders are flawed.
We are all Sons of Abraham,
that model of faith, and we are all
struck down by hearts of stone,
leaden particles of dust
shattering between us
in the opaque calculation
of suicide bombs—
“Forgive them, Father,
for they know not what they’ve done.”
–Scott Edward Anderson
______________________________________________
(Note: There are families in eastern Indonesia who have married two faiths, Christian and Muslim. The first-born son or daughter is baptized; the next is raised in Islam. We are all connected. I love my Muslim brothers and sisters as well as my Christian, my Jewish, my Buddhist, and my Hindu families. There is only one God.)
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When a poet goes missing does anyone hear? Yes.
May 11, 2009
This weekend, the Los Angeles Times reported that award-winning poet Craig Arnold, who went missing in Japan in late April, is presumed to have died after a fall.
The American search team, established by his employer, the University of Wyoming after the official Japanese search was ended, tracked Arnold to the edge of “a high and dangerous cliff, and there is virtually no possibility he could have survived the fall,” according to a release quote in the Times.
According to the report, Arnold was fascinated with volcanoes and had traveled to Kuchinoerabu-jima, a tiny Japanese island, to visit the volcano there and was in Japan on a creative exchange fellowship and was blogging about his trip: Volcano Pilgrim.
Reports of his missing buzzed through Twitter a couple of weeks ago after he failed to report after his trip to the volcano.
Very sad news, indeed.
Here is a link to Craig Arnold’s page on the Poetry Foundation web site, which includes several of his poems.
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Who wants to be an Arab poetry millionaire?
May 5, 2009
Gulf poets compete in Millions' Poet competition
A couple of decades ago I had an idea for an all-poetry cable channel. We would have talk shows hosted by and featuring famous poets, films about poets, live readings and workshops, and possibly even feature length movies, dramas, and comedies. (Stephen Dobyns’ Saratoga Hexameter, would have made a good source for a mini-series.)
I shelved the idea after realizing the only way I could afford to develop The Poetry Channel was to develop my other idea — The Disaster Channel. “All disaster, all the time,” was the tag line; 24/7 of disaster coverage, disaster movies, and disaster reporting. My wife said she would divorce me if I went ahead with that idea. (The Weather Channel has since taken the best parts of the format to the bank and is planning to launch a separate channel this spring.)
I now see what my idea was missing: I needed a poetry contest reality show! In the most unlikely of places, Dubai television personality Nashwa Al Ruwaini has launched Millions’ Poet, sort of a Gulf version of American Idol, in which Arab poets battle it out for 5 million United Arab Emirates dirhams (more than $1.3 million). 70 million viewers tuned in to see the finale, according to news sources. Amazing.
Here is what Nashwa Al Ruwaini says about it in an editorial that appeared in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer:
Three years ago, when I devised the format of Millions’ Poet, it was with little more in mind than creating an entertaining, original, and youth-oriented television show. Now in its third season, with more than 15 million viewers each week, the show has become the Gulf countries’ most prestigious poetry competition and a platform for young male and female poets to voice their thoughts before a broad audience. Most unexpectedly, it has also helped spur some progress in the region’s attitudes toward women.
Read the full editorial here: Millions’ Poet
Here is an article about Saudi poetess Ayda Al-Jahani, who is featured in the editorial and who made it to the final four in this usually male-dominated competition: Ayda Al-Jahani
And a link to an NPR Morning Edition story on her: NPR
If anyone has links to English translations of Ayda Al-Jahani’s work, will you please comment below? Thanks.
Carol Ann Duffy Selected as UK Poet Laureate
May 3, 2009
- Image by Getty Images via Daylife
Poet Carol Ann Duffy was nominated for UK Poet Laureate yesterday. Here’s what she had to say about the position, which she had previously poo-poohed:
The appointment of a poet laureate can be seen, quite simply, as a spotlight on the vocation of poetry. I feel privileged to be part of a generation of poets in Britain who serve the vocation of poetry; writers who – in glad company with their readers – regard poetry as the place in language where everything that can be praised is praised, and where what needs to be called into question is so. Perhaps a better word than generation, for our community of poets, readers and listeners, would be family – or, as Ted Hughes had it, tribe. Doris Lessing, too, once described herself as a member of the honourable tribe of storytellers.
Read her remarks in full here.
Here is her poem, “Valentine”:
Not a red rose or a satin heart.
I give you an onion.
It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.
It promises light
like the careful undressing of love.
Here.
It will blind you with tears
like a lover.
It will make your reflection
a wobbling photo of grief.
I am trying to be truthful.
Not a cute card or a kissogram.
I give you an onion.
Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips,
possessive and faithful
as we are,
for as long as we are.
Take it.
Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring,
if you like.
Lethal.
Its scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife.
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Last words of a Poet Laureate: Motion bows out
April 28, 2009
After 10 years, eight royal poems and 700 bottles of sherry as payment, UK Poet Laureate Andrew Motion steps down from the role at the end of April.
He looks back at his experiences while in the post, both good and bad, and offers up a bit of advice for his successor.
Read the interview here: BBC Motion
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Two articles about Afghan poets
April 28, 2009
Two articles about Afghan poets in two days. What are the odds? Yet, here are two stories that, if you care about poetry, you will want to read:
The first, from the Sunday Times of London, is about a 25-year-old woman, the late Nadia Anjuman, a poet who risked her life to keep writing under the Taliban, and who was murdered by her husband after publishing her first book:
The defiant poets’ society. Attending a reading and writing class like this one could end in mutilation or murder for Afghan women — and simply leaving their homes could mean death. Christina Lamb returns to Afghanistan seven years after the fall of the Taliban and finds a country still rife with the persecution of females.
Read the full story here: Nadia Anjuman
The second, from the BBC, is about how the violence in Afghanistan is affecting the themes of contemporary Pashto poets. In a country with a rich poetic tradition, poetry remains relevant and vibrant today:
Afghan poets tackle scars of war by Dawood Azami. The violence in Afghanistan and the Pashtun-inhabited parts of Pakistan is making itself felt on the cultural and social life of the Pashtuns.
Read it here: Pashtun Poetry
Humbled after reading these two stories, in the wake of my post from Saturday whining about not yet having my book published.
For more on Nadia Anjunam’s poetry: Universe
A Poem for Earth Day from the Classical Tamil
April 22, 2009
I can’t think of anything better to say on Earth Day than what the early classical Tamil poet Auvaiyar wrote two millennia ago:
Bless you, earth:
field,
forest,
valley,
or hill,
you are only as good
as the good young men
in each place.
Auvaiyar (Tamil: ஔவையார்)(also Auvayar) was the name of one of the most famous and important female poets of the Tamil canon of southern India. She lived during the Sangam period (c. first and second century C.E.) and wrote 59 poems in Purananuru (புறநானூறு).
Poems translated by A.K. Ramanujan from Poems of Love and War.
Scott Edward Anderson
Scott Edward Anderson's Poetry Blog 