For me, poetry is a contemplative endeavor; best read undisturbed in a quiet nook. I know there are poetry readings but I have never been to one. Yet, this is going to sound a little hypocritical but I love hearing Robert Frost’s recital of Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. You can find it on YouTube.
The complaint I hear most often is I don’t get what the poet is writing about. Paul Celan wrote, “Poetry is a sort of homecoming.” When I read poetry, it feels like I am getting a glimpse into the poet’s abode. It is something personal that I have been given permission to see. I am no poet but when I do write, I think it comes from the wellspring of my being. Writing is music and each word is unique.
I find I am more in tune with the poet on a dark and dreary day. Perhaps the wind is playing a song in the trees and rain has joined in the chorus.
Reading poetry is not like diving into a math problem. There is no final solution, no answer to the equation. I often tell people that you can read a verse and then put it down. Come back later, it will still be there. There is no expectation that you read Whitman’s Leaves of Grass or Ginsberg’s Howl from start to finish in one sitting. Perhaps after reading a few verses you will be compelled into contemplation.
So ease up on the throttle and apply the breaks to the speed of life. There is more to it than careening down the road hell bent on reaching your next destination faster than the next person. Stop your race car, get out, plant your feet firmly on the earth, breathe deep, smell the fresh air, taste the wind, hold a leaf in the palm of your hand, listen to the birds sing, and watch the clouds float by. Let all the others in a rush pass on by. Your destination (and the poem) will still be there tomorrow.
The same verse you read today will likely have a different meaning tomorrow. These words from the Greek philosopher Heraclitus have always resonated with me whether I am reading a poem by Seamus Heaney, WB Yeats, or Shelley“. No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man”
These words from William Blake are equally as prescient, “If the doors of perception were cleansed then everything would appear to man as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern.”
How you perceive a poem is a personal matter. So pick a poet and read…and don’t be afraid. At first you might not understand but then perhaps your doors of perception might be cleansed.
This by no means an exhaustive list, but I return to these poets quite often:
Mary Oliver
W.B. Yeats
Robert Frost
Seamus Heaney
Walt Whitman
Edgar Allen Poe
Gary Snyder
William Blake
John Keats
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Interpretations of Poets from the Chinese Tang Dynasty by Red Pine
Emily Dickinson
Rumi
And more
