Why poetry?

This from the poet whose poem Live Oaks appeared  a few months ago.I like the idea that some people are just meant to be poets and that's just how it is. It's sometimes nice to think life is just that simplistic and predictable. I have enjoyed her book

The Poetry Birds

Jennifer Maier

When a friend asks why I am not a novelist,

I lean back in mg chair and watch the sky,

wondering how to tell him that although

I have combed the Gulf Coast towns

of my childhood, seeking the snowy egrets

of great short fiction, it is only the poetry birds

who land on me.

            And although I have sat in the dust

of Midwest highways, setting out all the carrion

of my life, I cannot lure the great turkey vulture

that roosts in the hair of novelists and whispers

in his sleep a tale that is spellbinding, a tour de force,

and based on a true story.

            The poetry birds are another thing.

One morning I look out and see them,

a dark alphabet against the sky.  Then

I anoint my arms with suet, tie cherries

in my hair, and stand, very still,

in the back yard.

            Confusion of wings and yellow feet!

            They flock down and I wear them,

a ravenous black veil,

and when they have picked me clean,

they fly off one by one,

until I am just a woman standing alone

in the backyard, and they, a line

in the gathering blue.

from Dark Alphabet 2006

More on Writing

Lisa shared this poem with me after the last post about writing. I think it is very humorous, ironic and true.  
 

For the Young Who Want To
Marge Piercy

Talent is what they say
you have after the novel
is published and favorably
reviewed. Beforehand what
you have is a tedious
delusion, a hobby like knitting.

Work is what you have done
after the play is produced
and the audience claps.
Before that friends keep asking
when you are planning to go
out and get a job.

Genius is what they know you
had after the third volume
of remarkable poems. Earlier
they accuse you of withdrawing,
ask why you don't have a baby,
call you a bum.

The reason people want M.F.A.'s,
take workshops with fancy names
when all you can really
learn is a few techniques,
typing instructions and some-
body else's mannerisms

is that every artist lacks
a license to hang on the wall
like your optician, your vet
proving you may be a clumsy sadist
whose fillings fall into the stew
but you're certified a dentist.

The real writer is one
who really writes. Talent
is an invention like phlogiston
after the fact of fire.
Work is its own cure. You have to
like it better than being loved.

Here are a few clever quotes on writing.

We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. Sheep lice do not seem to share this longing, which is one reason why they write so little.
Anne Lamott

Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.
Cyril Connolly

Writing is a lot easier if you have something to say
Sholem Asch

The Joy of Writing

The Joy of Writing

Wislawya Szymborska

Why does this written doe bound through these written woods?
For a drink of written water from a spring
whose surface will xerox her soft muzzle?
Why does she lift her head; does she hear something?
Perched on four slim legs borrowed from the truth,
she pricks up her ears beneath my fingertips.
Silence - this word also rustles across the page
and parts the boughs
that have sprouted from the word "woods."

Lying in wait, set to pounce on the blank page,
are letters up to no good,
clutches of clauses so subordinate
they'll never let her get away.

Each drop of ink contains a fair supply
of hunters, equipped with squinting eyes behind their sights,
prepared to swarm the sloping pen at any moment,
surround the doe, and slowly aim their guns.

They forget that what's here isn't life.
Other laws, black on white, obtain.
The twinkling of an eye will take as long as I say,
and will, if I wish, divide into tiny eternities,
full of bullets stopped in mid-flight.
Not a thing will ever happen unless I say so.
Without my blessing, not a leaf will fall,
not a blade of grass will bend beneath that little hoof's full stop.

Is there then a world
where I rule absolutely on fate?
A time I bind with chains of signs?
An existence become endless at my bidding?

The joy of writing.
The power of preserving.
Revenge of a mortal hand.

 

These poets are so clever in describing the writing process. Each makes writing seem like it has a life of its own with unlimited potential. As I read more poetry I am reminded over and over that writers are first thinkers with something to say. Additionally they have the gift of knowing how to say it.

Bait Goat

Kay Ryan

There is a

distance where

magnets pull,

we feel, having

held them   

back. Likewise

there is a

distance where

words attract.

Set one out

like a bait goat   

and wait and   

seven others

will approach.

But watch out:

roving packs can

pull your word

away. You   

find your stake   

yanked and some   

rough bunch

to thank.

Here's what I mean about writers being thinkers. Watch this video of Kay Ryan you can see the gears turning in her thought processes. She is hysterical, but always making important connections.
When this video ends you will have the option to watch parts 2,3, and 4 which I highly recommend.  Much more entertaining than anything on tv.