November 1: "Memorizing 'The Sun Rising' by John Donne," Funny as Hell, Mariah Carey

Yes, there was snow on the ground this morning.  

It is the first day of November, and that means it's the start of Mariah Carey season.  Yes, tonight I heard "All I Want for Christmas Is You" on the radio for the first time this year.  (Now, I know I'm in the minority, but I think Mariah is overrated.  Her song wouldn't be half as popular nowadays if it weren't for the movie Love Actually.)

Worked at home for most of the day, then went into my library office for a couple hours.  I spent a good portion of that time reading and talking about poetry.  That may sound like torture to some of you, but, for me, it was like Christmas--unwrapping one poem after another.

Billy Collins puts his poetic memory to the test . . . 

Memorizing "The Sun Rising" by John Donne

by: Billy Collins

Every reader loves the way he tells off
the sun, shouting busy old fool
into the English skies even though they
were likely cloudy on that seventeenth-century morning.

And it’s a pleasure to spend this sunny day
pacing the carpet and repeating the words,
feeling the syllables lock into rows
until I can stand and declare,
the book held closed by my side,
that hours, days, and months are but the rags of time.

But after a few steps into stanza number two,
wherein the sun is blinded by his mistress’s eyes,
I can feel the first one begin to fade
like the puffs of sky-written letters on a windy day.

And by the time I have taken in the third,
the second is likewise gone, a blown-out candle now,
a wavering line of acrid smoke.

So it’s not until I leave the house
and walk three times around this hidden lake
that the poem begins to show
any interest in walking by my side.

Then, after my circling,
better than the courteous dominion
of her being all states and him all princes,

better than love’s power to shrink
the wide world to the size of a bedchamber,

and better even than the compression
of all that into the rooms of these three stanzas

is how, after hours stepping up and down the poem,
testing the plank of every line,
it goes with me now, contracted into a little spot within.

I don't have many poems memorized.  Sure, I can quote some lines and stanzas of a few of my favorites, but, if my life depended on it, the only poem I could recite in full is Sharon Olds' "The Pope's Penis"--because it's only seven lines long.  And irreverent.  And funny as hell.

I have a friend who is a breathing/walking anthology of poetry:  he can jump from Shakespeare to Frost to Whitman without so much as a hiccup.  Of course, he spent over 30 years of his life teaching high school English and drama, so it's kind of in his blood.

Me?  I can barely remember what I had for dinner.  When I was younger, I used to act in a lot of plays and musicals, so my memorization skills were much sharper.  I can recite a few of my own poems from memory now, but I don't think that really counts.  You will never catch me reciting John Donne or Emily Dickinson or Walt Whitman off the top of my head.

However, Saint Marty can sing the hell out of Kelly Clarkson's "Underneath the Tree"--which should be the anthem of Christmas instead of Mariah's little ditty.