Song for Autumn
by: Mary Oliver
In the deep fall
don't you imagine the leaves think how
comfortable it will be to touch
the earth instead of the
nothingness of air and the endless
freshets of wind? And don't you think
the trees themselves, especially those with mossy,
warm caves, begin to think
of the birds that will come--six, a dozen--to sleep
inside their bodies? And don't you hear
the goldenrod whispering goodbye,
the everlasting being crowned with the first
tuffets of snow? The pond
vanishes, and the white field over which
the fox runs so quickly brings out
its blue shadows. And the wind pumps its
bellows. And at evening especially,
the piled firewood shifts a little,
longing to be on its way.
This is why I love Mary Oliver--poems like this. The world is unpredictable and beautiful, and every time I encounter Mary on the page, I find myself stunned into wonder.
I took a haiku writing workshop this afternoon. I've always loved the simplicity of haiku--its concentration on image and surprise. At the end of a haiku, I feel as if I will never see the world quite the same way. I am altered.
Now, I'm not going to turn this post into a lecture on poetic form. Not going to recite my favorite haiku, (It's "The Pope's Penis" by Sharon Olds, although some may argue with me about its haiku-ness.) Not going to talk about syllabics or nature imagery. If you want a poetics lesson, there are plenty of good books out there on the subject, written by people much smarter than me.
What I will say is that I think Mary Oliver writes extended haiku. Her poems are firmly grounded in nature and the seasons, and, when I read them, I am transported. Sometimes stunned and breathless. She does that at the end of today's poem, making the firewood hungry for flames. I will never think of autumn in quite the same way, and autumn has been my favorite season all my life.
So, during today's poetry workshop, we were given 40 minutes to go outside to the library's flower gardens and write haiku, as many as we could. There I sat with a large group of poets, under the summer solstice sun, trying to capture the mystery of creation in three short lines of verse.
Now, at the end of the longest day of the year, I will confess that, although they are short and fairly simple in imagery and language, haikus are a bitch to write. I always imagined Mary Oliver sort of living a life of constant wonder, each waking moment a haiku.
Of course, I'm sure that Mary struggled with language and writing, as all writers do. Her simple, beautiful poems are the result of divine inspiration and many, many hours of poetic blood, sweat, and tears (not always in that order). Effortless writing requires a lot of effort.
Saint Marty wants to be Mary Oliver when he grows up.
Some haiku from this afternoon . . .
Summer Solstice Haiku
by: Martin Achatz
In the blooming violets
a chipmunk
gorges on purple.
A small green caterpillar
on a friend's thumb
crawls toward butterfly.
A finger of lupine
points at me.
"Write!" it says.
Church steeple
against June sky
makes me thirsty for wine.
Blue birdbath
in library shadow
washes away words.
Spider on my journal
page doesn't care
about syllables or lines.
Poets
in a June garden
picking poems.
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