September 25: "No Things," Thingness, Fireworks

Poet William Carlos Williams once said, "No ideas but in things."

I think most poets subscribe to that maxim.  Ideas are empty cups, and it's up to the poet to fill those cups with pomegranate juice or blood or mud or a thousand breaths.  Whatever it takes to turn the empty cup into something that can be tasted or seen or smelled or heard or felt.

Billy Collins has some things to say about things . . . 

No Things

by: Billy Collins

This love for everyday things,
part natural from the wide eye of infancy,
part a literary calculation,

this attention to the morning flower
and later to a fly strolling
along the rim of a wineglass—

are we just avoiding out one true destiny,
when we do that, averting our glance
from Philip Larkin who waits for us in an undertaker’s coat?

The leafless branches against the sky
will not save anyone from the void ahead,
nor will the sugar bowl or the sugar spoon on the table.

So why bother with the checkered lighthouse?
Why waste time on the sparrow,
or the wildflowers along the roadside

when we should all be alone in our rooms
throwing ourselves against the wall of life
and the opposite wall of death,

the door locked behind us
as we hurl rocks at the question of meaning,
and the enigma of our origins?

What good is the firefly,
the droplet running along the green leaf,
or even the bar of soap sliding around the bathtub

when we are really meant to be
banging away on the mystery
as hard as we can and to hell with the neighbors?

banging away on nothingness itself,
some with the foreheads,
others with the maul of sense, the raised jawbone of poetry.

I don't spend my days preoccupied with nothingness.  No thingness.  I remain pretty enamored of the small things in my life.  Sometimes, when I close my eyes at night, I become very aware of each breath I take, the very action of inhaling and exhaling.  In summertime, I can spend a couple hours watching bees swimming in my lilac bushes, and, in wintertime, I love the slant of light in icicles.  

Thingness is what poetry is all about for me.  I'm not sure that makes me a disciple of Dr. Williams, but all the little fireworks of everyday life--ants crawling on the sidewalk, an ice cube melting in my glass of water--lend meaning and grace to my existence.

Even if you're not a practicing poet, you can still celebrate thingness.  I say practicing poet because I believe every person is born a poet.  When I've worked with elementary school students, they blow me away with their creativity and facility at language play.  And then something happens--life, puberty, bad teachers--and, by the time they hit high school and college, they're too cool or embarrassed to unleash their inner poets. 

Celebrating thingness is easy.  You just need to open your eyes, be aware of all the little miracles you encounter each and every day.  Once you get into the practice (it takes a little while--be patient), you will find it difficult to stop.  Each dandelion or mud puddle or spiderweb becomes a firework blossoming in front of you.

Saint Marty wishes you all happy thingness tonight.