Poetry Month: Some of My Favourite Poems
In celebration of poetry month, sharing an annotation of my favourite poems. This is by no means exhaustive, but I thought I'd share it now, and perhaps update with my other favourites later:
1. Banks of a Canal
–Seamus Heaney
Seamus
Heaney’s last poem starts simply—with a canal, a small and calm body of water, not
as fierce as the wild rivers that run through rugged valleys nor as vast as the
ocean. While it starts quietly, the poem eventually morphs into something bigger and
almost imperceptibly ends in a lofty place.
Like the
word canal, the water that flows
through it tends to be quiet, but it nonetheless touches lives though perhaps not
in the overt way that great rivers do; it does not provide a source of
livelihood like epic rivers do, but touches the soul by “slowing time to a
walking pace”.
While this
poem is based on an 1872 painting of Gustave Caillebotte of the same title,
Seamus Heaney clearly does not duplicate the insights already expressed in the
painting nor detracts from it. Instead, his poem adds to the painting,
encouraging the reader to imagine beyond what he or she could see, like perhaps
the people who pass by the banks of the canal: Why are they passing by the
canal? Is it out of practicality? Are they searching for greater clarity?
Perhaps the canal implicitly provides guidance through its smoother path?
2. Old Man –
Edward Thomas
I find this poem sweet and quiet. Its use of the sense of smell as
a memory cue resonates with me; as I become older, I tend to remember sensorial
cues first, then their associated memories flood back subsequently – I guess
this is not too different from Proust’s concept of involuntary memory, i.e.,
how the taste of the madeleine dipped in a cup of tea evokes strong memories of
the narrator’s childhood days at Combray (Volume I of Remembrance of Things
Past).
At first level,
the title refers to the name of the bush whose bitter smell brings back
memories:
“The herb
itself I like not, but for certain
I love it, as
some day the child will love it
Who plucks a
feather from the door-side bush
Whenever she goes in or out of the house.”
But at the same time “Old Man” also refers to that state when
those of us who are fortunate enough to reach it would inevitably start losing
our memory, and increasingly we would rely on sensorial cues to connect with
the past. In this poem, while the poet does not particularly like Old Man the
bitter bush, he would not exchange it for anything else because of the precious
and sweet memories it holds for him.
3. Kubla Khan – Samuel Taylor Coleridge
The first
few times I read Kubla Khan, I did not understand the poem at all, and yet I
kept on re-reading anyway. What compelled me to read on was perhaps the word
Xanadu, which had intrigued me a lot and evoked some kind of mystery. As a
child, I had imagined Xanadu to be an idealized place of bliss, where the
ladies stroll gracefully in colorful parasols, the weather is balmy, the palms
are swaying just right, and most importantly, there are no clocks to remind one
about time—a faraway world that was quite different from my own. I grew up in a
milieu that was years and miles away from the internet, where words and
corresponding pictures/web images were not exactly at my fingertips. And for a
long time, I had held this concept of Xanadu, developed largely from pure
evocation of the word, rather than seeing a physical manifestation of the
place. But I guess part of the mystery was in not knowing and not seeing.
Aside from
fascination with the word Xanadu, I kept on reading the poem partly due to its
chant-like and musical quality, helped by rhymes and alliterations like “a
damsel with a dulcimer”—this line in particular evokes sweetness and
gentleness, a description that helps reinforce the mystical quality of the
poem. And I think it is this musical quality that makes the poem an enduring
one. Oh yes, that an opium-induced dream inspired the poem is also a great hook
;-) And maybe I take vicarious pleasure in Coleridge’s opium-induced dreaminess
J
That the
poem was difficult for me to understand was clearly not a hindrance to savouring
it. At some point though the stanzas seem disconnected (due to the Porlock
interruption?). Some of the images are also jarring, like the sunny pleasure-dome
with caves of ice! The logic is not easy to process despite Coleridge’s
explanation of the wonderful engineering involved (a miracle of rare device).
But then again not every word or line has to be sensible for a poem to make
overall sense (I am thinking of Jabberwocky) or to have an impact.
4. The Stranger – Gabriela Mistral
Gabriela
Mistral for me is a true inspiration, a woman who managed to overcome early
adversaries in life (poverty, abandonment, tragedy), and went on to chart an
exceptional career as an educator and writer, piling up awards that culminated
in a Nobel Laureate in Literature in 1945 (and she was supposedly an early
influence to Pablo Neruda, a fellow Chilean and who also went on to receive a
Nobel Prize in Literature, 1975). Against this backdrop, her poems do not need
to say much because for me they will always be foreshadowed by the author’s
real life experience. Mistral is one of those whose life or personal narrative
per se became bigger than her work, though to be fair it was her exemplary work
to begin with that paved the way for the various roles she assumed later on.
Stranger
talks about a woman who moves to a new town, bringing with her ways that might have been regarded as normal where she came from, but is considered odd in her new town, i.e.,
praising a certain weightless God or her peculiar ways of planting cactus in
the garden, etc. The narrator takes on the persona of a native to the
community but who has not yet been assimilated or integrated. Somehow this is a poignant reminder that although
man has recorded many advances and breakthroughs in technology, aviation,
intergalactic exploration, and many great missions to understand the great
beyond/the outer space, here in our own backyard there remains a great deal of
work to be done. Hunger remains in many pockets of the world. And in many other parts, it is almost inevitable
for a day to end without news of someone or some group cordoning off a stranger
in our midst.
Among us she may live for eighty years,
Yet always as if newly come,
Speaking a tongue that plants and whines
Only by tiny creatures understood.
5.
Japanese Maple – Clive James
It is said
that Clive James wrote this poem knowing of his impending death due to terminal
cancer. Like many great poems, this starts simple, albeit strictly measured, in
a unique rhyme scheme. The subject of death, difficult but inevitable, makes the poem important (as they say,
it is the only thing we can be sure of, apart from taxes). Robert Pinksy
mentioned about the two elements of a great poem, subject and indelibleness. I
think James has both covered in this poem, the former as already mentioned is a
universal subject that I presume would elicit great response from most of us,
at some point, don’t we all think about death?
As for indelibleness, the rhyme scheme makes the poem easier to
remember, and the use of the Japanese Maple as a metaphor or receptacle.
6. Orpheus Alone - Mark Strand
Saving the best for last. Mark Strand is an all-time favourite. This poem is a bit long and more complicated than some of his poems, but it is so easy to get lost in the beauty of his words. Sometimes I read it just to savour the words.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/182870
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| Canals can be simple (as in Heaney's poem), but can also be grand, like this:) Adding this for the thumbnail. |
#CliveJames #SeamusHeaney #MarkStrand #Poetry #FavouritePoems
