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accounting4taste42 · 11 months

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T.S. ELIOT AND PRESENCE

[TL:DR as I age and I am "Being" differently, more present, different poems of his speak to me differently yet still eloquently]

I was 15 when I discovered the poetry of Thomas Stearns Eliot within the *Norton Anthology of Poetry.* Nearly 50 years later, I'm reading him completely differently. Back then, I was smitten by "The Hollow Men," which can still be read as quintessential teenage angst:

===

Shape without form, shade without colour,

Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed

With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom

Remember us -- if at all -- not as lost

Violent souls, but only

As the hollow men

The stuffed men.

===

It ends famously, in italics:

===

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper.

===

I discovered that I had to memorize Eliot before I could begin to make sense of his writings.

Next came "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." I created a verb, "to Prufrock," which is to take the notion of the most modest of molehills and turn it into something so massive and overwhelming that to take that action would disturb the universe, which could not be dared, because it wouldn't have been worth it and because the would-be protagonist was so insignificant anyway that even if he attempted to do so it would have been completely misunderstood.

But then, glossing over "The Waste Land" until much later, I found "Burnt Norton," the first of his 4 Quartets. I endeavored to memorize the complete works of T.S. Eliot before I graduated high school, but after much of "Burnt Norton," my brain was full.

But it is "Burnt Norton" that still speaks to me today, as it is about presence, and time. It was written after a walk through the garden outside the mansion of the name with Emily Hale, "The Hyacinth Girl" of "The Waste Land," written for her, the woman he did not marry, but was nonetheless in love with whom he had created her to be 15 years earlier. We create the idea of who the other people are in our life. He was in love at the time, he would later write, not with Ms. Hale, but rather with the "ghost" of the Emily he knew decades earlier.

It begins:

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Time present and time past

Are both perhaps present in time future

And time future contained in time past.

If all time is eternally present

All time is unredeemable.

What might have been is an abstraction

Remaining a perpetual possibility

Only in a world of speculation.

What might have been and what has been

Point to one end, which is always present.

Footfalls echo in the memory

Down the passage which we did not take

Towards the door we never opened

Into the rose-garden. My words echo

Thus, in your mind.

But to what purpose

Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves

I do not know.

===

A lament, and yet acknowledging how fruitless it is to mourn the road not taken or a future the will not be embraced.

He ends the first section of the poem:

===

Time past and time future

What might have been and what has been

Point to one end, which is always present.

===

*Always* present.

Later in the poem:

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At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;

Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,

But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,

Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,

Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,

There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.

I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where.

And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time.

===

He can't place it in time because it is always present -- the still point of the turning world, the in-between of past and future.

The second part ends:

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Time past and time future

Allow but a little consciousness.

To be conscious is not to be in time

But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden,

The moment in the arbour where the rain beat,

The moment in the draughty church at smokefall

Be remembered; involved with past and future.

Only through time time is conquered.

===

There is more to the poem. He brings in religion and damnation, evoking Dante. Some might read my perceptions of these poems and paraphrase a line from "Prufrock" and protest:

"That is not what he meant at all

That is not it at all."

But "The Hollow Men", as brilliant as it still is with its memorable haunting lines, nor longer speaks for me. For decades I identified with Mr. Prufrock, and while it is still an amazing poem which I likely will still be able to recite when I can't remember my own name, he no longer resembles me, nor I him.

But now, as I aspire towards Being, and Presence, I am conscious to not be in time, for all emotion is temporal, either as laments or nostalgia for the past, or as apprehension or excitement for the future. To be fully present is to be at the still point of the turning world....

#ts eliot #presence #burnt norton #the love song of j. alfred prufrock #the hollow men #Emily Hale #the hyacinth girl

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jasmeee · 1 year

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The different stories : a reflection on the anthology , “lockdown litanies countless untold stories" an essay by Jaslie Velando

To get started, allow me to share a motivational proverb. "life is like riding a bicycle". Comparing to ourlives, we need to take risk to achieve our dream, even if at first it will be challenging for us, just think about the good life you envision. To maintain balance, you must keep moving. Don't give up since there is a good grace from the Lord waiting for you despite our hopes and our parents, even though at first you will truly be satisfied with the challenges. But what If a seemingly ideal situation too many notes in a composition were out of tune? What if there was a lovely music playing? By somebody who then made a bunch of mistakes ? Is the player to blame for having a chaotic life? Inaccuracies? Look and seelthis article will explore the warls and thoughts that exist within each individual mind. A setting that might be responsible for someone's mental illness.

As I read the first poem “ Dear Diary” Sadly, I was mistaken in my excitement since I believed that I could read someone else's wonderful life. If there is something we don't want to forget or is unforgettable for us, we all know what we wrote in our diaries, but this one is unique. This poetry expresses a person's traumas and fears. How other people betrayed him/her, believing that he/she would not be left alone, and how they struggled in life to the point where it even affected their schooling, had a significant impact, i can relate this poem to the song Just hold on by presence

the second one is The Tale of a Modern Sisyphus” This poem, in my opinion, depicts women striving for the throne but also fighting for it. but unconcerned if they fall short. They all have the right win but we can’t do anything because the only one can win . nd they all down to earth , they don’t care as long as they know they did their best to get

the crown. Can relate this poem to the song “miss independent" by ne-yo.

the third poem, "O' Yayi (A Prose Poem)," would cause me pain. Because love is only a four-letter word yet has such a profound effect on our lives, I don't want to feel it. Even though you are ruining yourself, it is still okay because you want that person to be happy even though her happiness is destroying you since it is full of sacrificing and understanding. Can relate this poem to the song “make it with you" by ben&ben

The fourth poem that will be examined is "Two Red Lace on the Wonderwall." Because the poem states, "And tried my luck with several men," and because she mentions death, I believe it is about a sick woman who has a sexually transmitted disease. However, it's also possible that she met a man with whom she feels at ease, and she would go to any lengths for him because she has found solace in him and he genuinely cares about her. They may be in love, but I believe their story is being hampered by the woman's illness. And I can relate this poem to the song “Fall for you" by secondhand serenade

The fifth poetry, "Umbilical," is a metaphor of a mother's love; in this poem, the kid understands the hardships her mother endured in order to bring him or her into this world. Because her mother endured a lot of suffering, he or she may feel guilty, but guilt is unnecessary because it is a mother's love. They are at ease. They feel cherished and significant. The first relationship a baby has is with its mother. This poem can relate to the song “mapa” by sb19

The sixth one is a poem with an educational message. The majority of our parents have told us that grades K through 12 are just a burden for us and for them. While they may be correct that this is a burden for them due to financial difficulties, for students like me, grades K through 12 will never be a burden. Never will time or money be wasted on it. It helps us to be ready for our college journey because we need time to prepare, be well-mannered, and especially to be a disciplined student. We are not yet fully developed to enter the college life. Can relate this poem to the song “Follow your dream” by sheryn regis

For the seventh part of this poem is also unfathomable and horrifying since it discusses how difficult it may be to battle depression or anxiety, especially when those around you will only judge you if you admit it to them. “3 A.M. "Awakening" describes the sensation I have when I awaken at three in the morning. I have a strange feeling in the morning. Can relate this poem to the song “anxiety” by anne calendening

The eight part of this poem is

The story of "My Frail Lady" centers on a woman who committed suicide. I am aware that sometimes we want to live, but there is something wrong if you constantly consider other people's feelings or opinions. My skin is young but my heart is ancient, the song declares. The song that will suit here is “suicide” by nightcore

And for the last is No matter how difficult life may be, this poem serves as a reminder that we are capable of overcoming all obstacles. "Major Arcana" gives me hope for the future. Sometimes, when we are feeling down about ourselves, we just need a poem of this caliber to cheer us on. Can relate this poem to the song “i wont give up”

In conclusion, I greatly appreciate the diverse experiences and stories that this anthology exposed me to. They are quite brave, in my opinion, to share these kinds of stories. I wish them well and that they can find some comfort here.

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takethemonetandletsgogh · 2 years

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what i've been reading (august 2022)

disclaimer: I have been reading way too much. I work in the literary field so I have access to a lot of books and I don't know how to control myself.

books

Orphic Paris by Henri Cole: I have nothing good to say... sorry

Plainwater by Anne Carson: speechless. best read of the month. I devoured it in 2 days it was THAT good. Anne Carson never disappoints.

Crossing the Water by Sylvia Plath: amazing, beautiful, my favorite Plath collection so far it was just so so so good; I'm speechless.

Anthology of Palestinian Poetry: very interesting and so diverse collection of poetry from Arabic and Palestinian poets! Some were better than others but a great introductory read to delve into this field of poetry:)

The Essential June Jordan: this blew me away. one of the most impactful read of this year. I loved it so much I want to read it again and again and again.

Selected Poems by Paul Auster: a bit repetitive in the leitmotivs but it was really interesting. I need to read more of this author!!

The Albertine Workout by Anne Carson: great reflexion / poem on the character of Albertine in Proust’s Search for Lost Time. Would need to read it again after reading Proust to fully understand though.

Poems 1962—2012 by Louise Glück: a re-read. loved it even more than the first time. I can't express how much I love her poems.

The Royal Game by Stefan Zweig: such a compelling short story !! I couldn't put it down. highly recommend for a short read.

articles

“Anne Carson's Splintered Brilliance” by Charlotte Shane (2016) : “Anne Carson lives for the breaking up, the separation. She’s trafficked in fragmentation for a long time: Her career as a scholar of ancient works, which are often fragmentary or have no definite author, required becoming intimate with the incomplete, the impossibility of completion��

“The Handmaiden” and the Freedom Women Find Only with One Another by Jia Tolentino (2016)

On Rediscovering the Natural World Through Ovid by Nina MacLaughlin (2019) : “We grow close and closer, as with a friend, a love, the members of one’s family, so, too, a city block on the commute, the shifting light, the shape of the leaves on the Japanese maple around the corner. The tiny patch of lavender on a corner near my apartment that I see each early morning, a version of a friend. I am curious about it, interested in its presence and its growth: Who planted it, I wonder. Why’s it here?”

mangas & comics (I've been reading A LOT of those........)

Spy Family vol. 1 — 8 by Tatsuya Endo : I spent a whole 5 days selling them at the Paris Japan Expo back in July and they were so popular I decided to read them and I really liked it!! It was very funny and endearing. Very glad I stole magnets for my fridge at my job back in July.

Seuls vol. 1 — 13 by Fabien Vehlmann & Bruno Gazzotti : very interesting French comic I used to read when I was a child and recently discovered again!! Highly recommend. About children surviving some sort of 'apocalyspe' alone when every grown-ups have disappeared.

Le Bateau de Thésée vol. 1 — 10 by Toshiya Higashimoto : manga about a man trying to fix his family history that has been ruptured by a tragedy. Very reminiscent of Erased. I liked the world-building as time travels can be sometimes confusing. Not very convinced by the ending though. The main character is so prettily drawn!!!

Beauté vol. 1 — 3 by Hubert and Kerascoët : another French comic I used to read as a child (which I was probably too young to read...) and recently discovered again. This book is GORGEOUS (I love Kerascoët's artstyle<3) and asks some extremely interesting philosophical questions about beauty and politics.

Mon papa dessine des femmes nues by Philippe Dupuy : very heart-warming comic about art, fatherhood and sensibility. Dupuy's illustrations are mind-blowing and this feels like a true trip inside another world. Very interesting questions on culture and art in general, through the lens of children.

memoir research

"On Rediscovering the Natural World Through Ovid" by Nina MacLaughlin (2019)

“THE MYTH OF DAPHNE ON A COIN MINTED AT DAMASCUS.” by Gabriela Bijovsky (2003)

“ORACLE TREES IN THE ANCIENT HELLENIC WORLD.” by Luís Mendonça de Carvalho, Francisca Maria Fernandes and Hugh Bowden (2011)

“POETRY, METAMORPHOSIS, AND THE LAUREL: OVID, PETRARCH, AND SCEVE.” by JoAnn DellaNeva (1982)

“The Roots of ‘Daphne.’” by J. L. Lightfoot (2000)

“Ovid’s Metamorphic Bodies: Art, Gender, and Violence in the ‘Metamorphoses.’” by Charles Segal (1998)

#recs #reading list #ttmalgrecs

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jadevalkry97 · 8 months

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to love life, to love it even

when you have no stomach for it

and everything you've held dear

crumbles like burnt paper in your hands,

your throat filled with the silt of it.

When grief sits with you, its tropical heat

thickening the air, heavy as water

more fit for gills than lungs;

when grief weights you like your own flesh

only more of it, an obesity of grief,

you think, How can a body withstand this?

Then you hold life like a face

between your palms, a plain face,

no charming smile, no violet eyes,

and you say, yes, I will take you

I will love you, again. ~Ellen Bass

(Book: Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems)

#ellen bass #quotes #spilled ink #thoughts #Spotify

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milesbutterball · 1 year

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#poetry #poetry of presence #awesome #peace #loveislove #meditation #mindfulness

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lunamonchtuna · 2 years

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— Ellen Bass, “The Thing Is”, Poetry Of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems

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weltenwellen · 4 years

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Ellen Bass, "The Thing Is", Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems

#poetry #text

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luthienne · 3 years

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hi, I'm sorry if this sounds super vague, but do you have anything that could give me some comfort? my mother is in the hospital and I'm unsure of how to navigate my feelings and I feel like some comforting texts might be a great start? if it's too much, you don't have to :) thanks for reading anyway have a great day/night! 💘🥰

hi, i’m so so sorry that you and your mom are going through such a difficult time and i hope things look up. sending you all the love in the world. <3 here and here are some posts with some words on hope, and a few more words that comfort me:

“We talk so much of light, please let me speak on behalf of the good dark. Let us talk more of how dark the beginning of a day is.”

Maggie Smith, from “How Dark the Beginning”

“What we love, shapely and pure, / is not to be held, / but to be believed in.”

Mary Oliver, from Evidence; “Swans”

Callista Buchen, “Taking Care”

Cheryl Strayed, Tiny Beautiful Things

Lloyd Schwartz, “Leaves”

Kahlil Gibran, “On Joy and Sorrow”

“…I have known with certainty that the worst things, and even despair, are only a kind of abundance and an onslaught of existence that one decision of the heart could turn into its opposite. Where things become truly difficult and unbearable, we find ourselves in a place already very close to its transformation.”

Rainer Maria Rilke, from a letter to Anita Forrer, February 14, 1920 as featured in The Dark Interval: Letters on Loss, Grief, and Transformation

Valarie Kaur, Sikh activist, civil rights attorney, and author

“To touch someone is to risk pain, to risk rejection, be it your own or that of another. […] It is a bridge you walk together, swaying above an abyss of fear. To hold each other’s hands is to have balance. Yet it also means having their weight with you, should there be a sudden fall.”

D. E. Chaudron, excerpt of Your Body, An Altar

Learning to Die: An Interview with Jenny Offill

“...whatever the name of the catastrophe, it is never / the opposite of love.”

Mary Oliver, from Dream Work: Poems; “Shadows”

Aracelis Girmay, “Elegy”

“When we will ourselves to stillness, we find we are flawed and cleaved inherently. A rip is a wound that might undo you, but also a space where light comes through.”

Molly McCully Brown; Places I’ve Taken My Body; ‘Poetry, Patience, and Prayer’

Ellen Bass, “The Thing Is”, Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems

(x)

“If grief can be a doorway to love, then let us all weep for the world we are breaking apart so we can love it back to wholeness again.”

Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

#ask #anon #compilation #you can also look through the tags ->#to be human #a kind of holiness #on grief #i'm so sorry if these aren't what you were looking for #i got very little sleep last night and i should probably have waited to post this #but i wanted to share this sooner rather than later #sending you love <333

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srbachchan · 3 years

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DAY 4655

Jalsa, Mumbai Nov 27, 2020 Fri 11:04 PM

Work takes away most of the day and the words that need to be expressed on this special day remain in the solitude of the being .. they cannot be expressed or put into thought ..

Yet , the most telling words came from the lady of the family ..

“ Family, let’s remember Dad today with gratitude for giving us this name & may we never forget it ..”

I called him Dad .. but when speaking of him, it shall always be ‘Babuji’

The tribute in Hindi has been very kindly given translation by the bearded recluse from the hills of the Uddhagamandalam ..

Most-venerable and most-revered Shri Amitabh Bachchan ji,

Heartfelt bowed greetings and salutations... charansparsh, 27 November 2020 ... Infinite respects to most-revered Babuji, Dr. Harivansh Rai Bachchan ji... for his 113th birth anniversary... On this special occasion, I dedicate a brief write-up, in my humble language, on the literary-poetic life of the great poet Dr. Harivansh Rai Bachchan...

The final truth of life is death... but there are some who are remembered for long due to their good deeds and good qualities... Dr. Harivansh Rai Bachchan was one of them who gave lovers of literature the taste of exquisite poetry in simple easy words... It’s his birthday today... Once again, countless salutations to him...

While narrating his own life story, Dr. Bachchan has crafted such an intoxicating reality of ‘Madhushala’ that connoisseurs of the Hindi language will continue to find oestrus inspiration forever...

Only in literature can one find unity and religious harmony in a drunken stagger which is normally cursed by people... Where else could it be found other than the magic of Dr. Bachchan’s pen... who presented the philosophy of life with such ease and straightforwardness, showing equal prowess in both prose and poetry…

Dr. Harivansh Rai Bachchan --- A thoughtful scholar, true thinker, a strong essayist, auto-biographer, commenter, translator, and story-writer... who was at once natural, simple, sensitive, and thoughtful... He was as sensitive as thoughtful... compassionate as well as humorous... he wrote free verse as well as metered... expressive as well as ponderous... conscientious as well as patriotic... and a lover of the world at large...

(His style of poetry was often called Cchaayaa vaadi - reflective)

Apart from advancing the reflective style of poetry, Dr. Bachchan had also appealed to literature in prose... Like a silver waterfall dropping down the Himalayas, his compositions had an uncommon insight into hearts and minds... his poems carry the natural expressions of human feelings that touch the heart... Dr. Bachchan’s works were very popular in the common walks of life... His prose in stories, memoirs, essays, radio-talks, commentaries, diaries, auto-biography etc. are not only among the most celebrated writings, but they remain a priceless treasure of Hindi literature…

Dr. Bachchan;s inclination is that of a sensitive poetic thinker... his writings present observations on social subjects... He has written in his autobiography, “Perhaps it is in my nature to be expressive, which if let loose can become hyperbolic...”

Dr. Bachchan did not expect too much from the society or life... self-confidence, dedication, honesty and discipline... these were the mantra of his life... and his entire literary world seems to be bound by these principles... Probably this was the way that kept him from becoming weak... In the most difficult situations in life, he did not lose his inspirations, nor did his competence fail... he faced them, suffered them... did not compromise his beliefs, nor was faith shaken...

Dr. Bachchan, in his auto-biography, has served such an intoxicating mix of reality that connoisseurs of the Hindi language will always savour its pleasures... Dr. Bachchan, as a story-teller, historian, writer and as a critic, is at his peak... Hindi songs found a new direction in Dr. Bachchan’s verses... “Madhushala”, pushing away the divisions of faiths and differences, even if only as an experience of coherent joy, establishes a unity... “Nisha-Nimantran” and “Ekaant Sangeet” are among his very popular anthologies... “Sat Rangini” and “Milan Yaamini” are anthologies filled with passion and flowing lyrics...

Dr. Bachchan writes, “I wish to write great poetry, not an epic!”... But, not only did he write great poetry, his autobiography is itself an epic... an epic poem in prose... epics have para-narratives... this one has his own story...

This can be said without hesitation that, not only in Hindi, Dr. Bachchan’s place is reserved among the most loved poets across India…

Sir ji, you are past the threshold of the 78th year today... Yet you complete all your tasks successfully with full devotion and enthusiasm... Without a doubt, there is the support of Babuji’s compositions which provide an inner strength... it is that mystery and relish which keeps your excitement and energy even today... ahead and victorious... May Babuji’s blessings always remain over you and your entire family...

Sending you some amazing pictures of father and son herewith... Do give your love, Sir ji, which we always need...

With respect, affection, and abundant devotion Your devotee, Rajesh Shrivastav EF

In gratitude and in the generosity of all the Ef that have given their love and respect to him ..

I present your greetings to him here in his room in Prateeksha .. where he breathed his last .. this room shall ever remain as is ..

.. Babuji and Ma .. Ma in her wedding finery .. Babuji’s ‘Rachnavali’ his entire works, in bounded collection on the mantle .. on the left of in the safron cloth bound his Ramayan and his JanGeeta , which he read each day and asked me to do similar .. the smaller framed picture is of my Nana and Nani - Sardar Khazan Singh Suri and Amar Kaur Sodhi .. Ma ji’s parents .. the diya flamed keeps lit ever .. below the mantle are two stone sculptures that he had picked up, lying wasted on abandoned road sides .. a lady in one in female form and the other which cannot be seen in the picture is of a lion ..

.. since he had done his PhD on WB Yeats , the great Irish poet, from Cambridge .. he referred to the two sculptures as the ‘the Lion and the Virgin’ .. it was either one of Yeats’ prominent works addressed thus or a reference that he had researched on during his dissertation ..

.. the flowers , fresh, adorn the pictures each day ..

.. a desk, his reading glasses , his wrist watch and some memorabilia on it on the other side of the room where he sat and wrote ..

.. in devotion .. in memory .. in admiration .. in inspiration .. in his wisdom .. in his learning .. in his will .. in his ever presence .. in his being Babuji ..

🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

10 pranaams ..

... from his autobiographical title on one of the volumes ‘dashadwaar se sopaan tak’ .. from the room with dashdwaar , ten doors or openings , symbolic of the 10 openings in the human body , the room in our home in Allahabad , 17 Clive Road .. to Sopaan, our home in Delhi where he finished his writing of this autobiography as his last chapter ..

Amitabh Bachchan

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thefossilwhale · 3 years

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“nick wiseman has collapsed!”

button & nick, with some button & glitch. 3.9k words. set late chapter 5, on a hypothetical extra day before returning to aeon.

Good morning! For you: a question and a clue.

‘How funny you are today [Chicago]…’

There’s your clue. Guess the question?

Glitch’s texts arrive six minutes after their recipient steps into the shower. Phone silenced and hair lathered, Sabrina lingers obliviously behind the curtain, amid the warm water and warm vanilla scent of her soap. She emerges eighteen minutes later and smiles at her flashing screen, but decides that Glitch’s mystery can wait until she gets dressed.

Thankfully, Nick waits too. But as soon as she is dried and clothed, avoiding full body mirrors until she can at least throw on a robe, the fraternal voice in her head pipes up.

More poetry games? She can’t see his face, obviously, but she can feel his psychic nose wrinkle. How did you get “coffee date” from that?

Nick had done such a good job pretending not to exist for half an hour that she almost forgot they shared every thought now, and she had unwittingly dragged him along on her half-unconscious poetry explication.

“She’s quoting Frank O’Hara,” Sabrina explains, unsure why she says this aloud. She’s alone, though, so she keeps going: “The end of that poem is something like, ‘getting out of bed and having coffee and cigarettes, and loving you so much.’ I don’t know. Point is: coffee.”

Ah, yes. The famous lines from one of O’Hara’s finer works, thinks Nick, faux snootily. Love poetry, though? How do you know she wants to get coffee and isn’t trying to woo you? Or maybe she wants to smoke too many cigarettes with you. You’ll have to let her down easy—about the smoking, I mean. I like Glitch; you’d be cute together! But don’t start smoking.

Sabrina is parting her hair now, with a wide tooth comb and surgical precision, and she rolls her eyes in the mirror. “I just know. Poet’s intuition.”

You’re not a poet.

“Critic’s intuition, then.”

Another flash of her phone screen halts any further defense of her close-reading skills: The question is actually time-sensitive, so I hope you’re not asleep. Then, another repurposed O’Hara quote: ‘Oh [Sabrina Wiseman] we love you get up.’

Sabrina Wiseman, already up, replies: Coffee sounds great! Primping as we speak.

As Glitch texts back with more details, the idle whirl of Nick’s thoughts becomes too vague and unvoiced to follow. Sabrina gets ready as slowly as punctuality will allow, basking in the late morning’s quasi-normalcy. Braiding her hair, picking out her favorite boots, making plans to meet… a friend?

Admittedly, the growing social circle and coffee plans are less familiar prospects than her morning routine, but it all feels normal. An utterly unremarkable day awaits her, it seems, and promises to leave her with that elusive sense of neutral contentment. Her psyche heaves a sigh, half-bemused and half-relieved, before she can suppress it, and it mingles with the soft hum of Nick’s presence in the back of her mind. She feels a guilt she doesn’t recognize, until she realizes that it’s his.

Sharing a mind with her brother is not as difficult as she thinks everyone imagines it is. Nick has always been here, stepping gingerly among her thoughts like a house guest through their host’s messy storage room. Steps light, smiling ruefully at his intrusion, arms braced to catch any fragile trinkets that his passage may send tumbling. The only difference, now, is that she can’t sit in the next room and pretend not to hear the crash behind the wall. Sabrina feels her own guilt, at making Nick listen to how convenient it is for her that he is without a body, and Nick’s guilt, at making her feel guilty for feeling her own emotions inside her own head, and their regrets mingle and multiply like so much shattered ceramic at their feet, making the tiny storage room even more treacherous than before.

Nick hesitates. She feels him like a slight pressure against the wall of her skull, straining to give her room to think.

“It’s fine, Nick.” Sabrina finds a mirror and holds her own gaze. “And I really don’t want to talk about it.”

We just did, Button. Don’t worry about it. Just have fun today.

A million other thoughts lurk behind the ones he voices, and they both ignore every single one.

As she leaves the house, Sabrina mentally recites the few snippets of O’Hara that she remembers verbatim. Nick tries, only once or twice seriously, to guess what the missing words might be. Her expression doesn’t shift as she walks down the street, but in the back of her mind where no one else can see, they share in every silent laugh and hidden smile.

...

The morning with Glitch is not—and Sabrina feels she should have anticipated this—the epitome of lazy normalcy.

She arrives to find that Glitch had already claimed seats and ordered for them both, which is nice. Two identical mugs are still warm on the table, next to the poetry anthology that Sabrina had plucked from the lending library on her last visit. (“Who do you think I should quote in my next selfie caption to start the most fights about pseudo-intellectualism in my comments?” She had asked, pondering O’Hara and Ashbery while taking advantage of the venue’s excellent lighting. Glitch nominated Ginsberg.) The book is open, but at the sound of the door opening, Glitch looks up from its pages, grins, and makes a show of closing it to give Sabrina her full attention.

You know, Button, Nick muses as they approach the table, I’m surprised you agreed to meet her again.

How are you surprised? You’re in my head. You know every decision as soon as I make it.

That’s true! Nick concedes. Another thing about being in your head, though? I can tell when you’re trying to avoid a conversation by pretending to miss the point.

I don’t have time for a conversation, Nick. I’m talking to Glitch instead, because I agreed to meet her a second time, which is perfectly in cha-

“I said, ‘Hi Sabrina!’”

She blinks at Glitch, then looks awkwardly around herself at the table, where she had sat without quite realizing. Glitch laughs at her. It reaches her eyes, which gleam with humor and something else, more like the glint of a knife. She holds Sabrina’s gaze as if she can see behind the curtain of her eyes and recognize the second mind within her skull.

On instinct, Sabrina stares back and thinks of frog guts, then remembers just as Nick tells her: She can’t read your mind, Button. Not even without me here.

I know.

And you told her about me, anyway.

I know.

“Left speechless by my thoughtfulness?” Glitch grins, sweeping a hand towards the mug on Sabrina’s side of the table. “I can’t blame you. Failing words, though, tears of gratitude are an excellent substitute. Maybe a hand over the heart?”

Matching Glitch’s grin, Sabrina comes back to herself. She reaches for her coffee, disguises a steadying breath as an appreciative sniff of its aroma, and takes a sip. Glitch raises an eyebrow when they lock gazes again over the rim of her cup, but neither speaks until Sabrina has replaced the drink and slouched back against her chair, eyes closed and arms dangling.

“I cannot yet speak, struck dumb as I am by your thoughtfulness, and now also the taste of coffee, which is always sweeter when you buy it for me.” She cracks one eyelid to look at Glitch again. “Good enough?”

“Good enough!” Glitch confirms, with a wave of her hand. “I wouldn’t have minded a quote, honestly. And you probably should have said that coffee is sweeter because of my company, not because I pay for it. Actually, maybe you should just leave the poetry to me.”

“With pleasure.” Sabrina mimes the burden of poetry falling from her shoulders as she sits up. “I mean it, though; it’s good coffee, and you’re very nice to me. I’m sorry for being distracted when I sat down.”

She takes another sip. Glitch reclaims the poetry book she’d been reading and, without opening it, drags a thumb along the fore edge. That curious glint returns to her eyes, but this time Sabrina is present enough to suppress her discomfort at being scrutinized.

“Not your fault.” Below Glitch’s voice, there is still the drumming of her thumb along the pages. “‘My quietness has a man in it, he is transparent and carries me quietly, like a gondola, through the streets.’”

Sabrina blinks. “That’s… O’Hara?”

Glitch pretends to roll her eyes hard enough that her head is thrown back with the force of it. “Sabrina, I’m going to start a fight about pseudo-intellectualism in your Instagram comments.”

“There’s no room for intellectualism up here!” Sabrina taps her head—carefully, mindful of the pleats of her braid. “The man in my quietness is not very quiet.”

Hey!

“And it’s more like I’m carrying him.”

Well, it’s no gondola ride up here, Nick thinks wryly.

“Lucky you have me, then! Feel free to outsource all intellectualism right here,” Glitch advises, tapping her own head. “I’ll happily lend my brainpower to a worthy cause. My first act of charity: yes, that was O’Hara. I was reading it when you came in.”

Glitch opens the book—finding her page on the first try, and it hadn’t been bookmarked—then slides it across the table. The words “quietness” and “gondola” are nowhere to be seen upon inspection. Sabrina looks up, confused, but Glitch redirects her attention to the book with a shooing motion before she can question whether it was the right page, after all.

“‘Just Walking Around,’” she reads aloud. “‘John Ashbery.’ This isn’t O’Hara.”

Glitch downs the rest of her coffee and pushes out from the table, braced to stand up. “No, it’s another clue. Do you want to go on a walk with me or not?”

With a snort, Sabrina reaches for her own drink and takes a few gulps. That’s answer enough for Glitch, who smiles wide and turns away to replace the poetry volume on its shelf.

...

The stroll begins both silently and aimlessly. Glitch had explained as they walked out the door that, if Sabrina had bothered to read the Ashbery poem, she would have realized that the last three lines of the second stanza made the invitation especially clever. Something about repurposing “the secret smudge on the back of your soul” as a metaphor for the secret brother inside your brain, and something else about silence and preoccupation and wandering. Regardless, they both seemed content to live briefly in the spirit of those things and simply walk beside each other.

Sabrina amuses herself by trying to subtly attract the attention of passersby. Glances that cross each other, the blink-and-miss-it motion of a braid thrown over the shoulder, the scrape of a boot toe on concrete. Her eyes are normally straight ahead, expression blank, to ward off even fleeting interest. But now, when a stranger meets her eyes, she smiles blandly and looks away as if her attention has been caught by something in her periphery. Do they wonder what she is looking at, even for a moment? She lifts her head towards the late morning sun and openly basks, thinking all the while how much she hates the heat, hoping all the while that someone will see her pretending to love it and believe it. There is a stranger, who loves the sun.

Preoccupied as she is by building her own shroud of mystery, Nick’s presence fades once more to an indistinct hum, after a period of dutiful but conspicuous silence. But Glitch, still beside her, catches onto her game. The next time Sabrina meets someone’s eye, Glitch slings an arm around her shoulder. She leans towards her ear and whispers, “Take a left here, towards the station. I have to catch a train,” then pulls back and laughs. Sabrina laughs, too, pleased to have been placed at the center of some secret joke. But the fantasy ends when she realizes that Glitch has read her with a glance, tearing through her paper-thin secrets.

Sabrina stares straight ahead. She shoves her hands in the pockets of her denim skirt, but doesn’t shrug off Glitch’s arm.

“What are you going to do the next time you want to hang out, but you can’t find a line of poetry to make the invitation for you?” She asks.

The hand resting on Sabrina’s shoulder reaches awkwardly around to her face and swats at her forehead. “If I can’t find it, it doesn’t exist. If it doesn’t exist, I’ll write it! Don’t insult me, Sabrina.”

She laughs. Her shoulders relax as she removes her hands from her pockets, and Glitch lets her arm slide from its perch. Before it rests back at her own side, though, she loops it through Sabrina’s and swings their elbows back and forth.

“It wouldn’t kill you to brush up on your New York School, you know.” She disrupts the rhythm of their elbows to nudge hers lightly into Sabrina’s side. “I’ve been learning O’Hara and friends ever since you said you liked him, and you can’t even recognize the quotes? Thankless work.”

“You can’t convince me you needed to ‘learn’ them.”

“Right you are!” Glitch says, cheerfully squeezing Sabrina’s arm. “Casual quotation is an art, however, and requires not only a perfect memory, but excellent conversational skills and a sense of drama.”

“I don’t see how any of that relies on me being able to-”

“-And an appreciative audience. A poet cannot bloom in barren soil.”

“I’m very appreciative,” Sabrina assures her, grinning. “Just not genuinely intellectual enough for poetry, as you might remember.”

“Oh, I won’t forget,” Glitch laughs. “The comments section of your next selfie, starting fights, 7:00 PM sharp. You can’t miss me!”

They’re coming up on the station now. Glitch takes a step back but hasn’t dropped her hand yet. “Well, I hope you and your brother had a good time.” She walks backwards towards the stairs, not relinquishing Sabrina’s hand until both their arms are extended and they’re being a nuisance to fellow pedestrians. “See you!”

...

I like Glitch, says Nick, a ways down the block from the station. Sabrina nearly jumps, but keeps walking.

Instead of responding, she hopes he can feel her agreement. There is a warm sense of acknowledgement and a general contentment—if she can ignore a foreign, simmering anxiety. He’s working up to saying something, so Sabrina relinquishes as much of her own brain space as she can to give him time. A few more moments of steeling himself, and then-

I’m sorry for earlier.

She is surprised enough that she physically furrows her brow, as if he could see. Sorry for what?

What I said about you meeting Glitch. At the coffeeshop, before you sat down. I think I- He wants to say that he thinks he knows why she was upset, but hesitates, knowing that voicing how well he knows her often just upsets her more. Her treacherous mind confirms it, fear and frustration prickling in some dark corner, but she does her best to dampen it. She thinks, without voicing it, that she’s sorry. Please keep talking.

I didn’t mean to imply that it was weird, or anything, that you were seeing her again. You’re allowed to spend time with friends who aren’t me, Gray, and Salomé.

It’s very generous of him to count Gray as her friend, but—

It’s not. We all care about you. Glitch does, too, and I’m glad you had a good time. I was just… pleasantly surprised. To see you encourage a new friendship. Maybe that’s patronizing. Sorry if it is, but it’s true.

She does feel a little patronized, but it’s a feeling she is so used to that it barely registers. Before she can take offense, she’s thinking of frog guts again, then wincing at the drastic measures against her brother (again), then grasping for half-remembered shreds of poetry to fill her spinning mind.

My quietness has a man in it, and I carry him through the streets like a gondola. What is all this vessel shit anyway. Nobody saw me through the gates. Now I am alone and hate it. I have been to lots of parties and acted perfectly—

I would leave if I could, Button, comes Nick’s voice, both gentle and frustrated.

She knows that. Her mind falls eerily silent, as both of them try not to think anything that would upset the other. She breathes deeply, tries to get three different songs stuck in her head, and wishes she had memorized as much poetry as Glitch. By the time Sabrina has carried them both to the front door of Nick’s home, neither has thought another word. The silence is fraught, but the tension eases as she crosses the threshold.

It’s barely noon, and Sabrina is exhausted. She leaves her boots at the door and sinks into the couch, stretching horizontally across its cushions.

Glitch isn’t my friend. It’s her first coherent thought since they retreated to their own respective corners of her brain.

Button, that’s-

I don’t mean what you think. She hugs a pillow across her stomach. I wouldn’t hang out with her if she was my friend. That’s what I think every time we meet. Not because I don’t like her, I just- You and Gray and Sally know me, you know? Especially you, and I hate it sometimes, and I know you know that, too. And I like Glitch, because she’s smart and fun to be around, and because we just met this week, so she doesn’t know me. Except she’s too smart, because it feels like she already does. Like she can see into my mind, in a way that I can’t even blame my zero for. Just once, I want to make inane small talk with a vague acquaintance who doesn’t really know anything about me.

She places the pillow over her face and contemplates screaming, but doesn’t. I wouldn’t be telling you this if you weren’t trapped in my head, you know. So don’t… I don’t know. I don’t even know what you could do with it. Never mind.

What happens if Glitch knows you? Nick asks. He feels more than he thinks—love and guilt and sadness, a thousand unvoiced thoughts behind the one question he asks.

I don’t know.

You cut off the friendship because she cares about you too much?

Knowing and caring aren’t the same thing, Sabrina tells him, fingers worrying the edges of the pillow. Maybe she does both, but they’re still different.

Okay. He’s not trying as hard to hide his frustration anymore, but it softens in the mingling with his other emotions. So they are. But what then? You just stop?

Why not? She thinks. I always had you, so I never cared who I left.

A warm, deep affection crawls out from beneath his sadness and leaves her so full that she holds back tears. If she cried, would they be hers or Nick’s?

It’s not a choice between me and other people, Button. Glitch and I can both know you and love you a whole lot.

I don’t want to talk about Gliiiiitch. She draws out the single syllable of Glitch’s name as petulantly as she can psychically communicate, then tosses the pillow away. It’s complicated, and I’m trying to tell you you’re a good brother.

I know. I love you, and I hope you’re appreciating the restraint it takes to not start bawling like a baby and leaving tears all over your brain.

“Don’t you dare,” she laughs, finally breaking the silence of the living room. “I will go through the cabinets and cry in your vanilla extract.”

Aww, and then my next batch of cookies will be filled with extra love!

Sabrina rolls her eyes and, eventually, makes her way upstairs to her bedroom. She contemplates another shower, to fully reset from the morning she’s had, but lacks the energy. Instead, she lets her hair down and changes into pajamas, in spite of the early afternoon. Nick’s constant mental presence even feels normal—as if he’s just downstairs, popping into her brain to chat rather than brave the climb to her room.

Nestled comfortably as she is beneath her sheets, she doesn’t have the heart to walk over to her bookshelf. Glitch will have to be content with a review of the first three poems produced by googling Frank O’Hara’s name.

‘Poem?’ Nick reads the first search result. Come on, no title? I hate when they do that.

From what I remember, he does it a lot. Sabrina taps the offending text, trying to guess which untitled poem it might be, and nearly drops her phone.

“God,” she mutters, rolling onto her stomach. “Of course it’s this one.”

Which one? Nick pipes up.

“Just look.” She focuses on the portion of her screen occupied by the capitalized text, ‘LANA TURNER HAS COLLAPSED!’ “That’s a headline. It’s about… I’m not a poetry professor, okay? But it’s about a celebrity collapsing in some freak emergency and people gossiping about it. Sound familiar?”

You can read it if you want, he is quick to assure her. It won’t bother me.

“That’s not the point. The point is… it’s just stupid! ‘Oh Lana Turner we love you get up?’”

Hey, Glitch quoted that this morning!

“Yeah, to get up out of bed. Not up from the hospital.” She’s too incensed to keep lying down, and she’s pacing around her room, ranting before she can stop herself. “Do you know what that nurse said to me? ‘Chicago won’t lose our Justice.’ Just imagine, ‘oh Justice we love you get up.’ Isn’t that stupid? Who’s ‘we,’ anyway?”

Sabrina. Please, it’s-

“And it’s not even mine to be mad about. I know. And people love you, and that’s great. But I- Lana Turner was fine, you know? And she got up. But they didn’t love her.”

I really don’t care what some random nurse said about me, Nick says. I’m sorry that people are talking to you like they know me; that pisses me off. But the rest is fine.

“Could you let me be selfishly angry for a minute before talking me down, please?”

You’re not being selfish. You’re working yourself into a rage on my behalf, and you should stop. Sabrina flops back onto the bed, phone on her stomach, but kicks the air a few times in protest. Pick up the phone. I want to read the poem.

“I really don’t.”

Okay, is all he says, until moments pass and Sabrina’s anger is replaced by embarrassment. She wants to use her phone again, to find another poem, but she doesn’t want to face the capitalized text that nearly launched her into a grief-induced tantrum.

Well, if Frank O’Hara won’t, Nick says, and she can feel the overwhelming mental energy of his smirk, I need you to tell me how my people love me.

His tone is intensely dramatic, and clearly satirizing all the pomp and ceremony Chicago has devoted to mourning the concept of a comic book superhero. A validation of her bitterness without fueling it, another ploy (like so many others) to make her feel better. She pretends not to notice as unlocks her phone.

I can’t speak for Chicago, she thinks, closing the “Poem” tab. I love you, though. Get up soon.

#mind blind #i Know nick knows some poetry ok i Know!!! but im banking on the fact that someone who learns shakespeare n neruda for seduction purposes #would not be into whatever the new york school was up to #anyway. i havent posted fic on tumblr in years and this is a deeply embarrassing ordeal for me!!! thank you everyone for witnessing #i am pretty happy w this minus the last scene. but i felt the need to include it bc... otherwise why am i talking so damn much abt ohara #goodbye. it's 1 AM here but i wanted to post something for sabby before the patreon update! :D #oc: sabrina wiseman #my writing

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dk-thrive · 3 years

Text

But the mind always / wants more than it has

But the mind always wants more than it has– one more bright day of sun, one more clear night in bed with the moon; one more hour to get the words right; one more chance for the heart in hiding to emerge from its thicket in dried grasses–as if this quiet day with its tentative light weren’t enough, as if joy weren’t strewn all around.

— Holly J. Hughes, from “Mind Wanting More,” Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems, eds. Phyllis Cole-Dai & Ruby R. Wilson (Grayson Books, 2017) (Via The Vale of Soul Making)

#Holly J. Hughes #mind #want #need #joy #more

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cleverwordsandotherstuffilike · 3 years

Text

“But the mind always wants more than it has – one more bright day of sun, one more clear night in bed with the moon; one more hour to get the words right; one more chance for the heart in hiding to emerge from its thicket in dried grasses–as if this quiet day with its tentative light weren’t enough, as if joy weren’t strewn all around.”

— Holly J. Hughes, “Mind Wanting More,” Poetry of Presence: An Anthology of Mindfulness Poems, eds. Phyllis Cole-Dai & Ruby R. Wilson

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vinayrajoriaofficial · 3 years

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A Critical Essay on the Life & Poetry of William Wordsworth

With respect to 'The Prelude' & the 'Lyrical Ballads'

Portrait of the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth by Benjamin Haydon.

"You have given me praise for having reflected faithfully in my poems the feelings of human nature. I would fain hope that I have done so.

But a great poet ought to do more than this; he ought, to a certain degree, to rectify men’s feelings, to give them new compositions of feeling, to render their feelings more sane, pure, and permanent; in short, more consonant to Nature, that is, to eternal Nature, and the great moving spirit of things."

Wordsworth wrote this in a letter, in response, to his friend, John Wilson on the 7th of June 1802, thanking him for his heartiest congratulations on the success of his Lyrical Ballads and in the process reflected on the ideas of his poetical abilities and ambitions. Indeed, Wordsworth was a poet far ahead of his times, creating over the span of eighty years a colossal magnitude of poetic works which have become a part of the very fabric of the English language and literature.

Like many of his contemporaries, Wordsworth was influenced acutely by the historic event of the French Revolution, of which he was not only an observer but an active participant and supporter. But before delving too deep into his works and genius we must understand something about his life and childhood, without which, one cannot think of understanding his poetry let alone Wordsworth himself.

Young Wordsworth in 1798, in Town End, Grasmere.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH was born in the Lake District in April 1770 and died there eighty years later on 23 April 1850. He had three brothers and a sister, Dorothy, to whom throughout his life he was especially close. When she was six and he was nearly eight, their mother died. Dorothy was sent away to be brought up by relatives and a year later William was sent to Hawkshead Grammar School.

Wordsworth was cared for in lodgings and led a life of exceptional freedom, roving over the fells that surrounded the village. The death of his father broke in on this happiness when he was thirteen, but did not halt the education through nature that complemented his Hawkshead studies and became the theme of his poetry.

As an undergraduate at Cambridge, Wordsworth traveled (experiencing the French Revolution at first hand) and wrote poetry. His twenties were spent as a wanderer, in France, Switzerland, Wales, London, the Lakes, Dorset, and Germany. In France, he fathered a child whom he did not meet until she was nine because of the War.

In 1794 he was reunited with Dorothy and met Coleridge, with whom he published Lyrical Ballads in 1798, and to whom he addressed The Prelude, his epic study of human consciousness. In the last days of the century, Wordsworth and Dorothy found a settled home at Dove Cottage, Grasmere. Here Wordsworth wrote much of his best-loved poetry, and Dorothy her famous Journals.

In 1802 Wordsworth married Dorothy’s closest friend, Mary Hutchinson. Gradually he established himself as the great poet of his age, a turning-point coming with the collected edition of 1815. From 1813 Wordsworth and his family lived at Rydal Mount in the neighboring valley to Grasmere. In 1843 he became the poet laureate.

A recent cover page of the 'Lyrical Ballads' by Wordsworth & Coleridge, which heralded the Romantic Age in English Literature.

Now, keeping this dynamic canvas of Wordsworth’s life in consciousness can begin to grasp the magnitude of his poetic genius. To begin with, we can say Wordsworth was a game-changer in the history of English poetry. By publishing, his epoch-making collection of poems, Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth along with Coleridge heralded the Romantic Age of English poetry. On which Coleridge writes in chapter 14 of his book, Biographia Literaria, about Wordsworth and his romantic ideas thus:

"Mr. Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind’s attention to the lethargy of custom, and directing it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us; an inexhaustible treasure, but for which, in consequence of the film of familiarity and selfish solicitude, we have eyes, yet see not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand."

-Coleridge on Wordsworth, Biographia Literaria

And so we see that Wordsworth did exhibit all these themes and ideas repeatedly in his entire works. He takes as his subjects the poor, the old, and the outcast, for example in the poems ‘Goody Blake and Harry Gill’, Wordsworth talks about an old woman who has to steal firewood to survive the winter. His poem, ‘Her Eyes Are Wild’, about a vagrant woman suckling her child:

Suck, little babe, oh suck again,

It cools my blood, it cools my brain,

Thy lips I feel them, baby, they

Draw from my heart the pain away.

-from ‘Her Eyes Are Wild’

In ‘The Old Cumberland Beggar’, a beggar sits among ‘wild empty hills’ eating, and his ‘palsied hands’ scatter crumbs while the ‘small mountain birds’ surround him, waiting warily for their ‘destined meal’. In the popular poem, ‘The Idiot Boy’ a poor countrywoman, Betty Foy, is the mother of a disabled son who gets lost and spends a night in the open air. When she finds him he speaks wonderingly of the owls and the moon, without realizing what they are.

This was a major breakthrough in English poetry as Wordsworth brought to the poetic arena, the lives of the common people and this was huge because no one had ever made such people a subject of their poems before. Also new in Lyrical Ballads are poems about children and how adults fail to understand them.

In the poem, ‘Anecdote for Fathers’, a boy resists adult logic, and in ‘We Are Seven’, a small girl, whose brother has died, insists that he still counts as one of the family. Wordsworth’s belief in the superiority of childhood is expressed most challengingly in the ‘Immortality Ode’ written in 1802, where he remembers his early years.

A painting of the French Revolution of 1789, which ousted monarchy from France and had a big impact on Wordsworth and many intellectuals.

Through his selected works, written after the experiences of the French Revolution, one also comes to feel the sympathetic nature of Wordsworth towards the lowly and the poor. Like in The Prelude, he recalls, how a revolutionary friend pointed to an emaciated girl they met on a walk and declared:

'Tis against that

That we are fighting

In the ‘Residence in London’ book of the same poem, he remembers seeing a poor man with a sick child in his arms, and writes:

Bending over it,

As if he were afraid both of the sun,

And of the air which he had come to seek,

Eyed the poor babe with love unutterable

As for expressing the moods and settings of nature, Wordsworth is the unquestioned master, often and aptly called by many to be the poet of nature. One can even argue that no English poet expresses nature in its innate sensual beauty and spiritual entirety as Wordsworth.

What’s more interesting in Wordsworth’s portrayal of nature is that for him Nature is not just Mother Earth that needs to be expressed and captured in words but is much more than that. Like in the poem ‘Lines Written in Early Spring’, included in Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth expresses the belief that nature is conscious as he writes:

'Tis my faith that every flower

Enjoys the air it breathes.’

Or the core Romantic belief that nature is a moral educator is stated with breath-taking simplicity in another Lyrical Ballads poem, ‘The Tables Turned’ where he writes:

One impulse from a vernal wood,

May teach you more of man,

Of moral evil and of good,

Than all the sages can.

In this regard one remembers a famous passage from The Prelude which gives an instance of Wordsworth expressing, nature acting as a moral guardian. The passage is about one summer evening when young Wordsworth takes a boat without its owner’s permission, and as he rows, he expresses:-

A huge peak, black and huge,

As if with voluntary power instinct,

Up reared its head

It seems to stride after him and, trembling, he returns the boat to where he found it. Even when not guilt-ridden, the boy Wordsworth in The Prelude is aware of nature as a living presence:

I heard among the solitary hills

Low breathings coming after me and sounds

Of indistinguishable motion, steps

Almost as silent as the turf they trod.

On Wordsworth’s poetic oeuvre, Walter Pater, a critic of Wordsworth’s time comments in his essay titled- Appreciations (1889) that Wordsworth to be the poet of ‘impassioned contemplation’ and in stressing both words equally, he got the balance exactly right. In his attempts to characterize the nature of the poetic or creative power, Wordsworth laid similar emphasis on impassioned seeing.

Perhaps, one can say, that the best encapsulation of Wordsworth's entire creative output has been written by none other than Wordsworth himself in the poem, ‘Glad sight wherever new with old’, written in 1842 when he was seventy-two. This poem points to almost everything that has been central to his long imaginative engagement with words and things. Wordsworth in it writes:

Glad sight wherever new with old

is joined through some dear home born tie;

The life of all that we behold

Depends upon that mystery.

Vain is the glory of the sky,

the beauty vain of field and grove

Unless, while with admiring eye

We gaze, we also learn to love.

Image Credits:- Pinterest & Google

References & Research:-

The Concise History of English literature by William Henry Hudson

The Routledge history of English literature

The Routledge Anthology of Poets on Poets

A little history of Poetry by John Carey

JASTOR Essays

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