Group Critique

      For today's group critique I was able to get more input on my poem that I created using a Terza Rima rhyme scheme. I found using Terza Rima help me better write the poem because I was able find the come up with a system that helped me just focus on rhyming the words at the end. I also presented a conclusion to my essay about food and my personal experience and even a daily basis with it. My group help me decide on where I could take the project next in terms of what to e=write about.

Group Critique

Today during the group critique, I think my group helped me to figure out where I should take my dream analysis from here. I thought that it was getting to be too much but my group members assured me that it wasn't. I think that I am going to add a few more things to my analysis and then start on my next essay. I think the group critique really helps with writing because it gives the writer a few more ideas from another persons point of view.

How Poems Arrive

In the poem “How Poems Arrive” stevenson talks about how poetry is so diverse and how many emotions you can put in it and how you can write it. She talks highley about poem writing, showering her pride for poems.

How Poems Arrive

       The author, Anne Stevenson is communicating through this poem, the concept and ideas behind poems and how they come to be. Throughout it she explains the different type of feelings and emotions they express while amplifying feelings of the writer themselves. When Stevenson writes “Sporting with vowels, or showing off a chain of silver els and ms to host displays”, she references the different ways poems are written and how they can form images or displays for readers. She continues to speak on the overall feeling that’s left with the reader while reading and finishing the poem.

How Poems Arrive

I think throughout this poem, what the narrator is doing is giving brief descriptions and and making some great analogies that tie together with the way how a poem is truly structured and formed, as well as giving the poem a more real life meaning and bring it into reality. For example ,” You say them as your undergongue declares Then let them knock about your upper mind Until the shape of what they mean appears”. This example is stated in regards to how powerful the words you say in poetry can give it some actuality. This is strictly based on emotion , feeling, and imagination.

How Poems Arrive

I think the poem is expounding  the title “how poems arrive.”
Maybe you utter them or you write them via brainstorming or not; see how If makes sense and even if it doesn’t you could adjust it to make sense. They are often used to express one’s self. It consists of much depth often times and quite creative but the writer understands it best.

How Poems Arrive

I Feel Like This Poem Is Talkin’ Bout Love And How Sometimes We Can Be Blind By It.

How Poems Arrive

This poem describes the different ways poems are made and look. It explains the process of creating a poem and bringing it into existence. It says “then let them knock about your upper mind Until the shape of what they mean appears” This line creates a visual of when we think about what to write in a poem and then they have a unique structure once it’s on the paper. “Of intimacy or blame or joy or pain” explains that there are different types of poems people write to express their feelings. I think the author is in a way showing off how a poem is created.

Finishing Up w/ Poetry

As we finish the anthology, I would like you to think about some of the following questions:

• These are, according to Gioia and Lehman the "best" poems of 2018. Can you generalize about what it takes to write a "best" poem? What did you learn about poetry over the last few weeks? How did these readings confirm, or challenge, your previous feelings about poetry?
• Which poem was your favorite? Which poem did you struggle w/ the most? 
• Kay Ryan's poem, "Some Transcendent Addiction to the Useless" quotes from critic George Steiner's The Poetry of Thought in her title. It's my understanding that Steiner argues that truly great art is bound up with "useless" skills (like writing poetry). This brings us back to our discussion on the first day: How useful is it to read poetry? To write it? Why are you required to do it in 102? Are you glad that you had to read a book of poetry? Or was it annoying? Or both? 
• What questions do you still have about poetry, or about any of the poems in the anthology? 

Sad Math

Sad Math actually made me a little bit sad. The speaker is cellmates with a man named Larry who has developmental delays and Larry thinks his family will send him money but the speaker knows that he has no family. I thought to myself how could a guy like Larry get into prison. He has developmental delays and the education of a fifth-grader. Wasn't this taken into account before he was sent to prison? Maybe that's the reason why his family doesn't associate with him. I thought that Larry was ex-communicated because maybe his family was ashamed of his developmental delays. More than likely though, they don't associate with him because of his jail time.

We lived happily during the war

We Lived Happily During the War is an interesting poem because you would think a poem about war would be from the perspective of the ones affected by it but this poem is from the point of view from an American. The speaker says they lived happily during an unnamed war where America fought against an enemy. The speaker goes on to talk about protests and how they did not protest it enough. I immediately thought of the Vietnam Conflict. Anti war sentiments were high and people would protest the war and the draft very heavily. Maybe the poem took place during the Vietnam Conflict. Anyone else pick up on this?

Rhyming in poetry

To be quite honest, I normally think that when I write, read or think up a poem and it rhymes then justice is done to the poem. Speaking from my personal perspective especially; whenever I write a poem most times if not all, it is soothing to me when it rhymes but I am learning that it takes the seriousness out of sometimes and on the official level I knew not such a thing. It is really true that everyday or ever so often  you learn something new.

Thursday class/ library visit

Hi, goodnight. Would anyone be kind enough to help me to understand what transpired during the class period on Thursday?

It would be highly appreciated.

library visit

After the visiting the library I think that I have found a book that is going to help me with more research for my collection. I also think I will take out more books and take advantage of the library more often.

Advent

This poem itself seems confusing at first but after reading it a few more times it seems to make sense in my own way. The poem is about the arrival of an angel named Gabriel and the meaning for Advent is the arrival of a thing or event. "His mother must of looked away" the mother in this line can be related to Mary who is the mother of God in the Bible. The reckless boy could also resemble as Jesus who is another prominent figure in the Bible.

Grief Runs Untamed

The poem "Grief Runs Untamed" explains the experience of people in Guatemala who have been forced to relocate due to an ongoing gang crisis. Throughout the poem, the common theme is the important things these families had to unfortunately leave behind, some examples are their pets, homes and even their own family members. One significant part of the poem was the first stanza, "In one hand the exiles hold a bundle with a blanket, medicine, and a comb; in the other, a door handle. They attach it to every mountain and wall, hoping the handle will conjure the door that will open and let them in.". This stanza explains how quickly most of these families had to leave and how little they were allowed to take with them. The part of them attaching the door hand to evert mountain and wall was to signify in my opinion several places they wanted to make their homes but sadly couldn't do so.

Tilia cordata

In the poem “Tilia Cordata” , The author briefly describes the nature of the scenery around themself, describing what appears to be a tree or flowers.  The author deeply simplifies the meaning of the specific season taking place in the writing which is spring, talking about fragrances that occur throughout the experince. The main point of this poem is the narrator, sharing her experience that she faces during the holocaust , explaining her emotions and her feeling making the reader feel pathos. Overall, This is a really difficult poem to understand with all the perplexing words and phrases.

Tilia Cordata

    In this poem the central idea or main point was the authors experience of the holocaust and how she relates and explains it to her children. Throughout the poem, her feelings and descriptions of being born around the time of this event all emerge and are formatted together to create something the reader can almost visualize and create and image in their minds. One unique part that stood out to me was when the author talked about being  scared of taking showers because her mother told her gas used to come out of the shower heads instead of water.

The poem “Tilia Cordata” was very complex and had a lot of different things going on. It is stated in the poem that Tilia forests means both tree and flower so I originally thought that is what the rest of the poem will be about but reading further into it , the Nazi’s were mention along with “gas” coming out of the showers. I am not sure what this has to do with a tree or a flower , so that is a question I have. Also, Germany was mentioned and when I put two and two together, the event of gassing was happening in Germany.

Tilia cordata

I feel like the writer was speaking about a type of fragrance that comes from a flower. I also feel like it was talking about various things and if I’m to be honest it confuses me but I think if I read it again I might better get it.

I Feel Like The Poem That We Read In Class Is Talkin’ Bout A Special Tea From Europe And How It Can Help Cure illnesses.

Tilia Cordata

I’m pretty sure the narrator of this poem is Jewish. She  was a victim of the holocaust. Were they punished with gas instead of water during the holocuast? I didn’t recognize some of the words in the poem, I wonder what language they might be. This poem has a lot of emotions, mostly I think of sadness and pain that this victim suffered from.

Tilia cordata, this was a poem about the hollocoust. This made me realize how sa dit must have been for the hew during and after this time period. They lived in fear and paranoia, the girl didn’t even wanna take a shower because of the gas showers nazis gave the Jews, so he took baths although he knew the shower wasn’t the problem. It’s sad to know what they went through because no human being deserves that especially innocent ones.

Poetry Event on Thursday

I recommend this event on this Thursday at 2:10 pm in LB14. (I hear there will be pizza!) If you attend and submit a 1-p reflection to me, I'll give you extra credit.

Poem, pp. 47-92

In Sharon Olds' "Silver Spoon Ode," she writes a clever poem about her own wealthy upbringing and her consequent feelings of guilt. She invents a character near the end, Miss Lucille, who tells her, "And now / enough, Shar [Sharon], now a little decent silence" (75).  This new character, for me as a reader, created a bit of ambiguity. However, after reading the autobiographical statement in the back, I felt like I got a better hang on the poem.

This week, I'd like you to read one or two of the poems that I assigned you along with the autobiographical statement in the back. How does this writing about the poem help you understand the poem better? How is it similar to the author's notes I'm asking you to write each week?

My visit to the writing center

I must admit that my visit to the writing center was quite beneficial to me. The insights that we were all provided with both individually and collectively, I'm particularly certain that it has helped us, it has helped me to be closer to being somewhat more clearer on what I would like to establish in my collection and even how to formulate/construct my foreword, my outline and my draft altogether. I am grateful for the experience and I have no regrets that I went there.

Writing Center

Going to the writing center gave me a whole different approach and mindset in regards to writing the collection. I received some good critique about two of my poems that I've already written, and was made very clear to me that I must expand on it, and get more personal about it instead of just making it a general poem. The writing tutor helped me gather little tactics and strategies to help strengthen the message I'm referring to in my writing. Also, she helped me broaden my choices when it comes to writing either a short story, a memoir, a biography, or an essay, about my topics I chose. I definitely will look into visiting the writing center again to better my work and enhance my forward, afterword, annotated bibliography, and my collection.

Today's Special

Today's Special is a strange poem. I had to re-read it twice to really kind of grasp what it was about. Reading the title, you would think that it is a poem about food or a restaurant but the first line is "Today's special is all-natural rage,". So the tone shifts and now it's about anger. At this point, tons of thoughts went through my head. I thought of many scenarios that this poem could apply to and the best one I could come up with is that this poem is a rant in someone's head that they're reciting to themselves. With the use of repetition of the line  "Today's special is all-natural rage," it only made me think what I was reading could be someone's mental tirade against someone who wronged them.

Birds Punctuate the Days

 Birds Punctuate the Days is written in the form of a haiku and I haven't seen haiku used in this type of way before. It follows the standard format of a haiku but it compiles a bunch of haikus and creates sort of a story with it. To me, it feels as if this poem is trying to show the passage of time but instead of doing it in a conventional manner, it uses birds to convey it. This is only bolstered by the last haiku which says "Period. One Blue egg all summer long. Now gone". I figured the summer has past since the egg finally hatched. Does anyone else feel this way?

Writing Center

The writing center gave me a whole new perspective at writing the collection. The tutor really helped me decide on the different genres to write about since I was undecided . Not only did she help me out on the genres but explained to us on the foreword. It was confusing at first but then I understood as she explained it.  I was also confused about the annotated bibliography because of the topic I picked. I didn’t really know how’d I be able to get 10 sources but after giving me ideas about doing interviews and such things, showed me how to get my sources. After going to the writing center, I’m positive on what to write for my collection and how to better my writing.

Writing Center

On Thursday when we went to the writing center, I think it helped me develop a little bit more of an idea for my collection. The tutor helped me expand more on my topic and gave me good authors to research. I think now I have gathered more information to put into the current draft i'm working on.

Writing Center

We went to the writing center on Thursday. I think it was a great experience. The tutor there was a great help. We were working on how to write a Forward. We got familiar with what it is and we each discussed our topic with the tutor. She gave us advice on what we can include in our forward based on our topic. I'm hoping to go there more on my own time to get further help with my collections assignment.

A Translator's note

Since I never really invested my time into reading poetry before this class, I was quite surprised when I read, "A Translator's Note", on page 9 of The Best American Poetry book, because it did not look like a poem at all. I always imagined poetry as 4 lines with a different amount of stanzas within each poem. However if you take a look at "A Translators Note", you will find nothing of the sort, instead you find what seems to be a short essay. This of course brings up the question, how come poetry does not have a set visual form? In other words, how come poetry does not have to look a certain way. I came to the short conclusion that it depends on the writer. This conclusion is based off the idea that poetry is a self reflection of the writer, so the writer can create his own visual form of his poem. This idea of poems visual form being unique to the writer applies to every poem ever existed. But in a way it also depends on the type of poem being created. If you want a haiku, you only need three lines, if you want a poem to rhyme the last words of each line, then you need to make different lines for each sentence. I guess what I am trying to point out is although poetry is a reflection of the writer, not every poem can be visually represented differently based on what the writer wants. So I guess when writing your poem, you need to figure out how you want your poem to look, do you want it to look like a short essay as represented by "A Translators Note", or do you want each sentence to have it's own unique line. Just something to think about when writing your poem.

Renewed look at poetry

During the first day of this class, Prof. Talbird asked us to write on what we feel about poetry. Well, I wrote that poetry is the abstraction of writing, much like modern art is more the abstraction of the art world. I said this for a couple reasons. First off, my view on poetry is heavily influenced by the fact that most poems I have read do not make sense to me, although now that I have read more of the book of poems, I have new thoughts on the matter, anyways as I was saying most poems did not make sense. And I do not mean that the context didn't make sense, I meant more the grammar of poems do not usually make sense. The second reason that I thought that poetry is an abstraction of writing is that, and this is still a view of mine, poetry is open to an interpretation of every single person that lays eyes on it. Unlike most writing, which is usually straightforward and is not up to much of an open minded debate, poetry does not usually have context that screams this is what I am trying to show to my reader. Those are the two main reasons as to why I felt that poetry is the abstract of writing.

Now for my renewed look at poetry. I read the first 50 pages of Gioia's Poetry collection, and I must say poetry is not really as abstract as I first made it out to be. Sure the way poetry is written most of the time makes it seem like a rough draft of an essay without proper grammar and structure, which I still feel is partly why poetry is the abstract version of writing. However, I am starting to realize that poetry is almost a true reflection of the person writing it, but only the writer knows the true meaning. It seems as almost the whole idea of poetry is to hide your true self, but also reveal your past and your life to the reader. Poetry writing is  like looking into the eyes of someone to try and find their feelings, but you can't look into their mind. Anyways, that is my renewed view on poetry, perhaps it will change throughout the semester, or it could just stay the same.

Library Visit

In preparation for next Thursday's library visit, please follow the following link and answer the four questions:

https://goo.gl/forms/rlFWCVnVFNmPxwlu1

Group Critique

Today during the group critique, I think reading another persons work inspired me with other topics for my own writing. Right now I am doing something like a dream analysis while Tatiyana is doing more of an informative essay about sadness. I also think that reading the comments under my writing made me think of other ways I could expand on dreams during my dream analysis.

Haiku Poems

Haiku poems to me are very difficult to make. Since there are rules regarding syllables and that causes restrictions. Although its challenging, its a great way to experience something new and force you to use creativity while being limited. In Clements poem, "Birds Punctuate the Days", I to be frank did not know any of the birds in the poem before I saw their pictures on Blackboard. I'm sure I may have seen them but I didn't know their names. Few people know the names of birds in the modern world because they may not see it as a priority. They probably have so much going on in their life, birds is something they don't have time for. Although there are people that are intrigued with birds and specialize in bird studies or its just a regular person like a photographer that is passionate about taking bird pictures. There fore birds might not matter to majority of people but to some its more of a hobby.

Poetic Forms

We haven't really talked about form yet because we've only read free verse poems. But there are many other different kinds of forms which follow rules such as rhyme schemes or fixed syllables or line lengths. One such form is the haiku, invented in Japan in the late 19th century, but popularized in the West in the early 20th century. Check out Joyce Clement's "Birds Punctuate the Days" (15) which was originally published in Modern Haiku. How has Clement adapted the haiku to this poetic situation?

Check out the pictures on the Course Outline page of Blackboard (you'll have to sign in). How many of these birds did you know in Clement's poem before you saw their pix? Why do you think so few people know the names of birds in the modern world? Does it matter?

Remember the magnet activity last week? Fixed forms are another manner of creative constraints in writing. Feel free to experiment with haiku or other forms over the next few weeks as we discuss poetry.

Difficult and Easy Poems

Which is the "easiest" poem in the collection so far? For me, "Walking Home" (44) is the least challenging of the poems in this early part of the reading. Do you agree or would you suggest a different one? What makes a poem easy to read? If this poem--or a different one--is easy to understand, does that make it superior or inferior to more difficult ones? Speaking of difficulty, which poem so far have you struggled with the most?

Also, what makes these poems? (As opposed to prose.) What stylistic qualities have you noticed in addition to line breaks? Rhyme? Metaphor? Rhythm?

What questions do you have so far?

Also, a reminder: We will be meeting in class tomorrow (Th. 2/14, Happy Valentines Day) for our group critique. You only need to bring one copy of your draft b/c we'll be heading over to the Writing Center for the second half of class.

An Old Story

This poem through my understanding talks about the cycle of life and how unruly it can be. Lines like "Every small want, every niggling urge" could be describing people's drive to always accomplish and need more in life. Another example that could be used is "Livid, the land, and ravaged, like a rageful Dream." livid, the land, ravaged can be used to talk about the society we live in and rageful dream can refer to the American dream that everyone yearns for. "Then animals long believed gone crept down from tree" this could refer to the evolution of humans.

Re my draft

As it pertains to the responses I got from within the group critique session regarding the poem that I had for my draft “home is where the heart is,” the responses have helped me to go back to the drawing board to see where I can improve. It was liked, it confused another but brought clarity when I explained it. As someone said, sometimes a poem doesn’t fully make sense, some seems like a mystery, some contain figure of speech that cannot be interpreted literally but possesses a deeper meaning but that does not mean the concept of the poem is not enclosed within it. While I am more than willing to improve myself, I think it will be an ongoing situation where some will like certain materials, some won’t, some will understand and some won’t and this is what is prone to happen in various parts of an individual’s or a set of individuals life. Someone will produce some music and some folks will like and even love it while some; regardless of how good it is some genuinely won’t understand it, some will not like it and it’s a part of reality, it’s a part of life but what is imperative is that we should endeavor to be at the place where we are always willing and open to correction, to learn something new, to grow, to improve/to be a better person than the person you were yesterday.

I’m not perfect but I have a heart

I'm not perfect but I have a heart...
The difference between God and and man is that from us, he'll never part...
 As for some of us,  we fail to see beyond the scars...
We hold others captive in the inward parts...
Those things God won't do...
He sees us waaaay beyond our faults...
I'll end with what I've been saying; from the start...
I'm not perfect but I have a heart...

#written by: N. Martin

This was a poem I wrote long ago that I would like to share. I was just brainstorming when I wrote it; I believe. I like to rhyme. I’m also for and about reality pieces and nonfiction and that is the foundation to which the poem was built on.

Yonder, a Rental

Yonder, a Rental.

This poem was a bit of an interesting poem. My view on the poem was actually prostitution, or perhaps just sex. Take the title, at first glance it might just be a title, but read the poem, and if you take the view of this being a poem on a sexual encounter, the title fits in. let me explain. The author writes, " It's all of nada as noon-nights empanada/ discloses her pretty quarter, the priests collar/ hung high on the hook of evening's fluent/ wall". I believe that this line is the introduction to a prostitute, the author writes "her pretty quarter", perhaps this is referring to a women's genitals. The author also gives mention to a priest, now this is where the impression of a prostitute makes sense, because priests are not meant to have sex, which means that this sexual encounter is a 'dirty' encounter which could be interpreted as a prostitution encounter. However my thoughts on this poem don't just extend to the idea that this poem is about a sexual encounter, I also believe that this poem might just be a memory, not happening in the moment. The author writes, "It's fine to be sentimental". Perhaps this poem is describing a memory, and the person who's memory it is might just be holding on to it for whatever reason, perhaps it was a first time, or perhaps the person fell in love. Regardless of what it might be, these are my thoughts on the poem. 

Love poem: Chimera

When I first read Love Poem: Chimera, I was a bit confused about it, but I'm starting to slowly realize that poems aren't meant to always be understood. Anyways, once I read it a couple times I assumed it was about a women getting pregnant, although that did not make sense in some of the context of the poem. Once we went over the poem in class however, the introduction of chimera as being a beast from Greek mythology got me to understand the poem more.

I have an interesting idea of what the author might have been intending, or perhaps it is just my view. The whole poem basically is describing some beast, however the author makes no mention of hate of the "beast". He describes this "beast" in a way where most people would be repulsed if we laid eyes on it today. He writes in his second stanza, "From mane/ to forked tongue beneath the skin". This gives the reader the image of a hybrid creature of perhaps a lion, and a snake, which he most likely is describing given his first line of the poem. Anyways, my view on the poem is that the author is trying to connect this to how he views society. He describes this creature, however he mentions no hate towards it. This makes me think that although this creature might be hideous he cannot hate it. By combining my view with his poem, you might get that the author is describing society and how monster like we have become. His last line is almost a question to the reader, "What we've made of ourselves". This might be asking the reader if they are happy with society, or just stating that we as a society have made ourselves into a creature that most people would describe as horrifying. With this being said however, the author doesn't intend on us hating society, but perhaps just forcing the reader to look at ourselves. The overall tone of the poem does not scream hate, or love for this creature, it is more of a neutral tone, which again backs up my view on the author just having us take a step back and look at what we have become.

An Old Story

In my first reading of "An Old Story", I was a a little confused on what it was about. The speaker in the poem was talking about something that was terrible and a million thoughts came racing into my head until I re-read it and figured out it could be a story about war. More specifically the aftermath of war. The lines "Every hate swollen to a kind of epic wind, Livid, the land, and ravaged/The worst in us having taken over and broken the rest utterly down." gave me the impression that the speaker was describing war. In war, people are driven to hate the opposition and the battlefields are ravaged due to the fights. It reminded me of Vietnam where they would use Agent Orange in order to clear the jungles so American troops could see better. After war, the general attitude of the people becomes more joyful and eventually the society goes back to normal. The lines "And then our singning brought on a different manner of weather. Then animals long believed gone crept down from trees." show how the people recovered from the war that ensued.

Love Poem: Chimera

During my first reading of Love Poem: Chimera, I thought it was about pregnancy. You could easily make that distinction with the line "Thought myself body enough for two". However as I kept reading, I quickly changed my mind and figured the poem was about a relationship.The line "What clamor we made in the birthing/ What hiss and rumble at the splitting, at the horns and beard." made me think of how in a relationship, once the two partners get more comfortable with each other, they both reveal how they truly are and that could be seen as good or bad. The one thing that confused me about the poem was the ending line "What strong neck, what bright eye. What menagerie are we. What we've made of ourselves.". I can interpret it as both good and bad. It could be a declaration of how they don't mind what the relationship has become and how they're comfortable with it or a moment of reflection that has a tone of disgust because of how the relationship turned out.

Group Poem Activity

   In class on Tuesday we were placed into groups and were told to use piles of letters and random words to create a poem. This task was hard simply because the word choice and selection was random and there was no telling how to start off. We were limited to the use of only the words and letters we had which was even harder because when we thought we were getting somewhere we would be stuck because we didn't word or letter to continue or complete the poem.

Love Poem: Chimera

    While reading Love Poem Chimera in class, the first thing I noticed was the author's use of descriptive words. Donika Kelly used imagery which better helped me visualize the poem and what was going on. In addition, finding out what a Chimera was and what it looks like helped me understand the use of some words in the poem. Phrases like "what hiss and rumble at the splitting, at the horns and beard" led me to think of different animals with these body  parts and that make these sounds.

NY Times

All CUNY students can get free digital access to the New York Times. Just follow the link on the CUNY Grad Center website and then follow the directions.

Love Poem Chimera

The poem Chimera is a descriptive piece of work that describes parts of a Chimera from head to toe. It also gives a calamity feel as the poem describes the mythical animal. In the last stanza this quote sticks out the most "What we've made of ourselves". Do you guys think maybe the author is hinting a the society we live in today and how chaotic it is at some points?

Group Poem Activity

Theodor Cano, Nickolai Royster, Afolabi Taylor, Tatiyana Rogers:


"Blue Rose"

The summer to fall

winter is next

spring rain floods the road

yet the power of love is raw

you watch me go away

cry my friend by the lake

boil some mil chocolate please

I think that poems are a great way to get people to think and it's kind of interesting on how we all interpret poems differently.

Collective

For those of you who might be interested in publishing your work in a literary journal, the English Department's Collective will be taking submissions of fiction, essays, and poetry up through March 18th. The theme is "growth." See details below:

Making A Poem

We were given limited amounts of words to create a poem and we couldn't use any other words besides the ones on the table. It was very difficult to place the words in a way so the whole poem can make sense. It was a fun experience because it was challenging and pushed us to think and work together. We each incorporated our own ideas. Although it was not perfect the end product was not terrible either. I was surprised that we were able to do it, I thought it would turn out beyond random, but it was not that bad.

Love Poem: Chimera

I really liked the poem we read in class. I was sensing a lot of strength in the poem because the author mentions lion and serpent which are powerful animals. I felt like the author used Chimera as a metaphor to symbolize two people becoming one but contributing their own uniqueness. The union is quite clear and shows externally but they both stand out in their own way like a chimera. All the animals on the Chimera bring their own abilities and talent to the "table". Same goes for a couple they help each other out, keep each other strong, and have something to contribute in to the relationship.

2.5.19

From today's class I realized that writing a poem can actually be really challenging. Although our groups had set words to use for the poem, it was hard to arrange the words in a way that made sense. I cant imagine how authors write poems that are so deep without having anything to go by. I also realized that some poems can have plenty of meanings. When we read 'Love Poem: Chimera', it was clear to me that I had a different idea of what the poem was about, just like another classmate thought something different then the other. I think that the more we read poems in class and learn about how to dig deeper, we will start to interpret them in a similar way.

In Class Poem - Anyi Marin, Devonte Adams, Salomee Cecil, Nicole Horn, Vincenzo Ljuba

She sings sweet music 

A warm stare to manipulate those 

Delirious and ugly to bed 

Screaming and soaring through time

Inclass poem assignment

Names,

Shaista Jabeen
Joseph Woo
Nicole Martin
Andrew Mueller

The boy will not ask for a woman after delicate sleep near our sea

Urge is sad acheing eternity

We let shadows chant life

Poems

The three poems I asked you to read this week are pretty different from each other. So there are several ways you might approach responding to them on the blog.

• You might do a close reading of one of the poems (like we did w/ David Mason's poem last week)
• You might compare the poems. What similarities do they have? What differences do you notice?
• You might write about difficulties you have with a poem. Feel free to use the blog to ask questions. I value good open questions. (Open questions are subjective, they lead to exploration. Closed questions are purely factual ("What color is the sky?") or yes/no.) And yes, you get credit for asking good questions.
• Try to answer one of my open questions.
• Try to answer one of you peers' very good open questions. And yes, again, you get credit for responding to classmates' comments and questions. 
• Make connections between a poem and other texts you've read (or seen or heard).
• Make connections between a poem and your life experience. 

It helps to quote from the text if you're making a specific comment or claim about a poem.

Poet John Ciardi had these three rules for reading poetry:

1)  The poem is not to be confused w/ a paraphrase.

2)  Avoid speed-reading. Discover the natural rhythm of the work.

3)  Read it aloud.

 

Or we might consider what poet Richard Wilbur wrote about poetry (quoted in BAP 2018, p. xix): "A poem should not be like a Double-Crostic; it should not be the sort of puzzle in which you get nothing until you get it all." In other words, although a poem may puzzle you, it's not for you to solve. A truly rich poem should offer you something different every time you return to it. Shakespeare wrote his plays over four hundred years ago and people are still publishing books and articles about them. That shows you how rich some texts can be.

Foreword

I think it's instructive for us to read and think about David Lehman's foreword to Best American Poetry 2018, esp. since you all will have to write your own forewords. Some questions to consider:

• How does this foreword work in relation to the anthology of poetry that we're about to read? 
• What does the opening (introduction) do? How does it relate to what comes after?
• He's got three sections in the foreword which he divides with asterisks (***). What purpose does ea. section serve?
• What questions did you have after reading the foreword? Do you feel better qualified to write your own?

Problems w/ Safari

Apparently, there are some problems w/ posting using Safari. If you come across this issue, then try Chrome or Firefox. They're both free to download and easy to use.

My experience with reading and writing

Hi, my name is Nicole Martin. There was a point in my life when I loved reading but as for today it’s not exactly so. I do not dislike it, I just don’t have the passion as opposed to in my prior years. Lately I realize I have selective reading tendencies; to materials that is of interest to me. I normally liked writing reality pieces and poems too but I’ve become stagnant on that because I do not have the time sometimes among other things.
I am looking forward to what this class has in store for me and how it can help me to be better equipped in reading and writing.
As it relates to the poem we got on the first day about Christmas and Jesus, there were parts that did not come quite clear to me as I would have hoped but I hope as time progresses I will be able to understand various types of poetry and readings at large.