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Post by Gerry on Feb 8, 2016 20:52:53 GMT -5
I'm curious as to a few things.
One, how was the overall class experience in terms of your own reading and writing?
Two, what was your favorite poem we looked at? Why? Which poem challenged you most?
Three, is there anything you wish we had discussed that we haven't gotten to? Ask away.
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Post by betsey on Feb 11, 2019 17:13:02 GMT -5
I enjoyed the class. A poem a week is challenging, for sure, but I write better with a deadline anyway. I thought we all pitched in and did thoughtful critiques, and the Monday chats were fun. I still devote too little time to reading, but the careful reading of each poem is instructive. I was slightly disappointed that you didn't critique our poems on a pdf file, mainly because that has been so helpful in the past. However, I think you made it clear from the get go that you would provide a more casual review.
My favorite poem remains the Mackerel poem by Doty. Just the way the images play off the narrative.
The hardest for me was Haas, with "Sweet" a close second. I enjoyed delving into the Bishop, and learned from that close reading. Some of your analyses were deep and probing - excellent, I thought. I think I am closer to trying a meditation, though. It was nice to have some old favorites thrown in, like "We Real Cool."
I think we covered the poems really well. Can't really think of topics I felt were uncovered.
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Post by betsey on Feb 11, 2019 21:26:19 GMT -5
Sorry, everyone. I spaced on the chat tonight. Hope to read all the notes.
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Jimmy
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Post by Jimmy on Feb 11, 2019 23:18:44 GMT -5
I really enjoyed the class because it challenged me to read more carefully. I’m intrigued by the idea it gave me that my process of reading discovery is much like the process of the poet’s discovery. That’s a finding that makes me want to read poems even more. I was energized to be in class with such excellent and experienced readers which challenged me to dig deeper in my own readings each week.
My favorite poem as the Mary Oliver piece, chiefly because I got so much out of her crossing the conventional line between humans and nature. Whether that was real or imagined, it was real in the poem and it inspired me to find ways of crossing my own borders. I also loved the Haas poem.
The most challenging and least favorite for me was “Sweet.” I liked it but did think it veered toward being over ambiguous. I will still think I learned something from it though and a couple weeks after studying it, lines and ideas from it were popping into my head at all hours.
Missing from this class? Just more poems. There are many more I’d like to discuss this way.
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Post by bluebird on Feb 12, 2019 13:46:57 GMT -5
I think overall that the careful reading and your accompanying notes gave me appreciation for poetic FORM
and how it helps convey the content.
My favorites were: Meditation at Lagunitas and your guidance through it.
I learned a lot about moving from one thought to another and the achievement of a whole.
I loved "A Display of Mackerel" that worked from the specific and present moment to the universal.
Word choice were full of light and emotional.
I also like Bishop's poem but mostly because it stirred me to read "The Buffalo" which I thought was
brilliant and also I learned from the Bishop poems something about her style...those short lines
one after the other...and reading some of my longer lines I see how they could be divided into
short ones that connect to small breaths.
Least favorite was "Sweet" which even as I re-read it now feels difficult to follow (for me). This poem
challenged me a lot but in the end I didn't feel it was worth it. The poem by Hass was also challenging
but there was a big payoff (though not sure I would have experienced that w/o your notes.)
Maybe another discussion could have addressed a selected poet's evolution as a writer...
did Hass always write such a complex poem? What other themes interested him?
I learned a lot about the diversity of styles between poets and maybe another time could explore a single poet's evolution.
p.s. We Real Cool was cool...I probably would not have given it the time to "unpack" it on my own but, wow!
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Jimmy
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Post by Jimmy on Feb 12, 2019 14:15:34 GMT -5
Karen, this class helped me learn to recognize and cultivate forms as well. I was going to say exactly what you did about “Sweet” not having enough of a payoff. I want to give that poem another chance, though.
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Susan
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Post by Susan on Feb 15, 2019 8:46:29 GMT -5
Favorites - Hass and Gregerson. I am partial to Sweet, but I’m also the one who asked to discuss it. In both cases, the complexity drew me in because it is so intentional. There is nothing obscure in either poem, and while I may not be 100 percent certain of every line, I love the way both poets have through lines of sorts - ideas, images, language that appears throughout the poem.
Most challenging - Dunbar, because it was too easy to grasp on the surface. I didn’t give it enough attention until after we discussed it. I have always had that problem with rhyme and form. If I “get it’ too quickly, I don’t go beyond the surface. So I appreciated the slow, close reading and the Monday night discussion.
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linm
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Post by linm on Feb 15, 2019 10:40:00 GMT -5
I find I get a lot out of writing about poems, so this class really satisfied me in that regard. I want to keep doing that in my own reading of poetry (selectively!). I thought quite a few of the poems we read were in the meditative vein, and I was trying out that mode consciously in some of the things I was writing, and found myself foundering on the longer lines and use of abstractions. I generally feel it's hard (for me) to not be trite or obvious or flatly discursive when I try a meditative approach. I was glad and also frustrated trying to work in that vein. I really enjoyed the Hass poem; the discussions and comments helped me see more than I had previously been aware of. I found it inspiring. I'd worked with a few of these poems in other workshops, so they were old friends and it's hard to say which were favorites. If I do analyze a poem,I usually wind up liking it. Your explications opened up new dimensions of the poems, showed pathways into understanding form,--eye-opening for me.
My least favorite was "Sweet"--a lot of the elements in it just didn't appeal to me.
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Post by Gerry on Feb 16, 2019 17:29:00 GMT -5
So many of you didn't like "Sweet." It's a hard poem, but not that hard. Maybe we'll try an Ashbury poem next time I do something like this! Karen, "Meditation at Lagunitas" is from Bob's second book, PRAISE. I think his thinking is his thinking. And it's about loss  . Susan, I think that a fixed traditional form comes loaded with the baggage of it solving the formal poem: we've seen formal poems so often that are successful insofar as they rhyme, etc, that it's easy to miss what it's doing IN the form. I do hope you've cultivated some skill in how to close read poems you particularly like or particularly don't get that you want to see how/why they work on a different level, |
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Post by bluebird on Feb 16, 2019 18:32:11 GMT -5
One more thing I learned and forgot to say: to understand how each choice we make leads the reader in and so we have
as writers a certain responsibility (or at least kindness) to always have the reader/listener on our shoulder. I
never understood this so clearly before this class.
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