Good morning and happy Movember, bloggers. I can't wait until the month is over and the peach fuzz and pork chops gracing so many faces are razed.
Anyway, speaking of moving on...
Our up-and-coming unit is poetry. Most of you have studied it; some of you may actually enjoy it. Perhaps you even dabble in the art yourself. For this post, please write about two things:
First, describe your relationship with poetry. Is it lustful? Love-hate? Tempestuous at best? Explain whether you enjoy reading and/or writing poetry and why.
Next, (keep this on the same post) read the short biography and two poems inlcuded below. Amanda will be our guest artist during class time on Tuesday, so knowing a bit about her will be helpful. After reading the poems, pose questions or comment on them. Are there lines you are drawn to? Questions you have? This is a good time to jot down any questions you might ask Amanda about the craft of writing poetry in general. Enjoy!
Amanda Jernigan is a poet, playwright, essayist and editor. Her first collection is Groundwork: poems (Biblioasis, 2011); her poems also appear in Undercurrents: New Voices in Canadian Poetry, edited by Robyn Sarah (Cormorant Books, 2011). She lives and works in Canada with her partner, the artist John Haney. Amanda graduated from the fine ivy league institution of Waterloo-Oxford D.S.S. nestled in the swarming metropolis of Baden, Ontario.
Bats
They billow from a hillside in Cha’am.
Together, they are more than plural:
the planet’s darkest song, a tongue,
a serpent muscling air apart,
a dire banner come unfurled,
a river flowing wholly from
the old, mute mountain’s desperate heart,
the last confession of the world.
Conceive of each one singly, if you can.
Lullaby
My little lack-of-light, my swaddled soul,
December baby. Hush, for it is dark,
and will grow darker still. We must embark
directly. Bring an orange as the toll
for Charon: he will be our gondolier.
Upon the shore, the season pans for light,
and solstice fish, their eyes gone milky white,
come bearing riches for the dying year:
solstitial kingdom. It is yours, the mime
of branches and the drift of snow. With shaking
hands, Persephone, the winter’s wife,
will tender you a gift. Born in a time
of darkness, you will learn the trick of making.
You shall make your consolation all your life.
Front Story
Phemios
At the end of the Odyssey,the Iliad
comes back in all its terrible
detail: Odysseus slaughtering
suitors till the floor runs red
as great Scamandros; or 'rutting',
lustful, 'in his rooted bed'.
I didn't want to tell you,
but I have to since he spared me.
