Tag: fear

poetry appreciation

hallowe’en

Oct 28, 2021 #ancestors, #Annie Finch, #autumn, #Celtic, #comfort, #connection, #continuum, #day of the Dead, #death, #Eternity, #fear, #Finch, #halloween, #mortality, #mother, #Samhain, #scary, #soothing, #spring, #time, #winter by Lucy Crispin

Well, if Strictly can have a Hallowe’en special, why can’t this column? I do like Annie Finch’s take on the Celtic Feast of the Dead, ‘Samhain‘. I don’t know that I understand it all intellectually but, as ever with me, that matters less than the feeling with which it leaves me. There’s a shiver, not of fear but something more like awe, of apprehending the vastness of time and our place in a continuum. See how the poem leaves you.

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poetry appreciation

answering light

May 6, 2021 #ageing, #change, #Child Waking, #commitment, #courage, #death, #Deaths of Flowers, #Edith Scovell, #Edna St VIncent Millay, #fear, #Figs from Thistles, #freedom, #hope, #My candle burns at both ends, #Scovell, #St Vincent Millay by Lucy Crispin

Someone brought ‘Child waking’ by Edith Scovell to the 42 group last week. The poet’s name was vaguely familiar but I had no sense of her work. I loved ‘Child waking’, though, so since then I’ve been scuttling about the interweb looking for Scovell’s work. And I give you: ‘Deaths of Flowers‘.

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poetry appreciation

if only…

Apr 1, 2021 #bargaining, #blame, #control, #doubt, #fear, #grief, #Jennifer Maier, #Maier, #post hoc, #post hoc ergo propter hoc, #regret, #self-blame, #self-criticism, #the road not taken, #what if by Lucy Crispin

Apologies for radio silence over the last 2 weeks; I’ve not been well. I’m glad to be back, not least because this week’s poem is a relatively new discovery (to me) and I’ve been looking forward to sharing it. Some part of me deeply recognises the states and thoughts described in Jennifer Maier’s ‘Post Hoc‘ by Jennifer Maier. How about you?

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poetry appreciation

is April really the cruellest month?

Feb 11, 2021 #Bill Christopherson, #Christopherson, #cold, #coronavirus, #Covid 19, #dark, #Dickinson, #Emily Dickinson, #fear, #February, #form, #hope, #pandemic, #regret, #Shakespeare, #shall i compare thee?, #sonnet, #structure, #winter by Lucy Crispin

Cos this month, though it’s short, does seem to go on rather. I do enjoy the early nightfalls of winter, and the pleasure of being cocooned in the heavier-weight duvet, rejoicing in warmth while all outside is cold. But there comes a point when I don’t want to get up in the dark; when I’m tired of wearing clothes that rustle and having my hood up, slithering in mud on my morning walk. So when I discovered this account of ‘February‘ by Bill Christopherson, it resonated. See what you think.

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poetry appreciation
poetry appreciation

apokalyptíria

Jan 28, 2021 #apocalypse, #apokalyptíria, #coronavirus, #Dorothy Parker, #fear, #Fire and Ice, #Frost, #frustration, #hate, #hatred, #hope, #hopefulness, #Nash, #Ogden Nash, #Oscar Wilde, #pandemic, #Parker, #Revelation, #RObert Frost, #sovid 19, #the news, #Wilde by Lucy Crispin

There’s a lot of fear, frustration and anger flying about at the moment, and this last year we’ve read many headlines and seen photos and footage we never want to have seen. Since the beginning of this strange and disturbing month one of the poems echoing in my head has been Frost’s ‘Fire and Ice‘ (click the red arrow by the title if you’d like to be read to). Does it resonate with you?

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poetry appreciation

darkling

Dec 31, 2020 #2020, #2021, #beauty, #bravery, #courage, #dread, #fear, #Hardy, #hope, #New Year, #optimism, #pandemic, #The Darkling Thrush, #The Oxen, #Thomas Hardy by Lucy Crispin

Joy and pain, hope and despair, don’t always seem evenly balanced in Hardy, that’s for sure. Just ask Tess. Or Jude. But for the turn of such a year as this I want to remind myself of the beauty-in-the-midst-of-desolation that we find in Hardy’s ‘The Darkling Thrush’. I’m sure it’s familiar to you, but you can re-read (or read) it here.

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poetry appreciation

difficult thoughts

Nov 19, 2020 #disenfranchised, #dread, #dream, #dreaming, #fear, #gloom, #hope, #hopelessness, #hopes, #Lindsay, #Louis MacNeice, #Macneice, #passion, #possibility, #powerless, #powerlessness, #protest, #unrespresented, #Vachel Lindsay by Lucy Crispin

When times are hard, is it helpful or appalling to read something and realise that times have been hard in the same way before (and therefore probably will be again)? Mostly, as you’ll know by now, I tend to think it’s helpful to read and know you are not alone; but when today’s poem presented itself for duty in my head, seeming apt for the times, resonant and gloomy, I did initially feel a bit droopier than I already had been. So, see what you think: do you feel droopier when you read ‘The Leaden Eyed‘ by Vachel Lindsay? (Note: in versions I’ve seen in print there is a stanza break between lines 4 and 5, which doesn’t appear in this online version.)

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poetry appreciation

thank you

Oct 22, 2020 #anger, #appreciate, #appreciation, #fear, #Gay, #gratitude, #mindful, #mindfulness, #miracle, #mortality, #ode to the west wind, #Percy Bysshe Shelley, #poem, #poetry, #presence, #present, #Ross Gay, #Shelley, #sorrow, #Thank you by Lucy Crispin

At the moment, the world is offering us lots of reminders that life is short and time’s winged chariot is always hurrying near. It’s easy to get sucked into fear, anger or sorrow about this. They’re all around us (as well as inside us). So I was particularly delighted to discover this poem which suggests a different and beautiful response to intimations of mortality. Here it is: ‘Thank you‘ by Ross Gay. Read it and be refreshed. (You can also hear him read a couple of bits from a recent book here.)

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poetry appreciation

tenderness

Aug 6, 2020 #care, #careful, #caring, #connection, #coronavirus, #Covid 19, #fear, #Naomi Shihab Nye, #pandemic, #shoulders, #tender, #tenderness by Lucy Crispin

One of the many weird, sad things about living during this time of pandemic is what it does to how we look on other people: suddenly everyone is threat, or potential threat, and connection is something to be avoided, not sought. I’d like to offer a little antidote to this—a reminder of connection as protection—in the shape of ‘Shoulders‘ by the deeply gifted Naomi Shihab Nye.

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