Category: poetry
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spine — day 25 of the micro.blog april 2024 photoblogging challenge 📸
Books in Fernando Pessoa’s library, Lisbon, April 2023
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🔗 Some thoughts on International Women’s Day
Speaking truth to the power of the patriarchy is unimaginably difficult, even as I live a life of relative privilege. In the past, I’ve experienced deep levels of discomfort at writing one small truth because there’s the worry that I’ll be branded a troublemaker, a man hater, a difficult woman to work with. All of which heightens my respect for those women across global history who’ve had to fight like lions for the barest modicum of political and/or cultural change.
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John Donne 💬
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Bright Star, 2009 - ★★★★★
Watched on Wednesday December 20, 2023.
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Location check in 🗺 — Keats House, Hampstead 🪶⚱️
🔎 Zoom in
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Genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.
T. S. Eliot
From Dante, a 1929 essay. The full quote is
What is surprising about the poetry of Dante is that it is, in one sense, extremely easy to read. It is a test (a positive test, I do not assert that it is always valid negatively), that genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.
💬
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Dylan Thomas around Swansea Marina
Dylan Thomas Square
Dylan Thomas Theatre
Captain Cat
The sleepers are rung out of sleep with his loud get-out-of-bed bell
Under Milk Wood
The Dylan Thomas Centre
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language — day 09 of the micro.blog september 2023 photoblogging challenge 📸
Wales Millennium Centre, 2012
Welsh: Creu Gwir fel Gwydr o Ffwrnais Awen
(trans: Creating Truth like Glass from Inspiration’s Furnace)English: In these Stones Horizons Sing
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8th July, 1822 – The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley died on this day when his boat went down in a sudden storm off the coast of the Gulf of La Spezia, Italy. #OnThisDay
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Linkblog 🔗: The Waste Land: A Biography of a Poem by Matthew Hollis review – a classic laid bare
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Linkblog 🔗: TS Eliot’s Waste Land was a barren place. But at least a spirit of optimism still prevailed | Kenan Malik
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Linkblog 🔗: The Waste Land: A Biography of a Poem by Matthew Hollis – genesis of a masterpiece
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Linkblog 🔗: Long gone, but speaking clearly to our age – Shelley, the poet of moral and political corruption
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Percy Bysshe Shelley died on 8th July 1822, at the age of 29, when his boat went down in a sudden storm off the coast of the Gulf of Spezia.
#OnThisDay
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Linkblog 🔗: The love song of TS Eliot: intense letters reveal the passion behind the pen
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Finished reading: One Language by Anastasia Taylor-Lind 📚
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TS Eliot’s The Waste Land issues weather warning for our times 🔗
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Plague poems, defiant wit and penis puns: why John Donne is a poet for our times 🔗
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Beat Poet Elise Cowen’s Time-Traveling Love Letters to Emily Dickinson 🔗
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Finished reading: Pandemonium by Armando Iannucci 📚
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John Keats was born #OnThisDay, 31st October 1795, in Moorgate, London, where his father worked in a livery stable at the Swan and Hoop inn. A small blue plaque at the site reads
In a house on this site the “Swan and Hoop” John Keats, Poet, Was born 1795
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The Concert by Edna St Vincent Millay 🔗
Poem of the week in The Guardian
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Currently reading: Sissy by Ben Borek 📚
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Distracted from distraction by distraction
I’ve just read this article in by Oliver Burkeman The Guardian:
It is an edited extract from his book Four Thousand Weeks: Time and How to Use It, published on 26th August 2021.
I recognise and certainly experience a lot of the symptoms of being distracted that he is pointing out.
Social media is engineered to constantly adapt to our interests. No wonder the rest of reality seems unable to compete
We mustn’t let Silicon Valley off the hook, but we should be honest: much of the time, we give in to distraction willingly
When we succumb to distraction, we’re motivated by the desire to flee something painful about our experience of the present
What we think of as distractions aren’t the cause of our being distracted. They’re just the places we go to seek relief
The title of this post comes from Burnt Norton the first of T.S.Eliot’s Four Quartets:
Distracted from distraction by distraction
Filled with fancies and empty of meaning
Tumid apathy with no concentration -
Clothes just undone—not that there were many,
— Cavafy Bot (@cavafybot) July 18, 2021
for an exquisite July was blazing.
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Should Feminists Read Baudelaire? BBC Radio 3 - Sunday Feature 🔗
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Interesting and informative podcast series from the Keats-Shelley Memorial Association and Keats-Shelley House. John Keats’ Bright Star 1820: read by heart with analysis is one of the highlights for me. 📚🔗
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The Great British Art Tour: why is Keats at Guy’s hospital? 🔗
The Romantic poet John Keats died 200 years ago today at the young age of 25. He has long since been celebrated for works such as Ode to a Nightingale and To…
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John Keats: five poets on his best poems, 200 years since his death 🔗
Ode to a Nightingale (1819) My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk, Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains…
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Enclosing their lives
Old castle walls reinforce
The rule of the few✏️ #mbnov
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I’m gazing downwards
A tiny pedestrian
Fights against the flow✏️ #mbnov
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Behind a dark mask
Punchinello imagines
Time of Carnival✏️ #mbnov
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What can be certain?
No dilemma for Descartes -
I am, I exist✏️ #mbnov
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Adjust the colour
Wait for something to happen
But nothing was changed✏️ #mbnov
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A call through the mist
Angry noisy chattering
Tiding of magpies✏️ #mbnov
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Ancient monument
Provision of memory
On featureless plains✏️ #mbnov
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Books quickly devoured
But to capture the meaning
Is more of an art✏️ #mbnov
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Seeking a refuge
Lands of milk and honey lie
Beyond the border✏️ #mbnov
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A winter journey
Departing warmth and shelter
Towards the unknown✏️ #mbnov
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Old photographs fade
Our history in albums
Dusty from neglect✏️ #mbnov
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Possible worlds spin
Planets around their orbits
Peopled by strangers✏️ #mbnov
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Covering the tree -
Dependence on an other -
Lichen spreads slowly✏️ #mbnov
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My train of thought lost
Interruptions disturb me
Or are they welcome?✏️ #mbnov
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Pale marble headstone
Memory of young poet -
A broken Greek lyre✏️ #mbnov
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Rumbling thunder sounds
Far away lightning flashes
Rain in the valleys✏️ #mbnov
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Trees disturbed by breeze
Shadows beyond the window
Spooky gloominess✏️ #mbnov
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Difficult to guess
The story of an image
Caught in an instant✏️ #mbnov
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Hard and unyielding
All things will slowly wear down
Given enough time✏️ #mbnov
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Mary on the Green
I’d say the bright statue speaks
In true memory✏️ #mbnov
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Elderly pathways
Straight lines through an empty town
Lost destinations✏️ #mbnov
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Force me to select
One highlight of the autumn -
Abundance of squash✏️ #mbnov
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Trying to bind us
Ivy creeps slowly over
The cracks in our walls✏️ #mbnov
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To inflate one’s worth
Beyond the reality -
Mistake of many✏️ #mbnov
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Beginning of day
Puzzling over breakfast tea
Wondering what next?✏️ #mbnov
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Green changed to amber
Pine needles are covering
Red tiles on the stoop✏️ #mbnov
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Near neighbours entwine
Branches and tendrils twisted
Broken in the fall✏️ #mbnov
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A fake persona
Wane into obscurity
Astonish me now✏️ #mbnov
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Concentrate on sleep
Losing thoughts and ideas
Mislaid in the mist✏️ #mbnov
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An autumn morning
Dreary days of wind and rain
Sweeping sodden leaves✏️ #mbnov
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John Keats was born #OnThisDay, 31st October 1795. And on 31st October 1820 the 25 year old poet also first set foot on Italian soil after 35 days at sea and 10 in quarantine. Keats-Shelley Memorial Association podcast 🔗
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Currently reading: The Fire of Joy by Clive James 📚
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From standup to stanzas: Frank Skinner’s terrific guide to poetry 🔗
Now embarking on its second series, the podcast is a terrific listen: bursting with enthusiasm for its chosen poems and constantly amusing about Skinner’s relationship with them.
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France divided over calls for Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine to be reburied in Panthéon 🔗
The Guardian -
Clive James: ‘The poems I remember are the milestones marking the journey of my life’ 🔗 — Excerpt: What makes great poetry? An exclusive extract from the late critic’s final book The Fire of Joy celebrates the poems he loved most. 📚
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‘He returned to what he really was’: Clive James’s daughter on his poetic farewell 🔗 — Excerpt: Ten months before his death last year at the age of 80, Clive James underwent an eight-hour operation to remove a tumour on his face. Already very frail – he had been suffering from leukaemia for a decade – afterwards it took him almost a week to emerge fully into consciousness.
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The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was born #OnThisDay, 4th August 1792.
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The Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley died #OnThisDay, 8th July 1822, at the age of 29, when his boat went down in a sudden storm off the coast of the Gulf of La Spezia.
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Radical Wordsworth by Jonathan Bate review – fleet-footed and inspiriting 🔗 — Excerpt: In 1798, William Wordsworth arrived from Bristol at the cottage of his friend, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in Nether Stowey in Somerset.
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William Wordsworth was born on 7th April 1770. #OnThisDay 250 years ago.
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Poet’s corners: a car-free tour of inspiring Wordsworth sites 🔗 — Excerpt: William Wordsworth was born in Cumbria 250 years ago, on 7 April 1770. Inspired by nature and a sense of place, he was an environmentalist as well as a poet, so it’s fitting to visit the places he celebrated in as eco-friendly a way as possible.
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Walking in London - Finding poetry, politics and more - a Flickr album 📷 🔗
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Keats Bar at the Globe. Drinking a London Pride by Fuller’s Brewery. Check in 🗺
🔎 Zoom in
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Keats House, Hampstead
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Keats House. Check in 🗺
🔎 Zoom in
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Shelley in London: Poland Street 🔗 — Excerpt: Soho is my favourite part of London. I love walking from Oxford Circus to Leicester Square, dipping into Covent Garden.
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Fascism: I sometimes fear… — link to a poem by Michael Rosen 🔗
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William Blake, poet and printmaker, was born #OnThisDay 1757 BBC In Our Time
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Simon Armitage: ‘Nature has come back to the centre of poetry’ — link 🔗
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Baudelaire’s unknown extra verse to erotic poem revealed — link 🔗 📚
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Forward Arts Foundation in conversation with Fiona Benson — link 🔗
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Currently reading: Vertigo & Ghost by Fiona Benson 📚
Purchased after reading this review in The Guardian.
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Currently reading: Baudelaire by Claude Pichois and Jean Ziegler 📚
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Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was born on this day in 1792 - BBC In Our Time - The Later Romantics
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16-bit Intel 8088 chip
It’s National Poetry Day, so …
16-bit Intel 8088 chip
with an Apple Macintosh
you can’t run Radio Shack programs
in its disc drive.
nor can a Commodore 64
drive read a file
you have created on an
IBM Personal Computer.
both Kaypro and Osborne computers use
the CP/M operating system
but can’t read each other’s
handwriting
for they format (write
on) discs in different
ways.
the Tandy 2000 runs MS-DOS but
can’t use most programs produced for
the IBM Personal Computer
unless certain
bits and bytes are
altered
but the wind still blows over
Savannah
and in the Spring
the turkey buzzard struts and
flounces before his
hens.Charles Bukowski
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Currently reading: Percy Bysshe Shelley – Poet and Revolutionary by Jacqueline Mulhallen 📚
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The great Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was born On This Day in 1792 - The Later Romantics
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Currently reading: Poetry Notebook: 2006–2014 by Clive James 📚
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Porthcawl won with the last kick of the game 🏉
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Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s remains rediscovered in wine cellar 📚
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Spring by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Spring
To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know.
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify?
Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.Edna St. Vincent Millay
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Edna St Vincent Millay is one of my favourite poets - just noticed and appreciated this article, published on the anniversary of her birth, February 22nd 1892: Edna St Vincent Millay’s poetry has been eclipsed by her personal life – let’s change that 📚
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Grave of John Keats in the Non-Catholic Cemetery, Rome
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Keats-Shelley House
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Checked in at Fondazione Keats-Shelley Memorial
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🔖Bookmark ― Mary Shelley review – sturdy literary biopic fails to resurrect spirit of author ― but I do still want to see this.
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The great Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was born #OnThisDay in 1792 - The Later Romantics
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Talk & The Optimist - D. H. Lawrence
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How sweet it is to sit and read the tales
Of mightiest poets and to hear the while
Sweet music, which when the attention fails
Fill the dim pause — -
Patrick Jones #poetry at Tramshed Cardiff @TramshedCF @heretic101 #Hipstamatic https://t.co/N5WIYgO7HQ
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RT @BBCInOurTime: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, conceived in a long summer storm in 1816, was published #OnThisDay 1818 https://t.co/IBRFGta…
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Edna St.Vincent Millay #poetry https://t.co/q8JHFlTJQJ
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RT @BBCInOurTime: Lord Byron, poet, was born #OnThisDay 1788 https://t.co/Vophborhnx
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RT @britishlibrary: Percy Bysshe Shelley died #otd in 1822. Explore how he came to write his poem ‘To a Skylark’ https://t.co/NOYOvXiEly ht…
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QI: Percy Bysshe Shelley’s lost poem acquired by Oxford University https://t.co/MTIlqKeUYh
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Anarchy in Peterloo: Shelley’s poem unmasked http://t.co/5bSHTIwqOM #adn
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finished Young Romantics: The Shelleys, Byron and Other Tangled Lives by Daisy Hay http://t.co/0eW87VXY #Kindle
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My Top 3 Weekly #lastfm artists: Shearwater (21), Chumbawamba (13) and Percy Bysshe Shelley (4) http://bit.ly/cjoMxQ
