april the poetry month.

One of my pet peeves is hearing the phrase, "i don't get poetry." I know why this phrase bothers me so much: I know exactly what that means. As much as I like feigning ignorance and giving quizzical looks every time I hear someone say that they won't read poetry because they don't "get it," I must admit to often feeling the same. I like the sound of but truly don't get Sylvia Plath. I read Ariel like my Spanish Lit books: in awe of the sound and certain clever phrases but knew deep inside that I would have to read the English translation before class and really I can't major in Spanish Lit.

But it still annoys me when people say that. I think people don't give poetry a chance. It really puzzles me how avid readers who read through many awful fiction and nonfiction don't try more than three poets.

Okay, poetry does make us feel guilty. It's a prime suspect for inspiring, "oh I really should've read this person" feeling. And it also makes otherwise over-educated people feel stupid: "I don't get exactly what this poet is saying here and I have a nagging feeling that every other word is some sort of a metaphor I can't get." Now in our culture, it's okay to not get the first law of thermodynamics because, ya know, there's calculus involved and such, but poetry is just a string of words and not "getting it" makes people feel illiterate.

But how can those same people then go and stare at paintings at museums for modern arts in various cities. Do you "get" those? Why is poetry different? Why don't we just enjoy poems instead of trying to get them as if we were desperately trying to be a part of an inside joke? Even though I often don't "get" poetry, I find that poems are all I can read when it becomes really difficult to read anything or when I feel especially despondent precisely because I don't have to "get" it.

Anyway, I am being bitter and judgmental because I can afford to be. I have a friend who includes a poem every once in awhile in his email (bry), another who handpicks poems for me to try according to poems I already like (alice, my personal netflix-like poetry recoomandation system), and a friend who sends me a book of Joseph Brodsky poems through snail mail (natalie). So it's easy for me to find poems to try.

But if you don't have friends who offer poetry, you can try The New Yorker. In fact, one of the poems I told Alice about was found in the magazine. Or you can try "The Writers' Almanac" with a daily poem on WNYC at 8 PM (precisely!). Okay, these sound like awful suggestions, sorry, but I hope people find poems they like if not for the intrinsic value of poetry in their lives then to feel less guilty about not having a favorite poem.

It's spring; it's the national poetry month; it's time to not suffer from a sense of low self esteem due to being word-challenged.

For me, I am celebrating the national poetry month (really for the first time in my life) by trying a new poet. After reading a NYT magazine article comparing Emily Dickinson to Twits, I thought she would be perfect for someone like me who is concentration-challenged. But when I tried to read her, I found that I didn't, what-do-ya-know, "get her." So I tried Joseph Brodsky (thanks again Natalie) and oh I get him, sorta, and I definitely enjoy reading him.

lonliness...

I found a perfect description of "togetherness":

"Having a sister or a friend is like sitting at night in a lighted house. Those outside can watch you if they want, but you need not see them. You simply say, "Here are the perimeters of our attention. If you prowl around under the windows till the crickets go silent, we will pull the shades. If you wish us to suffer your envious curiosity, you must permit us not to notice it." Anyone with one solid human bond is that smug, and it is the smugness as much as the comfort and safety that lonely people covet and admire."

Housekeeping
Marilynne Robinson

I don't have any sibling and I am convinced that shuts me out of understanding a specific type of bond. but I have felt smug with a friend. And being alone is, more than anything else, embarrassing:

"I have often noticed that it is almost intolerable to be looked at, to be watched, when one is idle. When one is idle and alone, the embarrassments of loneliness are almost endlessly compounded."

Housekeeping

Marilynne Robinson

I am used to being alone. I prefer it at times. When friends are not around, books can work quite well. The world watches you and you can feel it, but you are not idle. You are reading, or pretending to while considering their gaze and shifting your perspective so you can see how you must look to the others. I like to read, I like words, but also, I need my book to accompany me so that I am not lonely, I am not idle. I don't want to be caught on a bus twiddling my thumb. The iPod works pretty well too. but the words, the pages, they better isolate you.

I have been feeling uneasy this week and I couldn't quite identify what I was feeling. It wasn't good. It was something mixed with anxiety. Then I read Housekeeping and apparently I am lonely. Not for the lack of people. But because we are all alone in our pods, stuck in our perspectives. When I am acutely aware of my loneliness, it's hard to imagine what it's like not to feel this way:

"... once alone, it is impossible to believe that one could ever have been otherwise. Loneliness is an absolute discovery."

Housekeeping
Marilynne Robinson

P.S. (4/4/09): Even holding a book in public is comforting because the book is my escape plan. The presence of words alleviates my fear of being stuck in a situation, in a world I can't escape. I guess this is simply a fear of commitment. I think my generation is deeply infected with this phobia. So we should all read and live in our heads.