I sat in the back with a real attitude in AP English Lit my senior year of high school. I refused to learn the mechanics of poetry: oh all those devices! Getting me to participate in class discussion must have been like scraping melted rubber off the floor.
But poems are insiduous. And I spent the next decade buttressed by them. One in particular, I forget and remember as needed: "One Art" by Elizabeth Bishop. Since "so many things seem filled with the intent to be lost," a person has no choice but to master "the art of losing." As I am losing a mentor who taught me a different art ("None of these will bring disaster"), I want to go find Mr. Gern and thank him for sending in his army of poems.
Happy poetry month everyone!
But poems are insiduous. And I spent the next decade buttressed by them. One in particular, I forget and remember as needed: "One Art" by Elizabeth Bishop. Since "so many things seem filled with the intent to be lost," a person has no choice but to master "the art of losing." As I am losing a mentor who taught me a different art ("None of these will bring disaster"), I want to go find Mr. Gern and thank him for sending in his army of poems.
Happy poetry month everyone!
