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Nat Lipstadt Mar 2015
I Am Not Yours
Sara Teasdale, 1884 - 1933


I am not yours, not lost in you,
Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
Lost as a snowflake in the sea.

You love me, and I find you still
A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
Lost as a light is lost in light.

Oh plunge me deep in love—put out
My senses, leave me deaf and blind,
Swept by the tempest of your love,
A taper in a rushing wind.
And see this poem set to music...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cUbI8ibYZo


I was fortunate enough to see the New World School of Arts High School Choir perform  it last night...the music led me to the poetry and Ms. Teasdale will make an appearance in my next poem...

On August 8, 1884, Sara Trevor Teasdale was born in St. Louis, Missouri, into an old, established, and devout family. She was home-schooled until she was nine and traveled frequently to Chicago, where she became part of the circle surrounding Poetry magazine and Harriet Monroe. Teasdale published Sonnets to Duse, and Other Poems, her first volume of verse, in 1907. Her second collection, Helen of Troy, and Other Poems, followed in 1911, and her third, Rivers to the Sea, in 1915.

In 1914 Teasdale married Ernst Filsinger; she had previously rejected a number of other suitors, including Vachel Lindsay. She moved with her new husband to New York City in 1916. In 1918, she won the Columbia University Poetry Society Prize (which became the Pulitzer Prize for poetry) and the Poetry Society of America Prize for Love Songs, which had appeared in 1917. She published three more volumes of poetry during her lifetime: Flame and Shadow (1920), Dark of the Moon (1926), and Stars To-night (1930). Teasdale’s work had always been characterized by its simplicity and clarity, her use of classical forms, and her passionate and romantic subject matter. These later books trace her growing finesse and poetic subtlety. She divorced in 1929 and lived the rest of her life as a semi-invalid. Weakened after a difficult bout with pneumonia, Teasdale committed suicide on January 29, 1933, with an overdose of barbiturates. Her final collection, Strange Victory appeared posthumously that same year.
"Teej" Julie Teasdale  aka MasikaniCrocodile aka Crocodile of Happiness has taken her life after suffering from bipolar disorder. She was 27. She's home with Jesus now, God I miss her.

All her HP family are invited to the service Sunday night at 1897 Little Snowbird RD Robbinsville NC 28771. I would love to give and receive hugs from any of you who were touched by her poetry. Trust me, she was the most beautiful, kind, sincere, meek person you could ever know. She was my best friend since the day I was born and my heart is shredded on my knees crying Lord, Lord.
You can see pics and get some more of her writing at her facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/teejs?fref=ts

-Robbie Teasdale
"Teej" Julie Teasdale  aka MasikaniCrocodile aka Crocodile of Happiness has taken her life after suffering from bipolar disorder. She was 27. She's home with Jesus now, God I miss her.

All her HP family are invited to the service Sunday night at 1897 Little Snowbird RD Robbinsville NC 28771. I would love to give and receive hugs from any of you who were touched by her poetry. Trust me, she was the most beautiful, kind, sincere, meek person you could ever know. She was my best friend since the day I was born and my heart is shredded on my knees crying Lord, Lord.
You can see pics and get some more of her writing at her facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/teejs?fref=ts

-Robbie Teasdale
WHEN I am dead and over me bright April

Shakes out her rain-drenched hair,
Tho' you should lean above me broken-hearted,
I shall not care.
I shall have peace, as leafy trees are peaceful

When rain bends down the bough,
And I shall be more silent and cold-hearted
Than you are now.
Charles Barnett Feb 2011
I can't always let it be
forgotten like a flower is
forgotten. Withering in a
vase on a kitchen table
next to the finest china
and silverware.
A Response Poem to "Let it be Forgotten" by Sara Teasdale
Did you never know -- how much you loved me,
that night, with those prone rolling hazes
around us -- the ones entrapped in such dim,
salubrious air? Your charms, your smiles, and your
reddening cheeks -- all are the ones that flocked into
my mind. I was enthralled, I was flattered!
But you were too pure and fresh-hearted, I admit,
untouched like the faint showering rain; and its gay entourage
as though in a singular dream in the moonlight
-- but frowning again, again, and all over its wings
at the alarming torch of the morning sun.
Full of hesitation was your soul, and affirmative instinct --
but unsullied as my own unripe grace, and eloquent
seriousness -- you were but too pure, too pure to know.

Fate is a wind, and when the snow did fall again
I could not help but smiling at that memory --
with just a shaded tint of plain curiosity!
Memory of you -- so precious; and duly monstrous
amidst those roaring vapours, and gales -- of the sky.
It’s our secret, you know; but as I gazed into you again
in this serene morning walk --
I suddenly knew what it means -- my dear, my dear.
Nat Lipstadt Mar 2015
Aye Aye
(Poetry is the Adhesive of Our Lives)

6:33 am

for Joe*


once again,
in a strange bed,
in a strange city,
left a cold snowed city climate
debtor-in-possession,
owner of a carryover question
of yours,
what was a
winter prior posing,
is now a plane plain ride over
have coming with me
awaking,
by a sun provoking,
the answer,
now strange composing
in a visually warm city where
beautiful tanned bodies
are mined in beach sand

and
this,
my answer,
it too,
mine,
it too
being mined,
subconsciously working, coming,
f o r m I n g
in my always busy,
overthinking,
daily nighttime shift of
repositioning from a
dark night ended reposing,
into a
sunny day answer deposing

t'is a tricky one,
when one poet asks another
straight out,
after the the fashion of the day,

of my poetry,
whattaya think,
whattaya know...

about
my very own
words,
this communal place,
HP,
an open bed,
where we lie down with strangers,
where we lay down our words,
wake up lovers,
or worse,
ignored,
wake up encouraged,
(can one make hallelujah a verb?)
or refuted,
disputed by
the either/or
ignorant silence of the masses,
of what's truly good,
or sunk
under reedy rushes of swamping
despair,
at the ignorant adulation of the
endless trite, puerile

not one
for shooting from the
hip,
on a subject so
delicate,
that my paused,
slow mo response,
to you,
of course,
misunderstood,
as a red badge of no courage,
a refusal to answer
in this demanding age of
virtual, instantaneous any and every
stray dog thought

multiple shades of a Miami sunrise,
burnt oranges and Van Gogh blues,
frosted strawberry internal pink toppings,
whitish cream cappuccino streaks,
makes one wonder about the
creative design team that brought us the
universe and this all over
sunrise,
all natural, organic visual breakfast
that comes to remind me that
your answer,
you...

for all of us,
in our lives
there is always poetry infused,
there for the seeing,
and
for some,
even
adhering to our
private places

for you, Joe,
there is always poetry,

in this work,
is the continuous process,
self-recreating,
and this sir,
aye, aye, sir,
this one writ,
hopefully a satisfactory answer,
perhaps...
one of resolution,
of adhesion,
silicon bonded

for such is the nature of
this particular Joe,
an inquiring soul,
a nurtured one,
another poetry-partial-birth
child of mine,
born on-line

so,
requiring special handling when
creating, crafting,
******* lines of my presumptuous presumptive
"expertise"
in all matters that
our emotional heart
is the make-up-the-rules-as-you-go
rulemaker

thus,
peril,
fraught, and
simplistic excessive
frugality of word/feelings,
dangerous and inappropriate...

I loke (love + like)^
your poetry fine
the slow revolution of the screws
of growth so readily apparent...

But,
always,
a but,
my demands upon you,
so great,
the expectations of expectations,
greater for you than I dare share,
only since your quest
is my bequest
so shockingly that you dare
directly request

herein,
asked and answer attempted,
yet the risks are I lighthouse beacon
angle too high,
becoming too troublesome,
an Excedrin headache

You don't see,
You don't comprehend,
the way I do,
how far you have come,
your train,
upon which
I am a windowed, winnowed,
passenger,
a pseudo parent
in Loco (crazed) HP Parentis

so it breaks my heaVy heart,
that I want burdensome you better,
so much better...

Oh Toolmaker!
from your
as of yet
swelling unrealized
r e a l
blood sweat and
tears

I want to be forced
by you
to shed my own
tears,
gasp, intake my own
bloodied breath,
sweat when reading yours...
hopelessly selfish,
wholly unsatisfied...

I want
your refreshed wit  born in
Whitman
winters

tales of your Connecticut icy hot
Frost
should lay me low by new poems as good as
Lowell's

tease me, seek me
let me beg,
make me yours,
like Sara Teasdale's
"I Am Not
Yours"

I will you!
will you be,
recreate anew
William Carlos Williams

make me gnash my teeth
when you limerick like my first hero
Ogden Nash

moor my heart like
Marianne Moore

be a new American Master
of this awesome trade,
accepting of this modest tirade,
make new tools still invisible
that will become
more powerful than
any man's hand
can mechanical design...

most of all force me to
reside inside your adoms
locked in my soul's firmament,
until you have fashioned me
into
an obedient tool,
forcing me,
to weep my own
r e a l
blood sweat and
tears
that your words
backhoe excavate
from their hidden places

be mine own
GI Joe
poet~hero

hopefully,
this answers your question,
what I think
of your poetry voyage
to levels of heaven
you are yet
unacquainted

looking forward to an
aspiring spring,
a robust salute of
Aye, Aye,

for I  have fixed the spot in the sky
with the adhesive will keep your star aloft
tween you
and the rest of us
plodders

but now be bounded to lift
us to
unbounded highs
on the wings of the highest
expectations*

of all of us who
admire your journey so...
will not e v e r be satisfied,
until
you exceed,
you succeed,
until
we are such
so sated, so satisfied...
that we see the music,
dance to the words,
in places where the silence
of listening
is the greyest gift
one can give...
^Loke - courtesy of Joel Frye

Of course, I  just happened to hear Christine Ebersole sing this tonight...

It seems like happiness is just a thing called Joe
He's got a smile that makes the lilacs want to grow
He's got a way that makes the angels heave a sigh
When they know, little Joe's passin' by

Sometimes the cabin's gloomy and the table's bare
But then he'll kiss me and it's Christmas everywhere
Trouble's fly away and life is easy go
Does he love me good, that's all I need to know

Seems like happiness is just a thing called Joe

Sometimes the cabin's gloomy and the table's bare
But then he'll kiss me and it's Christmas everywhere
Trouble's fly away and life is easy go
Does he love me good, that's all I need to know

Seems like happiness is just a thing called Joe

Little Joe, my little Joe, little Joe
Dear Colette,
I want to write to you
about being a woman
for that is what you write to me.

I want to tell you how your face
enduring after thirty, forty, fifty. . .
hangs above my desk
like my own muse.

I want to tell you how your hands
reach out from your books
& seize my heart.

I want to tell you how your hair
electrifies my thoughts
like my own halo.

I want to tell you how your eyes
penetrate my fear
& make it melt.

I want to tell you
simply that I love you--
though you are "dead"
& I am still "alive."

Suicides & spinsters--
all our kind!

Even decorous Jane Austen
never marrying,
& Sappho leaping,
& Sylvia in the oven,
& Anna Wickham, Tsvetaeva, Sara Teasdale,
& pale Virginia floating like Ophelia,
& Emily alone, alone, alone. . . .

But you endure & marry,
go on writing,
lose a husband, gain a husband,
go on writing,
sing & tap dance
& you go on writing,
have a child & still
you go on writing,
love a woman, love a man
& go on writing.
You endure your writing
& your life.

Dear Colette,
I only want to thank you:

for your eyes ringed
with bluest paint like bruises,
for your hair gathering sparks
like brush fire,
for your hands which never willingly
let go,
for your years, your child, your lovers,
all your books. . . .

Dear Colette,
you hold me
to this life.
I am free, I will shout from rooftops,
I will dance on the clouds in the sky,
I hop, I skip, I twirl about,
“Now at last I can die!”

I leap onto stars in graceful flight,
I now have tiny, little lights to give,
I bathe in sun on warm summer days,
“Now at last I can live!”
wes parham Nov 2017
Slow is her progress and high is her climb,
It's measured in arcs that trace my night sky.
I spoke and she answered, but only in rhyme,
Across space and time, the poetess and I.

In my dream we met, and she told me she'd written,
Something dear to her kind heart- a poetic creation.
For Sara herself, I was utterly smitten,
And I urged her to share it, with awkward elation.

I rambled then, foolish, and shy to be near,
Since her words had already reached me before.
In a future that’s past yet, paradoxically, here,
And knowing, not knowing, just what was in store.

“There's a poem that you wrote...”, I had started to say,
“In the Bradbury story, I think that's the one”,
“There's an automated house that's going through it's day...”,
“It recites your piece aloud...?  but the people have all gone...?”

“ ‘There will come soft rains’,dear friend”, her reply,
And her smile said, “thank you.  I'm glad you recall”,
But this one is shorter”, and her voice was a sigh,
It’s a different theme, but encompasses all”.

Then, as you'd expect, in the midst of a dreaming,
She opened her notebook and the next thing I knew,
Four lines of writing appeared, only seeming,
To arrange themselves magical, universal and true.

——————————————————
"Moon's  Ending"  by Sara Teasdale

Moon, worn thin to the width of a quill,
In the dawn clouds flying,
How good to go, light into light, and still
Giving light, dying.

——————————————————

Every step of our lives, we are walking the line,
Fail or succeed, illuminated in the trying,
The moon is just as bright when she's on the decline,
Our light, consolation to the living or dying.

Thank you, poets. You gave everything that you could,
When you’d make something holy from the simplest spark.
Thank you, friend, for understanding. I had hoped that you would.
Thank you, Sara, for writing the light and the dark.
https://soundcloud.com/flowermouth/moons-ending-with-wes-parham

This is for another collaboration with a composer in the Netherlands, Dennis Ramler.   He wrote a composition inspired by a poem that he loves called "Moon's Ending" by Sara Teasdale and asked if I could write something to mix in.  This is what I came up with.    I'll post a soundcloud link once Dennis has mixed and mastered his track.   The idea was a dream-memory in which the speaker meets Sara just as she has written "Moon's Ending" and entreats her to share it.  They ramble awkwardly about another poem of hers that was used in a short story by Ray Bradbury.  The poem is followed by, basically, a paraphrasing of how I interpret "Moon's Ending" and the final stanza is gratitude for poetry, poets, friendship, understanding, and for Sara who wrote so lyrically about beauty, love, life, and death, each in equal measure of respect and gratitude.
What do I owe to you
Who loved me deep and long?
You never gave my spirit wings
Nor gave my heart a song.
But oh, to him I loved,
Who loved me not at all,
I owe the open gate
That leads through heaven’s wall!
(By Sara Teasdale)

እዳ

በደንብ ጠበቅ አድርገህ ላፈቀርከኝ
የምከፍለው ምን ወሮታ አለኝ?
ለነፍሴ ክንፍ አለገስካት
ለልቤም መዝሙር አልሰጠሃት፣
ግን፣ ውይ፣ ለወደድኩት ላላፈቀረኝ፣
ዕዳ አለብኝ፣ በሩን ያለው ከፈት፣
በግድግዳወ አርጎ ሠተት
የሚያዘልቅ ወደ ገነት!

(ሳራ ቲሰዳል) /
Sometimes ladies act this way!I think Sara who sadly committed a suicide was a bit rebellious.Goggle and read about her life!
SøułSurvivør Mar 2014
Look closely at your dots and periods.
You'll see this...

. Bob Dylan .
. William Shakespeare .
. Maya Angelou . Emily Dickinson .
. Ralph Waldo Emerson . Robert Frost . Ai .
. Max Eastman . Thomas Hardy . William Blake .
. Edgar Allan Poe . Pablo Neruda . James Joyce . Ovid .
. Carl Sandberg . Anne Sexton . Taigu Ryokan . Sappho .
. Ogden Nash . Dorothy Parker . JD Salinger . Rumi .
. Dame Edith Sitwell . Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly .
. Anna Swir . Sara Teasdale . JRR Tolkien .
. Alfred Lord Tennyson . John Skelton .
. Dante Gabriel Rossetti .
. Dylan Thomas .



Soul Survivor
2014
The poets in my "dot" were chosen
at random, to fit the design.
Reading an anthology of
Classic poems
On quiet a night
With wings of
Enlightenment and delight
My soul took flight
To far-off lands bright
Rife with musical poems
Some brain racking,
While some savory but light.

When I saw celebrated poets
From my dream plane
I decided to alight
So that the messages
Encoded on their poems,
To me they further explain.
Cognizant that
Hearing things from
The horse’s mouth
Like Antarctica
Will not make things
As far south.

I saw Helen Steiner Rice
Reading whose works
Like  ‘Christmas Guest’
Is nice.
When she me behold
This to me she told
“Till your corporeal being’s
Turn come to be a sod
Never desist to
Put your hope in God,
Who foresees and shapes
That will unfold.
Always dwell
In the vineyard of
The Lord. ”
Drew close James Stephens
With Helen
You are right nod.
“Chap, if you look around
You will behold
On everything
The hallmark of
Creation stamped by God!
Also excellent, from
The ordinary extra,
Your will hear
Nature’s God praising
Orchestra! ”
Willian Henery Davis
Courteously came by
To say <<Hi!>>.
“Be content with
What you have
You will be happy
When that you learn to love.
See you not why
The example set
By the butterfly,
On a rough rock
That sleeps content
Without a blanket! ”

Soon I met
Enda St. Vincent Millay
Whose fame
Surfing the tide of time
To date that does resonate.
“As the saying goes
‘The world is lovely
And the loveliest is enough!’
To be happy
Try to nurture the culture
Of admiring nature.
Waste not time
Go to the mountain
The secret of happiness
To you it will explain.”

After seconds walk
William Ernest Henely
Approached me for a hard talk
“When beset by challenges
Never give in
That is a great sin!
As for me, whenever
I fall
Soon I get up as the
Captain of my soul.
Though in the darkness
God seems far,
For the downhearted
He is a lodestar.”
I saw Elenor Frajeon
By a roadside
With a book in her hand.
“Love to books
Is a launching pad
To a wonderland,
Where readers meet authors
Of different brand
Hence, a window to their
Soul they will stand.
Also read my poem
That draws attention
To mother-to-child affection
That defies description.”

I met anon
Austin Dobson
“A rose
To itself
A question
Opted to pose.
‘I wonder why
This hoary-headed
Gardner refuses to die?’
But soon
A wind blew up
Its sun-withered
Petals to the sky.
The analogy teach
On the timeline
Brief, beauty to a grind
Will screech.

Patted me on the back
My son,
Ben Johnson
“Like a Lele
Being short and brief
Could render life
Ease and relief! ”

Sat on a rock
Samuel  Taylor Coleridge
To me a secret he broke.
With bitter smile
Waving his
Pen as a tool,
“Those who think
A poet is a fool
They will realize
Who is rather the fool
If they think with
A head cool!”
I saw Walter De la Mare
Exactly the way towards
Old Susan he used to stare.
“Susan taken away by
A romantic fiction
Past midnight
Sat on chair
Engrossed in a monologue
‘Breeching
Culture rules
Is not fair! ’
After
One’s age
Did advance
Reading fiction
One stands
For reliving
The past
A chance.  ”

Soon, came William Blake
Me to the graveyard
To take
Pointing to
A headstone
“Now, my enemy,
Object of my anger,
Is dead.
Subject to a
Conscious pang
It is divested of a soft pillow
I go to bed!
You must not yourself find
An axe to grind
Otherwise, to a reason
You will become blind.”
For supper
Volunteered to be
My host
Robert Frost.
He stressed
“To settle
Punitive price
As lethal
As fire is ice!”
Came an invited guest
Edmund Spencer
To tell us
The mystery
That put
His phlegmatic dream object
And he, her
Ardent lover, asunder.
“When fire and ice
Are locked in a love’s dorm
Out of the norm,
One may not change
The other’s form! ”
Via the window,
I saw a graveyard
Past the meadow.
When my eye caught sight
Of Julia Caroline
I took steps
To sit by her side
The meaning of eternal love
To understand.

“A kiss on the lips
From a lover
Is a keepsake stamp
That transcends
An earthly map.”

There in the graveyard
I met Sara Teasdale
“Like a low hanging ripe fruit
In the gray time
When a lass
Is off guard
To ****** her
A chance a lad
May stand.
Also from affection
For conjugal felicity
Many a lass
Could give added attention.”
I posed
Why should you show bent
To profanity?
“My friend
A *** could not be taken naughty
For expressing man’s sexuality!
For the answer try to meet
                Anne Bradstreet.”

Before I asked
Her why she
Committed a suicide
She got clear
From my side.

Anne Bradstreet
I met
“It is tragic
To have at home
A child with
A down syndrome!

What lurks
In the subconscious
Of an author or a poet
Through his/her pen
S/he may seek an outlet
So to date,
Regretting
“Why did I
Write this a taboo-seen
Thing!”
Seems some author’s fate.


I saw Thomas Hood
Amidst his harvest
That fares good
He told me
“From a perfumed
And well attired lady
Who belongs
To the top brass,
It is by far better
To tie a knot
With a provincial lass,
In her hair
With a fresh flower
Plucked out of the grass
She shines bright
Bathed by sunlight!”

Out on the street again
I met Lithuanian Salomejia Neris
I became happy
As I never wanted her to miss.

I asked her
About the heard-renting fate
She, her father, her mother, siblings
Neighbors and her age mate
Underwent.
“During the  World War II
Children, who
Otherwise were
Considered
Unfit for themselves
To fend,
Were forced
The brutal ****
To defend!”
Soon I met
Richard Lovelace
And John Scott
Locked in an argument hot.
The former
“I want to head to the front
It is a source of pride
To fight on
Nation’s side.”
The latter
“Paying a price grand
I cannot understand!”

Edwin Arlington Robison came
To tell me the story
About Richard Cory
“Measure not
Your life by
The success of your object
Of admiration,
The one a role- model
You hold or held,
I am afraid
Off guard
He can lodge
A bullet in
His head.”


I saw William Butler Yeats
, an Irish poet
Who raised an issue hot.
“How an
Angel helped out
A tired priest
A snap who
Could not resist
While a laity
In his parish
Was Ceasing to exist.”
Robert Herrick approached
Me this to speak
“I am smote
By grief,
To see a Daffodil,
Like human beings ,is brief.”

Said Emily Dickinson
“It is when you ere to hit
A target heart felt
You’ll understand
The meaning of
Having something desired
Under your belt.”
At last
I saw
Edgar Allan Poe
To make this to me
He made haste.
Though a pauper
“From my soul mate
No earthly or heavenly power
Is capable to asunder me
Top date.
After reading this much
I realized why
Poets never die”//////
Give me a feedback on this poem about  famous poets  and the themes of their poems.Google and read about their history and read some of their poems.I have trans
Though monetary wise,
It doesn't promise to pay
I craft poems everyday,
For instance say

'Why my dream object,
To affections mine
Is adamant to reciprocate!'

The other way round,
Though to acquaintances
Absurd, it may sound,
Some, I have to spend
My poems to newspapers
Magazines and
Websites to send!

For love of the labour,
I will never
Letup the endeavour!

There is a
Great deal of satisfaction
From sitting hours,
To put words into action,
Racking brain
And stretching imagination,
From the earth's core and crust
To the sky and firmament!

At night, when all is quiet,
Till I hit the nail
Right on the head,
I will not repair to bed!

Reading poems
Has satisfaction
No less, for it affords,
Handshakes,with poets
Of all ages,
Poets with poems
Of all colour shades.

Probably the works
Of Shakespeare
That we hold dear!
What is more,Tagore.
In my duties
I will be remiss,
If I forget  mention
Savo,Anna Akmatova,
Sara Teasdale
And Salomeja Neris.

Till getting a cherished corner
www.Allpoetry.com
www.poetrypoems.com
www.poemhunters.com
­www.hellopoetry.com
www.writeoutloud.com
www.novelcollective.com
­Ecstatic I was never!
Now I peruse the websites
Of contemporary poets,
Displaying poetical prowess!

I want to add of course
An east African voice!

Out, a poem to digest
One could make a descent
Into wisdom's pit,
So poem virgins
Why don't you go for it?

From my experience,
For uplifting poems
'Start with Helen Steiner Rice!'
It is my advice.

'It is by the brow of one's sweat
One could paint
The future with
A rosy pink,
Don't you think?

Sitting idle,
Dreaming a rose-bed
Is quite absurd!'

Reversing such mind set
Go for targets set!
First I was wondering how poets come up with astounding poems.

Then I was daydreaming of becoming a poet by some miracle.

Through reading poems, learning poetry and trying my hands on crafting poems, paying every sacrifice, now I have a book bearing a collection of poems some admire.

Not only mental exertion to be a poet one has also to out lay some probably from a modest income.
~
March 2024
HP Poet: Caroline Shank
Age: 77
Country: USA


Question 1: A warm welcome to the HP Spotlight, Caroline. Please tell us about your background?

Caroline Shank: "I am 77 and I live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. When I worked for Barnes and Nobel for ten years, customers asked me frequently for suggestions. I believe 'The Alexandria Quartet' by Lawrence Durrell is a serious contender for best prose fiction which has been written. Also 'The English Patient' by Michael Ondaatje is such a teaching tool on how to write the greatest novel ever written. I digress."


Question 2: How long have you been writing poetry, and for how long have you been a member of Hello Poetry?

Caroline Shank: "I have been writing poetry since the adolescent striving of the very lonely. I am not sure how long I have been posting to Hello Poetry. At least 3 years, or maybe 5?"


Question 3: What inspires you? (In other words, how does poetry happen for you).

Caroline Shank: "The unusual image will send me running for pen and paper. Usually what inspires the senses: a wind, an odor or perfume. I still remember my love affair with Chloe perfume. And! English Leather! Those were the days. Great sadness or anger will send me to my laptop but those poems do not usually survive."


Question 4: What does poetry mean to you?

Caroline Shank: "Poetry means that I have a place in a wonderful place. Once in awhile."


Question 5: Who are your favorite poets?

Caroline Shank: "My favorite poet's are: T. S. Eliot, Rainer Maria Rilke (the Stephen Mitchell translations), E. E. Cummings. I am a fan of Sara Teasdale's, her From the Sea is amazing. I save Shakespeare for the best nuggets ever. Anna Peters, her “I Am Not a Gentle Person” is a tour'd if ever. I love the poetry that is a much needed relief from The Civil War. Especially Lorena. I guess that's a song. Only one poem of Ezra Pound's, The Metro. It is a graduate course in image exploration."


Question 6: What other interests do you have?

Caroline Shank: "I used to be a huge consumer of books. I read all the time. I find that at my age I can't keep reading without finding something else to do."


Carlo C. Gomez: “We wish to thank you for giving us this opportunity to get to know the person behind the poet, Caroline! We are honored to add you to this series!”

Caroline Shank: "Thank you, Carlo! I am very grateful for all the encouragement you have given me."



Thank you everyone here at HP for taking the time to read this. We hope you enjoyed coming to know Caroline a little bit better. I surely did. It is our wish that these spotlights are helping everyone to further discover and appreciate their fellow poets. – Carlo C. Gomez

We will post Spotlight #14 in April!

~
Trevon Haywood Nov 2015
WHEN I am dead and over me and bright April
Shakes out her rain-drenched hair,
Tho' you should lean above me broken-hearted,
I shall not care.
I shall have peace, as leafy trees are peaceful.
When rain bends down the bough,
And I shall be more silent and cold-hearted
Than you are now.

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)
Though monetary wise,
It doesn't promise to pay
I craft poems everyday,
For instance say

'Why my dream object,
To affections mine
Is adamant to reciprocate!'

The other way round,
Though to acquaintances
Absurd, it may sound,
Some, I have to spend
My poems to newspapers
Magazines and
Websites to send!

For love of the labor,
I will never
Letup the endeavor!

There is a
Great deal of satisfaction
From sitting hours,
To put words into action,
Racking brain
And stretching imagination,
From the earth's core and crust
To the sky and firmament!

At night, when all is quiet,
Till I hit the nail
Right on the head,
I will not repair to bed!

Reading poems
Has satisfaction
No less, for it affords,
Handshakes,with poets
Of all ages,
Poets with poems
Of all color shades.

Probably the works
Of Shakespeare
That we hold dear!
What is more,Tagore.
In my duties
I will be remiss,
If I forget  mention
Savo,Anna Akmatova,
Sara Teasdale
And Salomeja Neris.

Till getting a cherished corner
www.hellopoetry.com
www.allpoery.com
www.writeoutloud.com
­www.novelcollective.com
www.poemhunter.com
www.poetrypoems.com
Ec­static I was never!
Now I peruse the websites
Of contemporary poets,
Displaying poetical prowess!

I want to add of course
An east African voice!

Out, a poem to digest
One could make a descent
Into wisdom's pit,
So poem virgins
Why don't you go for it?

From my experience,
For uplifting poems
'Start with Helen Steiner Rice!'
It is my advice.
I write for love of the lobar without any return fighting against all odds
Trevon Haywood Mar 2016
They sent you in to say farewell to me,
No, do not shake your head; I see your eyes
That shine with tears. Sappho, you saw the sun
Just now when you came hither, and again,
When you have left me, all the shimmering
Great meadows will laugh lightly, and the sun
Put round about you warm invisible arms
As might a lover, decking you with light.
I go toward darkness tho' I lie so still.
If I could see the sun, I should look up
And drink the light until my eyes were blind;
I should kneel down and kiss the blades of grass,
And I should call the birds with such a voice,
With such a longing, tremulous and keen,
That they would fly to me and on the breast
Bear evermore to tree-tops and to fields
The kiss I gave them. Sappho, tell me this,
Was I not sometimes fair? My eyes, my mouth,
My hair that loved the wind, were they not worth
The breath of love upon them? Yet he passed,
And he will pass to-night when all the air
Is blue with twilight; but I shall not see.
I shall have gone forever. Hold my hands,
Hold fast that Death may never come between;
Swear by the gods you will not let me go;
Make songs for Death as you would sing to Love --
But you will not assuage him. He alone
Of all the gods will take no gifts from men.
I am afraid, afraid.

Sappho, lean down.
Last night the fever gave a dream to me,
It takes my life and gives a little dream.
I thought I saw him stand, the man I love,
Here in my quiet chamber, with his eyes
Fixed on me as I entered, while he drew
Silently toward me -- he who night by night
Goes by my door without a thought of me --
Neared me and put his hand behind my head,
And leaning toward me, kissed me on the mouth.
That was a little dream for Death to give,
Too short to take the whole of life for, yet
I woke with lips made quiet by a kiss.
The dream is worth the dying. Do not smile
So sadly on me with your shining eyes,
You who can set your sorrow to a song
And ease your hurt by singing. But to me
My songs are less than sea-sand that the wind
Drives stinging over me and bears away.
I have no care what place the grains may fall,
Nor of my songs, if Time shall blow them back,
As land-wind breaks the lines of dying foam
Along the bright wet beaches, scattering
The flakes once more against the laboring sea,
Into oblivion. What care have I
To please Apollo since Love hearkens not?
Your words will live forever, men will say
"She was the perfect lover" -- I shall die,
I loved too much to live. Go Sappho, go --
I hate your hands that beat so full of life,
Go, lest my hatred hurt you. I shall die,
But you will live to love and love again.
He might have loved some other spring than this;
I should have kept my life -- I let it go.
He would not love me now tho' Cypris bound
Her girdle round me. I am Death's, not Love's.
Go from me, Sappho, back to find the sun.

I am alone, alone. O Cyprian...

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933). 3/23/2016.
oh my stars May 2015
I wonder why poets are sad.
Is poetry salvation from misery?
Or is everyone sad?
And maybe we only notice it in the people who write:
Sylvia Plath.
Virginia Woolf.
Charlotte Mew.
So many.
Is poetry just cathartic?
Do people not write about happiness because it has no effect?
Or are they afraid of happiness?
Sara Teasdale.
Anne Sexton.
Richard Brautigan.
Why so many?
Does writing poetry cause sadness?
Because one must reflect on misery to create emotive poems?
Or do sad people write poetry as a form of release?
Humans are addicted to sadness-
Are poets more so?
Are poets the most emotionally intelligent of humanity?
Or are they merely able to describe them?

Us readers feed off the misery of them.
Our creative fuel originates from the pain of poets.

I wonder why poets are sad.
The link between sadness and poetry has always been obvious and yet unclear. So many poets have taken their own lives- there must be a reason? Do sad people write poetry? Or does poetry create sad people?
What do I owe to you
Who loved me deep and long?
You never gave my spirit wings
Nor gave my heart a song.
But oh, to him I loved,
Who loved me not at all,
I owe the open gate
That leads through heaven’s wall!
(By Sara Teasdale)

እዳ

በደንብ ጠበቅ አድርገህ ላፈቀርከኝ
የምከፍለው ምን ወሮታ አለኝ?
ለነፍሴ ክንፍ አለገስካት
ለልቤም መዝሙር አልሰጠሃት፣
ግን፣ ውይ፣ ለወደድኩት ላላፈቀረኝ፣
ዕዳ አለብኝ፣ በሩን ያለው ከፈት፣
በግድግዳወ አርጎ ሠተት
የሚያዘልቅ ወደ ገነት!
Compare this poem with my  latest poem Enigma
Trevon Haywood Mar 2016
I thought I had forgotten,
But it all came back again
To-night with the first spring thunder
In a rush of rain.

I remembered a darkened doorway
Where we stood while the storm swept by,
Thunder gripping the earth
And lightning scrawled on the sky.

The passing motor busses swayed,
For the street was a river of rain,
Lashed into little golden waves
In the lamp light's stain.

With the wild spring rain and thunder
My heart was wild and gay;
Your eyes said more to me that night
Than your lips would ever say. . . .

I thought I had forgotten,
But it all came back again
To-night with the first spring thunder
In a rush of rain.
☔⚡

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933). 3/22/2016.
Trevon Haywood Apr 2016
If I could have your arms tonight-
But half the world and the broken sea
Lie between you and me.

The autumn rain reverberates in the courtyard,
Beating all night against the barren stone,
The sound of useless rain in the desolate courtyard
Makes me more alone.

If you were here, if you were only here-
My blood cries out to you all night in vain
As sleepless as the rain.

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933). 4/26/2016.
Trevon Haywood Mar 2016
I lift my heart as spring lifts up
A yellow daisy to the rain;
My heart will be a lovely cup
Altho' it holds but pain.

For I shall learn from flower and leaf
That color every drop they hold,
To change the lifeless wine of grief
To living gold.

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933). 3/23/2016.
Trevon Haywood Mar 2016
No one worth possessing
Can be quite possessed;
Lay that on your heart,
My young angry dear;
This truth, this hard and precious stone,
Lay it on your hot cheek,
Let it hide your tear.
Hold it like a crystal
When you are alone
And gaze in the depths of the icy stone.
Long, look long and you will be blessed:
No one worth possessing
Can be quite possessed.

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933). 3/22/2016.
Caroline Shank Aug 2022
The soliloquies
born of tears,
spoke of Loneliness.
The Plays the Thing.
The Long and Winding Road.  

Hamlet was not crazy,
as some think,

he was alone.

Lady Macbeth scraped blood
from her hands in a
castle of lonely rooms.

McCullers loneliness
was a companion.  

Teasdale wrote of the sea's
lonely foam.

Lear,  alone,  held Cordelia
to the
cold and empty sky.

I know Alone.   It is a wind
just past my skin.   Your hand
on my face is a reflection.   My
skin is uninterrupted by the
conversation of your fingers.

Alone is the road
we travel.  

Evermore.


Caroline Shank
8.16.2022
Matthew Harlovic May 2018
The lights in the room have dimmed and pearled.
She’s in the mood to read some Teasdale.
I ease the ailment then appease her needs.
I open the window to let in a breeze.

© Matthew Harlovic
Fire Fox May 2015
There will come soft rains, and the smell of the ground.
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound.

And frogs in the pools singing at night
And wild-plum trees in tremulous white

Robins will wear their feathery fire
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;

And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.

Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly;

And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone.

-Sara Teasdale
Trevon Haywood Oct 2015
In my heart the old love
Struggled with the new,
It was ghostly waking
All night through
Dear things, kind things
That my old love said,
Ranged themselves reproachfully
Round my bed.
But I could not heed them,
For I seemed to see
Dark eyes of new love
Fixed on me.
Old love, old love
How can I be true?
Shall I be faith less to myself
Or to you?

Sara Teasdale (1884-1933).
I like Sara Teasdale
Nat Lipstadt Apr 2020
”What shall I give you, my lord, my lover?
The gift that breaks the heart in me:
I bid you awake at dawn and discover
I have gone my way and left you free.”


Sara Teasdale - 1884-1933. *The Gift


<>

Oh Sara, freedom comes not by departure,
when you parted away with so many whole bits of me,
this “gift” more marked by what you’ve left,
freedom redefined by achey absence, holes & gaps,
the long division remainders that are missing,
the homeless jigsaw pieces of final solution

one hundred years I’ve worshipped at your altar
of writ words carved in my oaken skin,
this a freedom true & stolid,
your blond letters etched, poems silken, each an earring,
a cascading dangling chandelier pairing in my internals,
alas, you loved me last not as a lord~lover, but as
savior~soldier

what conjuring wooled your eyes, woven disguise fooling
anyone, the dawn breaks, gone is my way by your away,
you are the gift that created my heart, you are the are,
this then return what
you are taken even in love wrapped,
return to me for
you are the gift that I cannot without live

<>
Sara Teasdale was born in St. Louis, Missouri to a wealthy family. As a young woman she traveled to Chicago and grew acquainted with Harriet Monroe and the literary circle around Poetry. Teasdale wrote seven books of poetry in her lifetime and received public admiration for her well-crafted lyrical poetry which centered on a woman’s changing perspectives on beauty, love, and death. Many of Teasdale’s poems chart developments in her own life, from her experiences as a sheltered young woman in St. Louis, to those as a successful yet increasingly uneasy writer in New York City, to a depressed and disillusioned person who would commit suicide in 1933. Although later critics and scholars have marginalized or excluded Teasdale from canons of early 20th century American verse, she was popular in her lifetime with both the public and critics. She won the first Columbia Poetry Prize in 1918, a prize that would later be renamed the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.

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