I like when a poem sort of tells you somehow the speed at which you’re supposed to rush through the poem.
I gotta say, Bones, I’m not a poetry guy but I save probably three poems a week from here to read to my wife when she gets home.
She patiently listens.
I’m so glad to hear! I’m trying really hard to pick poems that really hit you in some kind of way, mostly by modern poets, because I think classical poetry is too erudite for average folks to get into, but these are very accessible.
And tell your wife it’s nice of her to enjoy my poetry choices lol. I’d like to know which ones you have both liked best.
I can’t really say which ones she appreciated more than others. Sometimes it’s just her listening patiently as I read something that impacted me.
For my personal tastes I prefer something that tries to hold to some structure; if it’s just full sentences and paragraphs, for some reason I get annoyed.
I don’t excessively value rhyme scheme, rhythm, or meter, but I appreciate them when they are there.
But I took a look back at what I’ve updated in here before and most of these I would’ve read to my wife:
What I didn’t know before
Feeding the worms
Stop all the clocks
The thing is
Grave-digger
Red tights
The lost hotels of Paris
Hello, I must be going
It’s called maximalism, babe.
Ordinary life
Truant
A haiku for the train
Sincerely the sky
I love this list! Sometimes I post so much I don’t stop and take a good look at what I did post, because basically I have diarrhea of the mouth, so I like knowing what’s hitting people a certain way. Thank you!
I want to add a more erudite note about a book I’ve read part of but not all of, and though I haven’t read any of it in a decade plus I still consider it a book I’m reading: Le Ton Beau de Marot by Douglas Hofstadter.
It’s about the endless translation of ONE poem by a relatively obscure French poet to demonstrate the flexibility of human thought, communication, and written languages depending on the constraints we hold to when translating.
And it’s FUCKING FASCINATING. But I’m also an idiot that can only bounce off the surface of what they’re writing about.
Check it out if you haven’t already, it might be just up your alley.
Ordered a copy! I’m sure it’ll be pretty dense to read but I LOVE the idea.
It’s extremely dense. But in a very good way. It’s one of the only books I’ve ever (kinda) stuck when I’d sometimes have to read a page a few times to understand what it meant.
Amusingly enough my first copy of it was lost in a basement and thoroughly consumed by mold.
I turned to my dad and said “I bet Hofstadter didn’t expect this translation!”
LOL. I will let you know what I think!
“Good to see you. When you leavin?”