Comments for The Poetry Room

Comment on Shantih Shantih Shantih by rhymingisfun

rhymingisfun — Sat, 02 May 2009 22:42:40 +0000

I was planning on attending this poetry night only to attempt to understand the puzzle book I bought but unfortunately I was ill but I’ll definately be turning up for next months

Nicola

Comment on Shantih Shantih Shantih by tom r

tom r — Fri, 01 May 2009 19:54:44 +0000

Shantih Elioteers
A good night for poetry – even better this May Day that Carol Ann Duffy is poet Laureate -pity the laurels come from the monarchy’s garden. Anyroad – just a comment on the apparent disconnection between Eliot’s later deep, religious (among other things) conservatism and his own (disingenuous?) dismissal of his ‘grumblings’.
My feeling from ‘surrendering to the poem’ (which Eliot suggests a reader has to do before he can absorb it), is that the disgust and the wish for renewal is genuine. He ‘put his lands in order’ by moving towards a backward-facing set of beliefs which seemed to promise to allow the Waste Land to be redeemed if not transformed. Not my idea of progress, but the movement from one position to another surely begins with the experience of writing the poem.
If anyone wants to enter the labyrinth again – sorry if I was less than open to the initial discussion in the group – then the book ‘what the thunder really said’ by Anne C Bolgan, publ. Mcgill-Queen’s Univ. Press 1973, has a wealth of cogent analysis of the voices, content and form of the poem. I am finding it useful.
Again, just an appreciation of the nourishing openness, sensitivity and wisdom of the group, and the sure guiding hands of Anna and Linda
Ciao
Tom
Tom

Comment on The Cruellest Month by tom r

tom r — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 19:46:49 +0000

The ‘no cruelty allowed’ comment had baffled me; then I remembered the first line “April is the etc.” Doh.
Anyway, the ‘York Notes’ on the Waste Land are proving useful to me, but no-one provides a guide to actually pronouncing the Greek. Any classical scholars in ‘the group’ or planning to attend next Tuesday?
Tom

Comment on You could put worse things in your mind by tom r

tom r — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 17:53:03 +0000

Great night with Billy Collins. although i was probably a bit silly to take the ‘Purity’ metaphor as puritanically as I did, I do think that the ‘beat of my own drum’ bit is so true of Collins’ verse that it needs to be taken seriously. Technically, to me, it is precisely the rhythm of each poem, with each oddity of lineage, that is its structure – no rhyme, little conventional scanned beat, so that skeleton really does need to listen very hard to nothing else but its own beat.
Anyroad – next season answers questions I only thought of days after the final Tuesday evening, “how about some of the awkward Mistresses – all genders intended – of the Past, or is it too school-y to ‘do’ them?” And who’s the next Poet Laureate – the Poetry Society is/was looking for members to create nominations of the ‘Post’ – which begs all the political questions, I know, but whatthehell? Interesting question nonetheless.
riotous solstice an’ aw
Tom Richardson

Comment on Well Done Darling! by anna

anna — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 15:10:52 +0000

Hi Elizabeth,

Just to say thanks so much for this lovely message – and to echo your call! To any (potential) newcomers, do please come along – it’s great to hear people’s thoughts on the poems and to share our reading together.

See you on Tuesday!

Comment on Well Done Darling! by Elizabeth

Elizabeth — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 12:12:36 +0000

The meeting about Jackie Kay’s collection, Darling, was great. I have previously read some of Kay’s short stories which are equally accessible but multi-layered and it was good to see her poems following suit. I have already bought the Billy Collins’ collection in anticipation of next week’s meet and there are some great poems in there. For any, poetry beginners out there, please do come along. I’ve never particularly taken to poetry but this group is introducing me to poets I’ve never heard of and as there is only a short selection of poems to read, it means that you aren’t over-faced by having to read a whole volume (although I often read outside the list of poems chosen for the monthly meet). The group is also a great way to hear other people’s thoughts, opinions and takes on what the poem (and the poet) are saying.

Comment on Ideogram for Alice Oswald by linda

linda — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 20:18:45 +0000

Great to see two comments on the last session. Couldn’t resist commenting on the comment. I found The mud-spattered recollections of a woman who lived her life backwards more playful than complaining. It reminded me of the Zen koan encouraging the student to look at her face before her parents were born… Just recently I read that Rudolf Steiner suggested the practice of replaying your day backwards in bed before you go to sleep as a way of processing and integrating your experience. Maybe Alice Oswald had these sorts of ideas in mind. More likely perhaps than just having read a novel by Martin Amis?

Any more thoughts?

Comment on Ideogram for Alice Oswald by JaneB

JaneB — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 22:23:53 +0000

I finally got round to looking up the meaning of “cloops”, the word from “Danaides’ which intrigued. I loved the sound of it in the poem, and now I know the meaning I like it even more.

cloop – the sound of drawing a cork from a bottle

Comment on Ideogram for Alice Oswald by tom r

tom r — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 11:57:17 +0000

As Linda says, a great night – not an easy set of poems, but eventually emotionally and linguistically rewarding, I felt, thanks to the depth of everyones’ comments/reactions.
I wonder if anyone has any comments on the poems we ran out of time for – esp. the ‘carrying a baby’ and the ‘mud-splattered’ poems.
i appreciated the poetic intensity of the glass images in the baby one but felt critical of the metaphor since, however delicate a baby is, it doesn’t have an innate tendency to shatter and, carrying your kid out of the maternity ward after being there while mother and baby go through labour, you know just how physically resiliant they both are.
the ‘time’s arrow’ regress of the ‘mud-splattered’ poem felt almost like a deeply intelligent and powerfully-imagined whinge to me- surely it ain’t all that miserably hard is it? great mysterious resonance at the end though – back to the Big Bang?

Comment on Love-All At The Poetry Room by ahlberg enthusiast

ahlberg enthusiast — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 10:28:04 +0000

Hooked on Haiku

It was fantastic
understanding poetry
as never before

Thank you yet again for sharing your expertise with us all again.
I can’t make the next meeting but am looking forward to Linda’s Poetry Experience in Chesters walled garden.
Hoping for sunshine (1st line of Haiku)
Suzanne