Poetry is what broke through not being able to read much of anything some months ago. After months of feeling disconnected, of wanting to experience a deep emotional connection to art and always coming up short and ending up numb, I realized I should follow some advice I'd gotten a long time ago and begin reading poetry. I knew I'd only have to focus on a handful of lines, one page at a time, and each poem would be a singular, intense experience. Maybe a page and a half at most. I could manage my attention and focus on a handful of brief, intense moments of heightened emotion. Not a long narrative. Just a moment to feel something.
It's a method that's worked so well for me, I'm going to pretty much recommend it for everyone.
As expensive hobbies go, I figure commissioning poetry readings beats heroin. Especially since I can share them - and if I forget and leave that by the wayside for a while, it just means I have more to share once I finally get around to it.
In the past few months, I've commissioned the following readings, all from James Marsters:
Slowly I Married Her by Leonard Cohen, whose own reading of it is well worth a listen;
In Shakespeare by James Richardson;
California Winter Poem by Karl Shapiro;
Living at the End of Time by Robert Bly;
Messiah auditions Saturday — local headline October 20, 2006 by Nancy Devine;
Antilamentation by Dorianne Laux;
Meditation at Lagunitas by Robert Hass;
Pilgrimge by Ingrid de Kok.
Some of these I found myself. Some came from poetry collections and compilations, both books and websites. Most of them came from people I know on the internet, acquaintances and friends, making me all the happier I know them.
Meanwhile, another friend of mine commissioned Happiness by Louise Glück, and while her request didn't mention me by name, only that a friend of hers encouraged she commission a poetry reading of her own, my guess is that I've made myself memorable by being a repeat customer with a consistent type of request, and as that request is poetry readings, he made a reasonable guess of his own. And he guessed right.
Which I freely and fully admit has me smiling.
It's a method that's worked so well for me, I'm going to pretty much recommend it for everyone.
As expensive hobbies go, I figure commissioning poetry readings beats heroin. Especially since I can share them - and if I forget and leave that by the wayside for a while, it just means I have more to share once I finally get around to it.
In the past few months, I've commissioned the following readings, all from James Marsters:
Slowly I Married Her by Leonard Cohen, whose own reading of it is well worth a listen;
In Shakespeare by James Richardson;
California Winter Poem by Karl Shapiro;
Living at the End of Time by Robert Bly;
Messiah auditions Saturday — local headline October 20, 2006 by Nancy Devine;
Antilamentation by Dorianne Laux;
Meditation at Lagunitas by Robert Hass;
Pilgrimge by Ingrid de Kok.
Some of these I found myself. Some came from poetry collections and compilations, both books and websites. Most of them came from people I know on the internet, acquaintances and friends, making me all the happier I know them.
Meanwhile, another friend of mine commissioned Happiness by Louise Glück, and while her request didn't mention me by name, only that a friend of hers encouraged she commission a poetry reading of her own, my guess is that I've made myself memorable by being a repeat customer with a consistent type of request, and as that request is poetry readings, he made a reasonable guess of his own. And he guessed right.
Which I freely and fully admit has me smiling.
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