This poem by Wendell Berry perfectly describes the way I feel when I read Wendell Berry, which is apparently the same way Wendell Berry feels when he reads Hayden Carruth.
Who is your Berry, your Carruth? Oh, so many I could name! But that's a list (or possibly a list poem) for another time. For now, enjoy this perfect little piece.
To Hayden Carruth
by Wendell Berry
by Wendell Berry
Dear Hayden, when I read your book I was aching
in head, back, heart, and mind, and aching
with your aches added to my own, and yet for joy
I read on without stopping, made eager
by your true mastery, wit, sorrow, and joy,
each made true by the others. My reading done,
....
(Read the rest here.)
ETA: Here's the list of the poets you've mentioned so far:
Nancy Willard
John O'Donohue
Naomi Shihab Nye
Shakespeare
Emily Dickinson
Mary Oliver
e.e. cummings
Billy Collins
Khalil Gibran
Rumi
J. Patrick Lewis
Joyce Sidman
Jane Kenyon
Irene Latham
Amy Ludwig VanDerwater
Marilyn Singer
Rebecca Kai Dotlich
Ursula K. LeGuin
Denise Levertov
Margaret Atwood
Ted Kooser
Ada Limon
Robert Frost
Janet Wong
Paul Janezcko
Gerard Manley Hopkins and
Ross Gay
Aimee Nezhukumatathil
Jubi Arriola-Headley
Patricia Smith
~~~~~~~~~~
Mr. Linky is rounding up this week's contributions for us.
Drop your link, visit your friends, and share your "mastery, wit, sorrow, and joy,
each made true by the others."
Happy Poetry Friday!
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.
24 comments:
What a gem! Thanks, Karen. Gosh - for me, anything by Nancy Willard. And, as you say, so many others! Many thanks for rounding us up this week with your usual thoughtful, generous spirit! :0)
Love this poem!! Berry is my Berry, but also how about John O'Donohue? Naomi Shihab Nye, Shakespeare. Even dead, still beginning.
Thank you, of course, for hosting!! xoxo
Hi Karen, Yes what a treasure of a poem, and wonderful distraction for our times. Any poem by Emily Dickinson, Mary Oliver, and so many more… Thanks for hosting us today!
I love the line: I greet you at the beginning, for we are
either beginning or we are dead. Wow! I would have to go with Naomi Shihab Nye, though I also love seeing diverse perspectives in anthologies. Thank you for hosting, Karen!
Oh, that's lovely. "I greet you in the beginning." What a great poem for a PF host. Thank you.
Wow, great poem (new to me)! Add me to the "greet you in the beginning" admirers. :) Love Berry . . . also Nye, Cummings, Dickinson. Thanks for hosting this week. xo
An ode to a fellow poet by Wendell Berry, delivers a pertinent message regarding the power of words to engage the reader, to beguile the senses. Thank for this provokcation, Karen. I suspect my list of artists and writers who deliver me an instant shot of joy would include, poets, songwriters, and novelists, for I am truly inspired by the treasure left for me by myriad others. Thanks again for this post and for hosting this week.
Interestingly, I find Berry's work much more enjoyable and accessible than Carruth's, and was surprised that Carruth had such an influence on Berry's work. Thanks for sharing and for hosting!
Thanks for hosting and for sharing such a beautiful poem. Like you I have so many favorites including Mary Oliver and Billy Collins. Love being introduced to new poets, too.
Love these "beginning" thoughts so much! Berry is definitely on my list, which is long and rich with names but pretty much always begins with Khalil Gibran and Rumi. Love me some mystics! xo
Thanks for hosting, Karen, and for the question. I find I run hot and cold with most poets--my strongest reactions are to individual poems more than a poet's body of work. For every poet I love, they have poems that also do nothing for me! :>D Still, some of the poets most likely to make me feel something deeply are Mary Oliver, Billy Collins, J. Patrick Lewis, Joyce Sidman, Jane Kenyon, Irene Latham, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, Marilyn Singer...and many more too!
Oh, my goodness. I love both Berry and Carruth, and this particular poem gives me shivers! "...in your great dignity of being necessary" Aaaaahhhh -- yes. Thank you for this!
I think I inadvertently deleted my original comment, but I'll not relist my long string of "necessary" poets, which is really more necessary poems, as like Laura I'm a poem stan rather than a particular poet fan. I love that Berry simply cheers for this poet not as a wordsmith embarking on a great career but rather as a poet necessary enough to just be invited to skip all of that and get on with the poetry.
🪷 tanita
I'm loving this list of poets! Thanks, everyone, for chiming in with the joy and gusto befitting a discussion of poetry passion.
I need to compile a list of everyone you've named and add a P.S. to the post! :)
Laura and Tanita, yes to loving individual poems — I've been known to say I have a passion for a given poet but I'm actually basing that on one gem. :D
Keep 'em coming!
Dear Karen, so many poets! So many absolute favorites!! I do love W.B. very much, especially his Sabbath series of books … Here are three of my current daily books — these three collections will (each) take me a couple of years to go through, at my happy meditative pace of one poem per book, per day 🤗… Ursula K. Le Guin, Collected Poems, Harold Bloom, editor (700 gorgeous pages). The Collected Poems of Denise Levertov (1012 pages). Paper Boat: New and Collected Poems 1961-2023, Margaret Atwood (580 pages). Each of these, every morning, gives me — oh, a heart rising up sensation of good things being possible.
Karen thank you for hosting today with another poem that I have not read before. I love that you offer surprise poems to ponder. I also want to thank you for being supportive of me during this trying chapter of my life. Today, I offer my contribution to the Poetry Sisters' invitation to write with a "Letter To Heaven." Have a marvelous weekend.
Oh my goodness, I left out so many people. But I have to add in Rebecca Kai Dotlich, who was one of the very first poets I found and fell in love with!
Dang it, Karen--I popped back to do more than leave my link, to read and appreciate your offering, and dang it, now I've had to go and learn all about Hayden Carruth and consider Wendell's relationship with his work and whom I might address and I got sucked into a Writer's Almanac rabbithole and my self-discipline has been taxed and failed and now I'm going to be late to the Pride Poetry reading downtown and it has been lovely. Thank you!
Late to the gathering, but happy to report the first indie bookstore I visited this morning had Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Uncover Your World.
So many poets to love, how can we stop at just a few? Ted Kooser, Ada Limon, Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson are just a few of my many favorites. I like your idea of composing a list poem (maybe with favorite lines from favorite poets).
Heidi, I went down that same rabbit hole and found a poem I want to share in August. Let's see if I remember it by then! I loved beginning my day with the Writer's Almanac for many years.
Coming back to add in Janet Wong--yesterday I picked up her NIGHT GARDEN book and remembered that when I first thought to try and publish a children's collection, this was the book I aspired to, along with STONE BENCH IN AN EMPTY PARK by Paul Janezcko. And on the adult side, Gerard Manley Hopkins and Ross Gay for unabashed flow of language, and Aimee Nezhukumatathil as the humorous inheritor of Mary Oliver's territory. And on the VERY adult side, I've discovered Jubi Arriola-Headley. I'm also a fan of Patricia Smith's work.
Thanks for popping back in, Heidi! I added your latest to the list.
Ramona, yes, it's impossible to stop at a few names. :D
Carol, how I wish for you that you weren't going through the grief you're enduring! Thanks for staying in touch.
elli, you always have an amazing bookstack to share and discuss!
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