Poetry Friday: "A Dangerous Adventure" by James Tate

I was cleaning out files yesterday and found a typed copy of James Tate's poem, "A Dangerous Adventure." I had forgotten about this poem, and that's astonishing because who could forget a poem that begins:

The woman I love is typing in a nearby room.

Clippity clippity clippity clippity, then silence.

Today I went hunting for it online because now it had to be my Poetry Friday pick. (He had me at clippity.) It was a bit of a scavenger hunt, with my first search result landing on a page that told me this: 

Wait. Full Poem Text Available at ...  Jama's blog?! Perfect. I headed over there. 

The post from Jama, written in 2009, began like this: 

Ummm, if it hadn't already been obvious that I needed to share the Tate poem, this coincidence clinched it. I mean, really, friends. Marvel with me. I randomly stumble on a poem in my files, follow a bread crumb trail, am led to a Poetry Friday friend's post — FROM 2009  — that specifically refers back to a post of mine ... and to TODAY'S POETRY FRIDAY HOST, TRICIA (yes, I'm screaming) and I'm NOT gonna share about it? 

Well, of course I am. 

And at the same time, please marvel with me at the beauty and endurance of this Poetry Friday community. I've been on this ride with you all for nearly twenty years. We post, we read, we share, we comment, we forget who-posted-what-or-when and it's all good because it's all about poetry and friends. The people of Poetry Friday are typing in nearby rooms — clippity, clippity, clippity, clippity — and I love every single one of you. 

A Dangerous Adventure 

by James Tate 

The woman I love is typing in a nearby room.

Clippity clippity clippity clippity, then silence.

She’s thinking, like a jaguar, or a dagger.

Words but more than words. Currents, hairpin

turns. It’s scary but exciting. It’s like dancing

on a precipice or sleeping under a waterfall.

She doesn’t know the way home but she’s running

and leaping over chasms in the earth, and she’s singing too,

in a foreign language she’s never heard spoken.

But the melody is one I’ve known all my life.

....

(Read the rest here, at Jama's blog, and kindly applaud 

her husband Len for his forever-support of a wife 

who types in a nearby room.) 

~~~~~~~~~~

The Poetry Friday round-up this week is being hosted (of course) by Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect.

Photo courtesy of Pixabay.

Poetry Friday: A.E. Stallings

This poem struck me because it touches on two things I've thought about high school: 

1. Those days so far removed from the person I am now that they may as well have occurred in the Mesozoic Era. 

2. There are white-hot memories I can call up in a matter of seconds. 

Life, it seems, is a series of eras, periods, and ages that are constantly shifting, rearranging, being integrated, and viewed anew. 

This is such a good poem, and the final line is a killer.  

Written on the eve of my 20th high school reunion, 

which I was not able to attend

by A.E. Stallings 

    For the Briarcliff High School class of 1986


Just what I needed,
Just when the dreams had almost totally receded,

The dreams of roles for which I learned no lines and knew no cues,
Dreams of pop quizzes with no pants on and no shoes,

Just when I understood I was no longer among
Those ephemeral immortals, the gauche and pitiable young,

Suddenly come phone calls, messages sift out of the air
To ask who will be there:

Names I haven't given a thought to in a score
(A score!) of years, and names I used to think about but don't much anymore,

And those I think of all the time and yet
Have lost somehow like keys to doors I've closed, and some I have tried to forget—

....

(Read the rest here, at the Poetry Foundation.) 

~~~~~~~~~~

The Poetry Friday round-up is hosted this week by Buffy Silverman.

Photo courtesy of elizabethaferry at Pixabay. 

Poetry Friday: Get a word in Edgewise with Linda Mitchell

 I didn't get a poetry post done this week, so how about a few words on writing? 

“Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.” ― William Wordsworth

“Tears are words that need to be written.” ― Paulo Coelho

“If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.” 

― Toni Morrison

“You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.” 

― Madeleine L'Engle

“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.” ― Picasso

“Write what should not be forgotten.” ― Isabel Allende

~~~~~~~~~~

Visit Linda Mitchell at Another Word Edgewise for the Poetry Friday round-up this week. 

Photo courtesy of Tama66 at Pixabay.

Poetry Friday: "Dharma" by Billy Collins

 

Photo courtesy of Tati Hilabi, Pixabay. 

Monday morning, while walking and listening to Sad Boy Noah Kahan, I met the handsomest boy, who wasn't sad at all. I asked his person what his name was. Jake! It was Jake. A perfect name for a lumbering, retriever-y, labradorian-kinda guy with a thick, coppery coat and sprays of gray on his aging, distinguished cheeks. Jake and I immediately became best friends. I'd invite Jake over to spend some time together, but I didn't catch his last name, and it would be awkward to invite him and ignore his person (which I would totally do.) 

Who was walking Jake anyway? A man, a woman? A robot? Who knows, who cares? My relationship is solely with Jake, who made me think of "Dharma" by Billy Collins. I think Jake would like this poem, good, handsome, not-sad boy that he is. 

{Postscript: Do I need to get another dog?} 

{{Post-postscript: Maisy would say no, no. Most definitely, decidedly not. Do not mess around with her current lifestyle.}} 

Dharma 

by Billy Collins 

The way the dog trots out the front door

every morning

without a hat or an umbrella,

without any money

or the keys to her dog house

never fails to fill the saucer of my heart

with milky admiration.

Who provides a finer example

of a life without encumbrance—

Thoreau in his curtainless hut

with a single plate, a single spoon?

Ghandi with his staff and his holy diapers?

Off she goes into the material world

with nothing but her brown coat

and her modest blue collar,

....

(Read the rest here, at the Poetry Foundation.) 

~~~~~~~~~~

The Poetry Friday round-up this week is being hosted by Mona Voelkel.