David Whyte
I don’t read enough poetry. Or write enough. Somewhere I have a bit of an anthology loosely titled "of mirrors and mississipi rhyme". Poetry is at once, so big and so small…the dance between the edge and beyond…the visible and invisible. If the world we live in today is described by the thinkers and artists of 40years ago (my assummption), then poets of 100 years ago and beyond are likely to have explained it better still. Who then is describing what is coming? Which poets should I be reading?
Simon reminded me about David Whyte - enjoy!
"The poet lives and writes at the frontier between deep internal experience and the revelations of the outer world. There is no going back for the poet once this frontier has been reached; a new territory is visible and what has been said cannot be unsaid. The discipline of poetry is in overhearing yourself say difficult truths from which it is impossible to retreat. Poetry is a break for freedom. In a sense all poems are good; all poems are an emblem of courage and the attempt to say the unsayable; but only a few are able to speak to something universal yet personal and distinct at the same time; to create a door through which others can walk into what previously seemed unobtainable realms, in the passage of a few short lines".
A sample:
The Fire In The Song
by David Whyte
"The mouth opens
and fills the air
with its vibrant shape
until the air
and the mouth
become one shape.
And the first word,
your own word,
spoken from that fire
surprises, burns,
grieves you now
because
you made that pact
with a dark presence
in your life.
He said, "If you only
stop singing
I’ll make you safe."
And he repeated the line,
knowing you would hear
"I’ll make you safe"
as the comforting
sound of a door
closed on the fear at last,
but his darkness crept
under your tongue
and became the dim
cave where
you sheltered
and you grew
in that small place
too frightened to remember
the songs of the world,
its impossible notes,
and the sweet joy
that flew out the door
of your wild mouth
as you spoke."
Everything is inside of you…you are alive and have the capacity to be so in all our glory - speaking and creating your worlds into being. Speak and dance and sing and be!
Thanks to Michelle Ensminger for her words and David’s "Sometime, somewhere, I traded my song for safety. It’s time to open my mouth and let the fire of my song burn again" to her’s I add my own "sometime, somewhere, I traded my freedom, my voice, for perceptions of securtiy…" "I too am opening my mouth again…"
What song do you need to sing?
Image (c) Andy Goldsworthy via source [what was the world like before andy?!]
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December 2nd, 2006 at 4:55 pm
The Waterboys just came up on my mp3, a lovely little song around some Yeats…
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s morefull of weeping than you
can understand.
And this seems timely, reminding us that patterns also have destructive anti-patterns, no magic on their own, a palette from which we can choose to paint our pictures, they simply are, cf. “A poem should not mean / but be” — Archibald-MacLeish)…
In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fighting with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?
– Amy Lowell
Why? The question at the root of a source-story?
December 2nd, 2006 at 5:36 pm
hmmm, gut feeling from my last sentence…
“Why?” A question triggered by a crisis-point, a person actively seeks out meaning, that seems a little too obvious. Why is perhaps but part of the picture. What’s also prompted is that story embodies wisdom, caring for, before a crisis-point arises…
The wise come know that the young resist “telling” (and perhaps even become wise themselves to insincere “selling”, media savvy :). The story engages, it tells not just of our roots (why and where) but also the deep dark collection of trees, the forest we are better not to wander in to, lest another of those w words get us (the wolves - really, w is so nice to say, almost evoking the camp fire moments). A new generation, through story, can take on board the patterns of those who’ve had the nasty experiences, reinforced with some emotional affects, which trigger effects (through association), not needing, and thus avoiding, the dangerous effects of a real experience, a clear evolutionary advantage. Of course, like any pattern, myth-making can be put to devious ends too (cough, WMD). And I might just be waffling, so will stop.
May 2nd, 2007 at 4:16 am
Great site. So many useful info.
Really perfect!!! I’ll bookmark!
November 7th, 2007 at 1:04 pm
Hello…I Googled for andy goldsworthy, but found your page about David Whyte…and have to say thanks. nice read.
November 17th, 2007 at 12:53 pm
Hello webmaster…Man i love reading your blog, interesting posts ! it was a great Saturday