What I Read -- Morning Poems

My 2023 Reading Challenge is still substantially behind schedule, but I have not thrown in the towel just yet.  As a quick way to tick another book off the list, I have elected to read the shortest one remaining to be read: Morning Poems, by Robert Bly.

I am, as a rule, not much of a poetry reading.  It's challenging reading, and frankly I'm just not that into making my recreational reading difficult.

One thing I can say for Bly's poems is that at least some of them are reasonably approachable, which is nice.

The other thing I can say about them is that many of them are quite dark.  Some samples:

The Resemblance Between Your Life and a Dog
I never intended to have this life, believe me --
It just happened.
...
Sparrows in winter, if you've ever held one, all feathers,
Burst out of your hand with a fiery glee.
You see them later in hedges.  Teachers praise you,
But you can't quite get back to the winter sparrow.
Your life is a dog. He's been hungry for miles,
Doesn't particularly like you, but gives up, and comes in.

A Family Photograph, Sunday Morning, 1940
They've gathered on the farm lawn, ten people, all ages.
...
One boy smiles---it is me---and looks down.  He seems glad,
But his sweater sleeve is too short. The men's hands,
None placed in pockets, all hang down.
...
The men smile, but their eyes say hard things.
'The world pulls at me---it tore my father
Away already.  That forty-acre farm he bought
By Marietta is still black.  I have to go now.'
...
Two old women who guard the group on both sides
Take nothing on trust. "I trust my hands, and that's all."

For a Childhood Friend, Marie
She knew a lot about life on a farm: wagon
Poles that sometimes broke, and grown men
Pinned against the fencepost by a bull.
Sometimes you tie a favorite lamb
To a tree so that the old bucks will not kill him,
And he hangs himself from the rope.
...
Marie, thirty years old, still loved
The high school, the tall boys, gossip
About the teachers, the proms. She also
Loved our lives that were not going
So well.  She married the hired man---
My grandmother told her not to---and he drank.

Wanting More Applesauce at a Conference
It's something about envy. I won't say I'm envious,
But I did have certain moods when I was two.
Now of course I can't remember any of that.
I'm happy if another receives some attention
That's really mine.  ...
This is hard to bear.  ...
And I am no longer small.  Let's call it a mood
When we can't remember.  Let's call it a habit
Of opening the mouth when we, who have
Much, want more, even what belongs to the poor.

My Doubts on Going to Visit a New Friend
I have to ask myself what kind of friend I can be.
...
I am afraid there'll be a moment when
I fail you, friend; I will turn slightly
Away, our eyes will not meet, and out in the field
There will be no one.

Perhaps my favorite, because it is truly inspirational and not super dark:

Things to Think
Think in ways you've never thought before.
...
When someone knocks on the door, think that he's about
To give you something large: tell you you're forgiven,
Or that it's not necessary to work all the time, or that its
Been decided if you lie down, no one will die.

Kindred -- Take 2

I owe thanks to K for picking out Kindred as our postal book club book. I had been meaning to read it for quite some time, and I sure am glad that I finally did.

It's a difficult book to read, in the way that all books which are about slavery are difficult, especially when they are intensely personal.  But it's also incredibly well done in that the characters, though there are "good" and "bad" people, are almost all complicated.  Very few of them are entirely good or entirely bad; just when someone is approaching despicable, there is a scene that evokes just enough empathy to give you hope for a turnaround.

It also made slavery -- which seems to most of us like a nearly-ancient historical circumstance -- seem suddenly not so far away.  I give huge credit to Octavia Butler for that.  So many books which talk about difficult and embarrassing historical circumstances suffer from the collective volume of their brethren; it can quickly become tiresome to read more than a few books about slavery, Nazi Germany, persecution of any kind.  This one provides a new and interesting perspective which keeps the topic fresh.