Tag Archives: poetry

From Memory

Posted on May 1, 2018 by JMN

“A Refusal to Mourn the Death by Fire of a Child in London,” poem by Dylan Thomas poetryfoundation.org This poem is an antidote to the “thoughts and prayers” mantra. It reminds me of Millay’s “Dirge Without Music” in that it … Continue reading →

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Five Quotes About Poetry

Posted on April 28, 2018 by JMN

“It’s the poet’s business to make poetry out of the unexplored resources of the unpoetical.” (T.S. Eliot) “I would sooner give the laurel to vigorous error than to any orthodoxy not inspired.” (W.B. Yeats) “A poem by its nature operates … Continue reading →

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From Memory

Posted on April 28, 2018 by JMN

“Ozymandias,” poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley, http://www.poetryfoundation.org This sonnet triggers a puff of schadenfreude. It’s fun to imagine that, given time, the desert swallows braggarts. (Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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“Burning the Brush Pile”

Posted on April 24, 2018 by JMN

I find among my keepings a poem by Galway Kinnell published in the New Yorker June 19, 2006. Its title is “Burning the Brush Pile.” Tending the pile, the speaker discovers a small, half-burnt snake still alive: “It stopped where … Continue reading →

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From Memory

Posted on April 23, 2018 by JMN

“In Memory of W. B. Yeats,” poem by W. H. Auden, poets.org This poem has several “movements,” like a symphony. I marvel at its discursive tone — “You were silly like us” — until the last stanza, where it becomes … Continue reading →

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“For me, poetry proliferates…”

Posted on April 22, 2018 by JMN

“For me, poetry proliferates and flourishes in the intellect’s blind spot. But you have to have the intellect first; you can’t skip that step. I find intelligence to be most interesting when it’s tested — not when it’s challenged, but … Continue reading →

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From Memory

Posted on April 22, 2018 by JMN

“Dover Beach,” poem by Matthew Arnold, https://www.poetryfoundation.org Penned by a Victorian on his honeymoon! This is hardly a celebratory poem, but I get from it what the French call a “morne plaisir,” a gloomy satisfaction. Its somber music moves me, … Continue reading →

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From Memory

Posted on April 20, 2018 by JMN

“Dirge Without Music,” poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay https://www.poetryfoundation.org I’m attracted to the elegiac mode. This poem is formal, but with half-rhyming that doesn’t chime: “crowned” with “resigned,” for example. The speaker quarrels with how we handle death.

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From Memory

Posted on April 17, 2018 by JMN

“September 1, 1939,” poem by W. H. Auden, https://www.poets.org This is the longest poem I’ve memorized so far. It has nine stanzas, each of which has eleven lines. There’s a regular rhyme scheme. I detect a three-beat cadence. I read … Continue reading →

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