Poems

Rhyme IV

-Gustavo Adolfo Becquer [trans: Juan F. Medrano]

Do not say that, exhausted of its treasure,
there is lack of subject matter to silence poetry;
we may not have poets; but
there will always be poetry.

As long as the kiss ignites the heart with
waves of light,
as long as the sun dresses the torn clouds
with fire and gold,
as long the air carries perfumes and
harmonies in its lap,
as long there is spring in the world,
There will be poetry!

As long as science does not discover
the origins of life,
and in the sea or in the heaven there is an abyss
that cannot be calculated;
as long as the always advancing humanity
does not know where it’s heading;
as long as there is a mystery for man,
There will be poetry!

As long as we feel that the soul rejoices,
without the lips laughing;
as long as we can cry without the tears
blurring our vision;
as long as the heart and the brain
continue struggling;
as long as there is hope and remembrances,
There will be poetry!

As long as there are eyes that reflect
the eyes that look at them,
as long as the lip responds sighing
to the lip that sighs,
as long as two confused souls can
in a kiss feel themselves,
as long as there is a beautiful woman,
There will be poetry!

——————————————————————————————————————

“Harlem” by Langston Hughes

This poem is on page 67 of our handy dandy “Poems of New York” book. The poem is written by the Langston Hughes and it goes like this:

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore—

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over—

like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

like a heavy load.

     Or does it explode?

I saw this poem and immediately recognized the first three lines of the poems. They are famous phrases that I immediately associate with Langston Hughes (as well as the “Life ain’t no crystal stairs” from Hughes’ “Mother to Son”). In the poem, Hughes is questioning what happens to a person’s dreams when it is halted. Hughes is talking about the progress of African-Americans, which is subject to White oppression in the early 20th century. In my 10th grade English class, I remember seeing Lorraine Hansberry’s film “A Raisin in the Sun”, which obtain its name from this poem. The film focuses around the lives of a black family in Chicago who strives to get rich, but their “dream is deferred”. The poem is short, crisp and to the point, yet powerful and has a deep meaning behind it, which I think makes it a good poem to go over in class.

 

~Christopher Chong

“Return of the Native” by Amiri Baraka

I tried to find the poem online but for some reason it’s not popping up, so feel free to look in Poems of New York, pages 152-153, for the poem.

I absolutely love this poem. Amiri Baraka, a famous black poet of the 1960s, write this poem centered around Harlem, the hub of black life at the time. He imagines a life in a place like Harlem that’s meant only for black people and brings a sense of communal joy. He ironically describes Harlem as “vicious” and “violent” and “transforming,” yet somehow beautiful. He dreams that in this world Harlem sees only sunny skies, never rain, as a symbol of the warmth that fills that place. He imagines that they will have everything they need in this world, including love for themselves. There will be a sense of joy that they thrive among themselves and will be comforted by familiarity. In the poem, I feel like he skillfully juxtaposes this dream world to the reality of the 1960s.

This poem adds to what Harlem meant for so many Black Americans at that time – it stood as a vision of a better future. Living in The Towers near campus right now, I feel grateful to be in a community that meant so much to a people. However, standing in this present that this poem looks toward creates deep sorrow for what has happened to Harlem and this vision, especially amid the recent tragedies in America. It never fails to amaze me how art can open the door to social critique.

“The Argument Resumed, Or, Up Through Tribeca” by Thomas Disch

Disch’s poem speaks to the fact that some of the best moments in life involve little things. These events are often brief, yet they can still have a significant effect on your day. One of the most important points of this poem is that these beautiful moments must be brief and fleeting, otherwise, there will be no reason to long for the event to repeat itself. Not to make this about sports, but what, an example that comes to mind is the way that the media treated Derek Jeter this season, as it was his final season. Many outlets, including Gatorade, made exceptions to policies in order to honor Jeter. If these companies did this every time a player retired, it would not be special or significant. However, it was a very meaningful gesture because it does not happen very often. This is certainly not the best example for everyone, but it was something that came to mind for me. I’m sure we each have experiences like this that are brief, but still have a impact on us.

“The Owl and the Lightning” by Martin Espada

I believe it was Chloe that raised the question of what the significance of the cat and owl was. The main point of this poem is certainly related to religion and how God is a mystery. However, as Professor Drabik pointed out recently, poets do everything deliberately, so the choice for a cat and an owl was no accident. The differences between a cat and an owl are pretty clear, as a cat is domesticated and often bound by rules imposed by its owner and an owl is free, only bound by the laws of nature. In the poem, we see the cat trying to defy the laws of the projects and then fall to its death, whereas, the owl survives and thrives, as it seemingly conjures up a bold of lightning. The owl seems similar to God because he is not bound by the laws of others, and has a mysterious power that others do not. Whereas, the cat is similar to humans, as it is bound by the rules of others and eventually dies, often trying to overcome these limitations.

On “The Argument Resumed; Or, Up Through Tribeca”

Everything comes to an end. The ideas of limitations and absoluteness, infinity and ephemeralness, have been questioned since the time of the Ancient Greeks.  These opposing ideas mainly appeared through the focuses on immortality and mortality; life and death. Some believed that beauty was truly immortal. Things such as art, love, and even blood lines (mainly considering royalty) were considered beautiful and grand because they existed longer than a lifetime. Philosophers such as Socrates have supported this idea. Socrates viewed love as humanity’s attempt to achieve immortality, a feat that overcomes physical impossibilities.

The opposing idea, which the poem appears to follow, is that beauty is fleeting. It can only exist in limited periods of time. Many poets and romanticists, such as William Shakespeare believed in this idea. In his sonnets, Shakespeare discussed that death, in fact, makes life greater because it (death) ends it (life). Because life is limited by death, one must make their best of it, and enjoy what is has to offer. Without death, life loses it beauty, and becomes dry and sorrowful.

The idea of memory, however, treads the line between the differing views on infinity or temporariness. A memory is something that can last a lifetime, or can persist through time if it is somehow recorded (a diary, biography, painting, etc.). The thing that is remembered, nonetheless, is stuck in time. It is finite. The poet of “The Argument Resumed” shows that beauty must be finite, that something beautiful can only exist temporarily, and that it can only be enjoyed momentarily because of its connection to memory. The key line from the latter half of the poem is “How shall it bear repeating?”. “It”, here, refers to any beautiful moment, event or thing. The poet uses basic logic to argue that if something beautiful lasts forever, how is it possible for humans to recall it multiple times? The poet discusses that true beauty and glory exists in bursts or short periods of time. It is possible for these short bursts to reinstate that sensation of magnificence any time in the future.

I cannot help but finding myself in agreement with the poet. If beautiful things were everlasting, how would we possibly enjoy anything else? How would it be possible to ever return to any singular, truly enjoyed and cherished piece of time?

Up through Tribeca : Joshua’s Thoughts

Zings of beauty provide luster when luster is needed. Happiness when you are feeling a bit down. Intrigue when your job offers none.

These zings are fleeting so that they can be done again and still offer their impact.

One glows more than the rest and that is the soul? What of the rest? Have they no souls? Is the property of having a soul simply true for the brightest in the bunch? What of the rest? Maybe they have too dim of a soul to be considered by this poet…

This is an interesting poem, and one thing sticks hard in my mind: some things are fleeting so they don’t lose their effect.

123rd Street Rap

One of the most important things that I look at in a poem is structure. Willie Perdomo does a fantastic job in mimicking  the life on 123rd Street by the structure in the poem. The poem is a bit choppy and the lines are very short, perhaps reflecting the neighborhood and creating an eerie vibe of the street. The structure of the poem creates a bit of a disturbing, starting atmosphere in the poem. Clearly, the street was a filled with crime and violence which Perdomo represents by saying, “Automatic bullets bounce off stoop steps.”

As to the content of the poem, I initially argued that the poem reflects the hopelessness on the street and in the neighborhood as well. It seems that even the poet thinks this way. He says, “And I can’t tell what’s wrong fro what’s right.” But, I do not believe him anymore. By noticing the terrible situation itself, Perdomo knows what is wrong and what is right. Further, by writing this poem to express himself, Perdomo gives hope to this street. The hope lies in the poem itself.

-Angelika

Ruminating on shipwrecks and art

During the class’s discussion today, the wheels in my head screeched into motion as everyone thought about the line from Lorca’s poem (“as if they had just escaped a shipwreck of blood.”)

I seem to be surrounded by shipwrecks lately! The poet I work on in my own research uses them poignantly in his poems (notably in “A Throw of the Dice Will Never Abolish

Vernet

Vernet

Chance,” and “Stilled beneath the Oppressive Cloud”). At our concert outing to Carnegie Hall, Tchaikovsky’s The Tempest (inspired, of course, by the Shakespeare play of the same name) involves a fantastic shipwreck whose turbulent booms and crashes vibrated our seats. And now, beloved Lorca closes his dawn with that image (which seems to fittingly correspond to the light of dawn as many of you brought up).

Though in all these things, and especially the Lorca poem, I come back to a Moroccan writer, Tahar Ben Jelloun, who used the word in perhaps one of the most powerful contexts I’ve encountered. Writing about under-served and neglected youth in French suburbs (comparable to “inner-city” youth of American inner cities), he speaks of “the shipwreck of their destiny,” to hit home the catastrophic plight (in France) of their immigrant parents.

I find myself wondering if Lorca intended some sort of social commentary about the shipwrecked lives of these people in the mire of New York, as well.

 

123rd Street Rap

In amazing brevity Willie Perdomo is capable of illustrating this street from Spanish Harlem from the perspective of an observant and knowledgeable outsider. His use of alliteration (bullets bounce, stoop steps, bells bong) adds to the rhythm of the rap as well as quickens the pace of poem as a whole in company with the shorts stanzas. This quickened pace adds to the message of the poem in relation to having to grow up quickly in setting such as 123rd St. From the diction of the poem readers can pick up on a sense of roughness in relation to the neighborhood and fiscal struggles for the speaker. Lines such as “Sun that don’t shine”, “Trees that won’t grow”, and “Wind that won’t blow” also give off a sense of hopelessness.

This poem heavily relates to a section I recently studied in Anthropology on drug-dealing in Spanish Harlem and the social consequences/causes of this. In many ways Perdomo is trying to convey the fact that these children grow up surrounded by violence and drug-dealing and as they come of age they are struck with this internal moral conflict (“And I can’t tell what’s wrong from what’s right”). Many times stereotyping and prejudice bar these individuals from the inner city from attaining respectable jobs or being respected in the workplace which then forces them towards illegal means of income just to stay afloat. This relentless cycle traps many children, such as the ones Perdomo describes in his poem. Therefore, people are left with the question of if the illegal means of earning money which they are accustomed to or the discriminatory and degrading positions they acquire in the work force are correct. What outsiders many times fail to see is that this a social issue in which the victims are wrongly being blamed in a sense for partaking in this illegal activity, which in reality they are being forced into by societal pressures around them.

The Cabdriver’s Smile

The initial description of the cabdriver portrays him as a tough, stern New Yorker. The speaker’s brief and matter-of-fact statements describing the situation give off a very unemotional tone as he analyzes this man. This poem is greatly a commentary on human connections and the simplicity of our relationships with people we encounter daily. Everyday we come across hundreds of people especially in a populous city such as New York. As a cabdriver you come in contact with a variety of people but are only with them from point A to point B and in reality how much do you actually get to know about the majority of those people or moreso how much effort are the majority of passengers putting in to get to know their cabdriver, sadly very little. Though the cabdriver may seem cold in his interactions with the other friendly cabdriver as well as the speaker/passenger, I think he is just aware of the sad fact that so many people are too self-concerned much of the time to get to know the people around them; in that we are limiting our own opportunities for human connection. It is very easy to feel lost and insignificant in the large group of people which constitute the population of NYC. Even interactions like that of the cabdriver who “bows like a king” may seem somewhat false and the fact that he is being aligned with a king give off the sense that his actions are self-righteous and he acts as though he is superior. And the brief glimpse of a smile which the speaker sees on the mouth of the cabdriver conveys a small ember of hope that there are still members of society who see him as more than just a mode of transportation and dehumanize him in such a way, that there is still genuine compassion left in humanity.

The Significance of Humanity

Upon reading the journal entries I have gotten back today, I noticed a particular interest in one phrase I used by Professor Drabik.  My phrase was “humankind as a whole has no significance” and the response to this phrase was “Are you sure?”  This entry dates back to our fourth class, we were discussing the poems “Man Listening to Disc” and “The Weary Blues.”  I believe during this class we entered into one of the most heated debates about the significance of man.  Many believing that we do in all ways have much significance however my point is that in a cosmic scale we do not.  Even on a more global scale, the history of the conquered is always lost to those that conquer.  One specific example was the burning of the libraries at Alexandria, which set back medical science and research centuries of work.  The significance of those that published and researched for the good of all of mankind was lost because their only legacy left to the ages was also lost, burnt in a fire.

Simply put, humans only have significance because we give each other significance.  It is only in society can we have any effect on the scheme of things.  Without society, we are nothing.  You can not rebel against a society that does not exist, you can not progress a society that does not exist, you can not influence, control, manifest or do any like action on a society that does not exist.  If you look up the term significance in the dictionary, you are returned with this: the quality of being worthy of attention; importance.  When you really think about it, our whole existence is in no way signifiant.  If there was any cataclysmic event that were to wipe us out, a mass extinction of man, there would be nothing left of us.  No one, even if there were other intelligent forms of life, would know or hear about what we have endured, what we have created, or what we have suffered.  Without knowing, there is no “importance” in our existence because any step toward progress will eventually be forgotten to the cosmos and to time.

As I said this is all relative to the global scheme of things.  As long as there is society, we all have some individual significance.  We all effect those around us, for the good or for the worse and we all have some small local meaning and “importance.”  It would be an imprudent decision now to stop striving for progress because the in the present, the end of our species currently is unforeseeable.  However our significance as a species overall will eventually run out with time, but in the present, as long as there is a present, we will maintain our importance and significance.

Discussion on Dawn

We have not discussed this poem in last week’s seminar, so I thought I might try to describe one to the best of my ability. Also, this poem matches the timing I am posting this at.

“Dawn” uses a gloomy tone to explain events and feelings of New Yorkers. People feel like there is no hope, paradise, or love in the mornings. They are very sleepy and feel like if they had an enormous struggle to wake up. The poem seems to ask the question: why would any one want to wake up?

It is very confusing and more gloomy than necessary. I have noticed that almost everyone in the subway was sleepy, but I believe that the city is pretty clean in the mornings. For example, the public bathrooms have been cleaned and no one has used them yet.

123rd Street Rap

This poem by Willie Perdomo is a very dark portrayal of a day on 123rd Street. Despite this very gloomy look at a normal day on this street, the poem uses end rhyme that gives it a sense of rhythm and makes it an entertaining read. I almost felt bad reading this poem, because I enjoyed it so much. In the poem, nothing goes right on this street, from violence to nature that does not grow.

Dawn

This is one of the darkest poems I have read, certainly the darkest I have read from this poetry book. This poem takes a very pessimistic view of New York and does not say one positive thing about New York. Why does Federico García Lorca feel so strongly against New York? The last two lines are especially dark, “Crowds stagger sleeplessly through the boroughs as if they had just escaped a shipwreck of blood”. I have not been in New York for too long, but I have never seen anything like the images described in this poem.

Garcia Lorca

This is not yet an analysis, just a mentioning of the author to spark up some discussions.

I do remember Garcia Lorca being an eccentric writer when we (the intro to spanish lit. class in high school) first met his work. When we read La Casa de Bernarda Alba, we did sense something revolting about him (although, most people around g’27 had the pulse of revolution…). When we read his romances (octosyllabic quatrains), we were utterly confused as he spoke of the moon and the boy and the gypsies… If I remember correctly, he had a short life, as he was killed during a war/movement or something.

I’m opening up this thread for people who are confused after reading the poem for first five times.

Dawn by Federico García Lorca

The four columns of mire could be the bridges connecting Manhattan and Brooklyn, except that there are three bridges with at least three columns each.

Spikenards are costly perfumed oils of ancient times used primarily for their fragrance. So when I read “spikenards of drafted anguish” I understand “fragrant oils of anguish selected for a certain purpose”. What does this mean?

“furious swarming coins / penetrate like drills and devour abandoned children.” Hmmm…

I don’t understand.

The Cabdriver’s Smile

In “The Cabdriver’s Smile”, Denise Levertov writes about a cabdriver with rather poor customer service skills. The cabdriver does not seem to accept the passenger, even after receiving a very generous tip and is not even pleased when a fellow cabdriver greets him, even though he does not actually know the man. Upon seeing the cabdriver’s license photo, the passenger concludes that this man is hiding “longing and hope”. I do not feel this is necessarily a fair conclusion, especially since she has only seen this man once. For all she knows, the cabdriver is just having a bad day, but otherwise could be a very pleasant man. What about this man’s actions make the passenger extrapolate this one experience out to his entire life?

The Great Figure

This poem seems incredibly simple, especially since it is easily the shortest poem we have read this semester. However, it may be so simple that it is still very difficult. On the surface, William Carlos Williams writes about seeing a figure 5 on a fire truck, as sirens are going off. I do not understand why this is so significant. Why is the figure 5 so “Great”? Clearly there is some emergency that calls for a fire truck, but what is this emergency? I also do not understand the structure of this poem. Why is each line so short, yet there does not appear to be any pattern?

The Great Figure…

William Carlos William’s “The Great Figure”, compressed into one line, would read thusly:

Among the rain and lights I saw a figure 5 in gold on a red firetruck moving tense unheeded to gong clangs siren howls and wheels rumbling through the dark city.

The figure 5 doesn’t heed the clangs, howls, and rumbling nor the rain and lights. It’s going to go fight a fire—what does it care?