Poems for Life (5 page)

Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.

Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?

I have lived my life, and that which I have done

May He within himself make pure!“

— Alfred, Lord Tennyson

S
HELDON
H
ARNICK

Dear Ms. Wolff:

I am very flattered to be asked for my “favorite poem”; and your cause is certainly a worthy one — I do not have a “favorite” poem — there are dozens which fall into that category. But one of my favorites is Walt Whitman's “When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer,” which I have enclosed.

I think the reason that this poem affects me as it does has to do with a deep need on my part to preserve a sense of the mystery, the divinity (if you will) of life. Rather than explaining everything away by dry, cerebral means, there are moments when the intellect is not enough, when the spiritual part of me needs nourishment. That, or something like it, is what this poem says to me — and says it very powerfully.

Good luck with your project!

Cordially,

W
HEN
I H
EARD THE
L
EARN
'
D
A
STRONOMER

When I heard the learn'd astronomer,

When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,

When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,

When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,

How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,

Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,

In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,

Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

— Walt Whitman

B
ILL
I
RWIN

Stephanie Greco:

I don't know about a favorite poem but there is one that often haunts my mind. It is grim but beautiful. I'm afraid I can't find it, perhaps you might be able to. It is called “The Yachts” and I think it is by William Carlos Williams. (Good Luck)

All the best with your project,

T
HE
Y
ACHTS

contend in a sea which the land partly encloses

shielding them from the too-heavy blows

of an ungoverned ocean which when it chooses

tortures the biggest hulls, the best man knows

to pit against its beatings, and sinks them pitilessly.

Mothlike in mists, scintillant in the minute

brilliance of cloudless days, with broad bellying sails

they glide to the wind tossing green water

from their sharp prows while over them the crew crawls

ant-like, solicitously grooming them, releasing,

making fast as they turn, lean far over and having

caught the wind again, side by side, head for the mark.

In a well guarded arena of open water surrounded by

lesser and greater craft which, sycophant, lumbering

and flittering follow them, they appear youthful, rare

as the light of a happy eye, live with the grace

of all that in the mind is fleckless, free and

naturally to be desired. Now the sea which holds them

is moody, lapping their glossy sides, as if feeling

for some slightest flaw but fails completely.

Today no race. Then the wind comes again. The yachts

move, jockeying for a start, the signal is set and they

are off. Now the waves strike at them but they are too

well made, they slip through, though they take in canvas.

Arms with hands grasping seek to clutch at the prows.

Bodies thrown recklessly in the way are cut aside.

It is a sea of faces about them in agony, in despair

until the horror of the race dawns staggering the mind,

the whole sea become an entanglement of watery bodies

lost to the world bearing what they cannot hold. Broken,

beaten, desolate, reaching from the dead to be taken up

they cry out, failing, failing! their cries rising

in waves still as the skillful yachts pass over.

— William Carlos Williams

P
ETER
J
ENNINGS

M
AN WITH
W
OODEN
L
EG
E
SCAPES
P
RISON

I like this poem because it introduces young readers to the idea that poems don't have to rhyme, and that poems can tell stories. It has a good message about perseverance and determination and adaptation. Finally, James Tate, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1993, deserves the attention.

Man with wooden leg escapes prison. He's caught.

They take his wooden leg away from him. Each day

he must cross a large hill and swim a wide river

to get to the field where he must work all day on

one leg. This goes on for a year. At the Christmas

Party they give him back his leg. Now he doesn't

want it. His escape is all planned. It requires

only one leg.

— James Tate

E
DWARD
I. K
OCH

Dear Ms. Ellis,

I received your letter and I am delighted to participate in your project to aid the International Rescue Committee.

For me, Edgar Allan Poe's “Annabel Lee” is a poem of sentimentality at its very best. It carries the reader back to a gentler age and turns tragedy into a thing of beauty. It is a gracious love poem.

All the best.

Sincerly

A
NNABEL
L
EE

It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of Annabel Lee; —

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love and be loved by me.

I
was a child and
she
was a child,

In this kingdom by the sea,

But we loved with a love that was more than love —

I and my Annabel Lee —

With a love that the wingèd seraphs in Heaven

Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,

In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling

My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her high-born kinsman came

And bore her away from me,

To shut her up in a sepulcher

In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,

Went envying her and me: —

Yes! — that was the reason (as all men know,

In this kingdom by the sea)

That the wind came out of the cloud, by night,

Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we —

Of many far wiser than we —

And neither the angels in Heaven above,

Nor the demons down under the sea,

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee: —

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;