Tag Archives: Richard Wilbur

Trying to Be Present

housework, poetry

Sundays usually feel transitional, but they don’t always strike me the same way. If the upcoming Monday is free of outside obligations, Sunday can feel restful all day, as I know that I can organize myself and accomplish quite a bit of work the next day, and get the week off right (although I know Sunday is the first day of the week, my mental calendar doesn’t show it in that position.)

 

This week’s Lord’s Day falls in the middle of a season that is transitional as well. I’m just through a very busy time, and waiting for a Big Event, the birth of a new grandchild. It’s a chance to catch up on little bits of work that no one is holding a deadline over my head about. Such as that slow de-cluttering I have a backlog of. This afternoon is providing some time for sifting. Much of the stuff is linked to my past, and I have to dispose of many things in the future–maybe the very near future, like tomorrow?


To remind me to enjoy this work, and to say hello, I give you another of Richard Wilbur’s Opposites, #19:


Because what’s present doesn’t last,

The opposite of it is past.

Or if you choose to look ahead,

Future’s the opposite instead.

Or look around to see what’s here,

And absent things will not appear.

There’s one more opposite of present

That’s really almost too unpleasant:

It is when someone takes away

Something with which you like to play.

 

If I start to think about all the playing with words he does here, I begin to see that I could enter into two opposites of present at the same time by being discontent: miss the present moment, which is also taking away from myself, and thereby missing the gift/present God wants to give me.


And I don’t want to miss it, so, “Hi ho, hi ho, It’s back to work I go!”


Christ is Risen!

More Opposite #15

humor, poetry, ,

After getting less sleep than was needed last night, I wasn’t feeling perky tonight, so what did I do? Eat too much ice cream. Then I read this excerpt from Richard Wilbur’s More Opposites. So apropos.

15

The opposite of less is more.

What’s better? Which one are you for?

My question may seem simple, but

The catch is—more or less of what?

“Let’s have more of everything!” you cry.

Well, after we have had more pie,

More pickles, and more layer cake,

I think we’ll want less stomach-ache.

The best thing’s to avoid excess.

Try to be temperate, more or less.

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you, tomorrow…. I will be more temperate, not less.

 

Book Notes

books, poetry, , , , , ,

This stack represents the top of the current pile I’ve been working on. Any guesses as to which one I’ve already abandoned? I’ll start from the top. At Large and Small by Anne Fadiman was a gift from Pippin. We had both enjoyed her earlier book for readers, Ex Libris. She specializes in the personal essay and does a fine job of it, but I like the first book better; this one ranges over topics not so interesting to me. At least it is a small and lightweight book, which makes it possible to read while lying down just before the eyelids get heavy.

Creators is the first book by Paul Johnson that I have actually completed, though I’ve started in on two others by him. It is a collection of essays on famous creative individuals “from Chaucer and Dürer to Picasso and Disney.” Um…to be exact, I didn’t complete the book; there were a few in whose stories I couldn’t drum up enough interest at bedtime. The chapter comparing Picasso and Disney was certainly thought-provoking. Johnson thinks that the ideas of Picasso will fade and be outmoded, while those of Disney will endure–not because Picasso was so selfish and violent and Disney a maker of “family movies,” but for an entirely different and more fundamental artistic reason, which I don’t want to give away here.

I learned a lot more about many people in this book: T.S. Eliot, Jane Austen, Mark Twain, J.S. Bach, fashion designers and landscape painters. How does Johnson know so much, and how can he be so opinionated? He is easy to read, and refreshing in his willingness to tell you just what he thinks, and to not be politically correct, either. This book is one of a series with two others: Intellectuals, published many years ago, and Heroes, which has come out since. Some critics thought Intellectuals somewhat of a downer, but these last books should make up for that.

My friend K. lent me The Folding Cliffs. It’s not a book I’d have ever picked up otherwise, written as it is without any punctuation and me a member of the Apostrophe Protection Society. Is this even English? I guess it is, as I am able to read it, though it is definitely a variant form. In this case it is worth the trouble, though I’m not ready to tackle Merwin’s other poems. Here’s a sample from Cliffs:

The story is as captivating as the imagery, and I certainly won’t abandon this one, even if it takes me a year of little snatches. I like the way the words flow as soothingly over my consciousness as the stream over the narrator’s body.

Steinbeck’s novel East of Eden was recommended to me by two friends, so I was happy to find it in the used book store. I’ve read almost half of it, and enjoyed several of those hundred pages. But this is the one I’m quitting. Mr. Glad says I could write a dissertation on “What Can Be Learned of Steinbeck by Reading Half a Book”; I gave him my whole dissertation while cooking dinner after my decision to quit, but I will spare you readers. It boils down to the reality that life is short, and there didn’t seem to be anything to be gained by continuing with Steinbeck. There has always been something missing between him and me. Perhaps this time would be different, and I’d be surprised and gratified if I’d finished it, but one can’t have everything in life.

The Hacienda by de Teran is a re-run for me, but now my husband and I are reading it aloud together. It’s a fascinating story of Venezuela in the 1970’s and of the author’s experience–how she got herself into a mess and lived in a primitive society for quite a while before escaping for her life. I’ve read a couple of other books by this author and she tells a good tale–the ones I’ve read were the autobiographical accounts.

I love to read on a airplane. There is not much else to do, usually, so hours can go by without the attention being distracted. The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton I took on my last flight as a treat I’d been long waiting to enjoy again. I knew the first time I read it that it was the kind you have to read at least two or three times if you hope to get near the bottom of it.

Before our plane taxied down the runway I was well into the first chapter. My seatmate, who had initially seemed reserved, interrupted my reading to tell me that he much admired Chesterton and that particular book. Over the next ten or fifteen minutes we chatted on the subject of good writers, Christianity, how books had changed us, etc. And we still hadn’t taxied anywhere, because as it turned out, the plane had a mechanical problem which ended up delaying our flight for three hours, by which time we’d all disembarked and my new friend had got a different flight. I was quite pleased that the Lord had given me a short and sweet discussion time and a long and sweet reading time, all on the same leg of the journey.

Richard Wilbur may be my favorite poet. K.’s having introduced me to hers jogged me into digging out Wilbur’s poems again, which are so varied and beloved, I will have to write one or more posts just on him.

Now that there aren’t any travels in my near future, there might not be many new books begun, either. But as you can see, I’ve still plenty to keep me busy.