IN WHICH The Girl Gets Poetic

If anyone were to ask me if I liked poetry or prose more, I would automatically say prose. When given the opportunity, I almost always choose to read stories and novels over poetry. However, it doesn't take much to remind me how much I truly love poetry.

For the first time in a while, I'm teaching a class with literature. As I started to prepare the poetry unit, I found myself going through the book exclaiming, "Oh we have to do this one... and this one too... and I love this poem... and how can they not be introduced to this one!" Needless to say, I had a list of way too many poems to cover in the time allotted. This is still a composition class, so we only have a few days to really focus on the poems before we revert back to talking about writing.

At the very least, I wanted them to actually listen to poetry and maybe appreciate the sound of it if nothing else. There were a few poems that I got really excited about in class. They probably just thought I was crazy. If you have never heard Gwendolyn Brooks read her poem, "We Real Cool," you are seriously missing out. It's probably my favorite reading of a poem ever. My own version of it never sounds nearly as "cool." Here's an audio version. She actually introduces the poem a bit, and that explanation is helpful. The poem itself starts around 1:45.




Some poems are fun to discuss because you can see students' faces as they realize what a poem is actually about. For example, most of my students didn't really get that "The Ruined Maid" by Thomas Hardy is talking about a girl who had sex before marriage and is likely a prostitute or mistress:

"O 'Melia, my dear, this does everything crown!
Who could have supposed I should meet you in Town?
And whence such fair garments, such prosperi-ty?" —
"O didn't you know I'd been ruined?" said she. 

That revelation was pretty entertaining to witness. We also read Shakespeare's Sonnet 130 - "My Mistress' Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun," and one student actually said, "Oh no, he didn't!" when he starts making uncomplimentary comparisons. You know you want to Alan Rickman read this poem (and watch someone's YouTube tribute to him):



Reading "anyone lived in a pretty how town" by e.e. cummings is also fun because it sounds so nonsensical when you first hear it. Then I'm like, "Wait, wait, there is some semblance of order and meaning here! I promise."



Lastly, there's my all-time favorite of "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot. I didn't actually make them do this whole poem because of time and difficulty. We just looked at one stanza as an allusion to Carl Sandburg's "Fog." There are multiple reasons I love this poem despite its pretentiousness. One is just the language itself and juxtaposition of beautiful imagery - "when the evening is spread out against the sky," with disturbing imagery - "like a patient etherized upon a table." Also, the whole thing is just about this dude's indecisiveness about making a move and fear of misinterpretation. I get that. If I ever get another tattoo, I want it to be the lines:

"Do I dare
 Disturb the universe?"

I found this really weird animated version of the poem to share with you. Not sure who thought this was a good idea:


Well there's a few poems for your weekend. Enjoy!