[William A. Baurle]

Someone was looking at one of the old threads where Sexton was slammed, so I suggest reading it. Robert Mezey's poems have appeared in big-house anthologies. He's a biggy, but he detested Sexton's poetry.

I have forgotten all that about her abusing her daughter. I don't know anything about it. If she really did that, then she loses all respect from me as a person. But I know nothing about it. Will investigate.

Thread here:

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/showthread.php?t=194

[William A. Baurle]

Well, that didn't take too long. Seems one of her daughters is a novelist:

http://www.nytimes.com/1994/10/14/bo...-s-bedlam.html

What a shame. I remember none of this, if I ever heard of it. How the hell can you sexually molest your own child? Any child? But your own child? Revolting.

[Michael F]

Interesting to read those links, Bill. Thanks.

I’ve said before re: Plath, and it’s true of Sexton, that one of the big differences between them and Dickinson is that with Dickinson, you feel the pillars of the psyche strain; with Plath and Sexton, you feel them break. I can usually follow Miss Emily emotionally, and I always want to; I cannot always and often do not want to follow Sexton (or Plath). Couple this with the confessional nature of Sexton’s poetry and its limited themes, and IMO it is much less ‘universal’, much more circumscribed in its appeal. Yes, it is human experience; but it is a limited and often very disturbing slice of human experience, and not one that I often wish to revisit. I also think that Sexton relied too often on the shocking or grotesque trope at the expense of coherent meaning. IMHO.

As to the abuse of her daughter, I don’t know what to say. Sexton was patently ill.

[John Isbell]

Bill, thank you for posting these links.
Michael, I thought that was well put.

John

[John Isbell]

Changing the subject. Here is Wislawa Szymborska's "Synopsis":

"Job, sorely tried in both flesh and possessions, curses man's fate. It is great poetry. His friends arrive and, rending their garments, dissect Job's guilt before the Lord. Job cries out that he was righteous. Job does not know why the Lord smote him. Job does not want to talk to them. Job wants to talk to the Lord. The Lord God appears in a chariot of whirlwinds. Before him who had been cloven to the bone, He praises the work of His hands: the heavens, the seas, the earth and the beasts thereon. Especially Behemoth, and Leviathan in particular, creatures of which the Deity is justly proud. It is great poetry. Job listens: the Lord God beats around the bush, for the Lord God wishes to beat around the bush. Job therefore hastily prostrates himself before the Lord. Events now transpire in rapid succession. Job regains his donkeys and camels, his oxen and sheep twofold. Skin grows over his grinning skull. And Job goes along with it. Job agrees. Job does not want to ruin a masterpiece."

Wislawa Szymborska

[Michael F]

Oh, John. Szymborska! You do know how to win a poet’s heart (this one at least).

I recall from college readings that the epilogue in Job is possibly from a separate source, and may have been tacked on to the core Job story to make the canonical book. I always liked that theory. I wrote a poem on ‘Job unreconstructed’, which was not very good, and rightly found the circular file. But I still like the idea...

[Aaron Novick]

Since Marianne Moore was discussed earlier in this thread, here's her "A Jelly-Fish" in its final version:

Visible, invisible,
…a fluctuating charm
an amber-tinctured amethyst
…inhabits it, your arm
approaches and it opens
…and it closes; you had meant
to catch it and it quivers;
…you abandon your intent.

And in its originally published version:

Visible, invisible,
A fluctuating charm,
An amber-colored amethyst
Inhabits it; your arm
Approaches, and
It opens and
It closes;
You have meant
To catch it,
And it shrivels;
You abandon
Your intent—
It opens, and it
Closes and you
Reach for it—
The blue
Surrounding it
Grows cloudy, and
It floats away
From you.

It's astonishing how cutting 1/3 of the poem, changing two words, and re-arranging the line-breaks turns this from an eminently forgettable poem into (imho) one of the most perfect poems ever written.

[William A. Baurle]

Help me out here, Aaron.

In my copy of The Poems Of Marianne Moore (2003, Schulman), the poem is printed in its originally published form on page 14. I can't find another version of it in the book, and I've combed through the index of titles. Where did this final version appear?

I notice that when searching the poem, various sites give one or the other. Poets.org gives the older version, and says that the poem was ..."Published in Poem-a-Day on August 30, 2015, by the Academy of American Poets."



I agree that the 8 line version is superior.

***

It's very hard to decide on a good lesser known poem by M.M., since she was so damn good. But I finally settled on this little piece, not because I think it represents how good she was (it doesn't) but because it mentions Tagore, who's been cited in this thread, and Yeats, who didn't know how to write a lousy poem.



To William Butler Yeats on Tagore

It is made clear by the phrase,
even the mood—by virtue of which he says

the thing he thinks—that it pays,
to cut gems even in these conscience-less days;

but the jewel that always
outshines ordinary jewels, is your praise.

— Marianne Moore

[John Isbell]

Michael: you're welcome! "It is great poetry" I think is tremendous.
Aaron and Bill: yes, MM rules, I concur.

[William A. Baurle]

Can anyone cite and post the (a) "definitive" translation of this poem by Wislawa Szymborska, which I absolutely love: ?

***

Circus Animals

Bears are stomping in perfect time.
A lion jumps through flaming hoops.
A whip cracks and the music grinds.
A monkey rides a bike in a yellow suit.
A whip cracks and the animals turn their glance.
Dogs dance in carefully measured movements.
An elephant walks with a pitcher in perfect balance.

Myself, I'm quite embarrassed, I, a human.

People didn't enjoy themselves that day.
You wouldn't know it from the clapping hands
though one hand elongated by a whip
cast a striking shadow on the sand.


—Wislawa Szymborska
(translation by Joanna Trzeciak)