Comments on: Calmly we walk: Delmore Schwartz

By: brdavis9

brdavis9 — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 06:06:30 +0000

Oh. Sadly, my immediate comment was lost.

ðŸ˜’

By: The Other Chuck

The Other Chuck — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 21:59:26 +0000

Baklava:

At first I thought you were way off topic with the Peterson link. Then I listened to it. He may not be a poet, but he certainly has the melancholy part down pat.

Short version: You’re born. You suffer. You look for meaning. You die never finding it.

My segue, like yours, may seem off topic but isn’t. I had the great pleasure of attending a local symphony concert Saturday evening. The surprise was a soloist opera singer named Natasha Czajka. She is a local girl in her senior year studying at the San Francisco Conservatory of music under renowned soprano Deborah Voigt. She sang the aria Mi Tradi qeull’alma ingrata” from Mozart’s Don Giovanni.

Her singing filled the theater with such beauty and power it was overwhelming. The nuance of her interpretation of Elvira, the woman scorned by Don Giovanni but still in love with him, was masterful. We were front seat balcony and could see the reaction of the audience as everyone stood and cheered. In the years I’ve attended local performances, I’ve never seen anything to match this.

There IS beauty and wonder in this world, in this life, in being.

http://northstatesymphony.org/masterworks-3/

By: Phillipa crawford

Phillipa crawford — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 17:42:19 +0000

“What am I now that I was then?”

This line hit me like your ton of bricks because I had the children and babies of your earlier line (“…and just about everyone who was around him on that day in the park (except some of the babies and children) is dead.”) still in my mind’s eye, as though looking back through time to my child self.

Very moving.

By: arfldgrs

arfldgrs — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 16:49:53 +0000

In an almost empty universe a candle could be the sun… – artfldgr

By: Yancey Ward

Yancey Ward — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 06:02:19 +0000

There is one cultural reference to the poem above- in the first Star Trek TNG feature film, Malcolm McDowell’s character paraphrases the line about time being fire in which we burn- one of the rare instances in which I didn’t have to struggle to remember from where a literary allusion came from.

By: Yancey Ward

Yancey Ward — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 05:59:20 +0000

I first came across Schwartz in the Norton Anthology series while in grad school almost 30 years ago- I had filched the book from my oldest sister who was, at the time, of a more literary bent than I was. I don't remember if it was this particular poem by Schwartz that caught my attention in the anthology, but I am pretty sure it was. In any case, I went the library and checked out a collection of his along with a book length poem that I never could finish- it was quite reminiscent of T.S. Eliot'sThe Wasteland, but not nearly as interesting. I did read some of his short stories, though I don't really recall much of them these decades later. I still often search his poetry on-line these days when I feel the urge.

By: huxley

huxley — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 05:19:42 +0000

Milwaukee: I sure heard a strong echo (“I shall have peace, as leafy trees are peaceful/When rain bends down the bough”) in Teasdale from Yeats’ classic “Innisfree” though the intentions are quite different:
___________________________________________

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart’s core.
___________________________________________

By: Baklava

Baklava — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 04:37:49 +0000

I think my brain is running on a one cylinder 2 stroke engine while Jordan Peterson has a V12 engine purring like a cat.

The most impressive video of Jordan just yet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofmuCXRMoSA
from January 30th.

By: neo-neocon

neo-neocon — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 04:33:35 +0000

Milwaukee:

And of course April is the cruelest month.

By: huxley

huxley — Mon, 26 Feb 2018 04:17:59 +0000

Creativity and manic depression (bipolar) are somewhat linked. neo: True. There have also been studies on poetry specifically such as this: I bask in dreams of suicide: Mental illness, poetry, and women Though it focuses on women poets, much of it is applicable to poets generally: In this section, we argue that several factors associated with poetry combine to produce an additive effect: the types of people who are drawn to poetry, the inability of poetry to assuage mental illness, the impact that the field has on poets, and a possible age effect. First, the nature and style of poetry draw people who may be more likely to be unstable. Second, unlike other forms of writing, poetry does not alleviate mental illness. Third, implicit expectations from the field may result in successful poets being expected to be ill. Finally, poets typically peak at a younger age, when mental illness is more likely to strike.