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On Poetry
2023.10.29
Lindy Expectancy: 36 Weeks
It feels as if every week for the past five months has been “quite the week.” When life gets like that, it is hard to remember to feel light and playful.
I don’t have much for you this week, but I do have a few poems I really like, poems that help me to put things into perspective and reaffirm my belief in myself.
Poetry
If you don’t know, I used to write and publish poetry. I think that means I was a poet. I also think that means that I still am.
Poetry is maybe the best way there is to feel like your soul is, quite literally, elevated. It makes you feel light & free–if you spend a moment to read it the right way.
What I mean by the “right way” is actually reading and processing it, and not like you would a textbook or article for a class; reading poetry does not have that obligatory feeling to it, that feeling of how do I get through this as quickly as possible. At least for me, it doesn’t ever have the same effect if I’m just “trying to get through it.”
You’ll know it when you feel it. You’ll know it when you experience it. I hope you feel it & experience it.
Invictus
This one feels freeing to me; it feels like taking a stand against whatever is oppressing or ever foreseeably could oppress you. Nothing trying to do you harm can get the best of you if you don’t let it touch your soul:
Invictus
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.
If—
This one feels like the above to me, too. It’s a lot about where you mustn’t compromise your character. It’s about seeing past all of the temptations that might make you want to act like a lesser man or woman, and staying true to yourself and what you know is noble and good:
If—
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
No Leaders Please
This is one of Bukowski’s less cynical pieces. In line with the other two, it feels uplifting to me, a good antidote for getting in to my own head. The meaning of “Leaders” in this poem is not immediately obvious; I have some ideas, but would love to hear yours.
No Leaders Please
invent yourself and then reinvent yourself,
don’t swim in the same slough.
invent yourself and then reinvent yourself
and
stay out of the clutches of mediocrity.
invent yourself and then reinvent yourself,
change your tone and shape so often that they can
never
categorize you.
reinvigorate yourself and
accept what is
but only on the terms that you have invented
and reinvented.
be self-taught.
and reinvent your life because you must;
it is your life and
its history
and the present
belong only to
you.
Again, this was a quick one. Poetry is a good shock to the system when you’re going in circles on something and the world feels like it’s ending.
If you’re still breathing, you’re still alive.
Live Deeply,
