In Celebration of Poetry

April Fool's continues for us! 

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this is the view from the balcony today

I usually welcome all of Nature's whimsies,

it just feels a bit confusing....I am almost tempted to pull out the holiday lights again!

I have to admit, it is pretty...

and I'll be dreaming of this weather when it's August and 95 degrees...

Ok, on to the POETRY!

April is National Poetry Month in the U.S.

  Poster by Jessica Helfand

"National Poetry Month is a month-long, national celebration of poetry established (in 1996) by the Academy of American Poets. The concept is to widen the attention of individuals and the media—to the art of poetry, to living poets, to our complex poetic heritage, and to poetry books and journals of wide aesthetic range and concern. We hope to increase the visibility and availability of poetry in popular culture while acknowledging and celebrating poetry’s ability to sustain itself in the many places where it is practiced and appreciated."

- Academy of American Poets

My love of poetry began at a very early age, when my Grandmother read Pushkin's fairy tales to me every evening before bed...

 

 Alexander Pushkin (1799-1837) is considered the greatest poet, novelist, and playwright Russia has ever known...

 google

 My favorite of his fairy tales was, and still is, 

"The Fisherman and the Fish"

...sounds simple enough...except this brilliant story, written in verse, teaches a most beautiful lesson....if you are not familiar with this tale, I highly recommend the translation here.

Please keep in mind that the language is of the early to mid-1800's

 

 

As I grew older, poetry continued to be a cherished companion...

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I have been blessed by several people close and dear to me, 

who were or are gifted poets....

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Do you enjoy poetry? Have you tried writing a poem? 

Who are some of your favorite poets?

What is poetry?

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There are countless ways to describe this most soul-elevating art....

I love this poem by Marianne Moore

Upon reading it, even those who do not find poetry enchanting or essential, may begin to understand what the fuss is all about:

Poetry

I, too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all
this fiddle.
Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one
discovers in
it after all, a place for the genuine.
Hands that can grasp, eyes
that can dilate, hair that can rise
if it must, these things are important not because a

high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but because
they are
useful. When they become so derivative as to become
unintelligible,
the same thing may be said for all of us, that we
do not admire what
we cannot understand: the bat

holding on upside down or in quest of something to

eat, elephants pushing, a wild horse taking a roll, a tireless wolf
under
a tree, the immovable critic twitching his skin like a horse that
feels a
flea, the base-
ball fan, the statistician--
nor is it valid
to discriminate against 'business documents and



school-books'; all these phenomena are important. One must
make a distinction
however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the
result is not poetry,
nor till the poets among us can be
'literalists of
the imagination'--above
insolence and triviality and can present

for inspection, 'imaginary gardens with real toads in them', shall
we have
it. In the meantime, if you demand on the one hand,
the raw material of poetry in
all its rawness and
that which is on the other hand
genuine, you are interested in poetry. 

Marianne Moore

1887-1972

In celebration of National Poetry Month, I would like to invite you all to visit a most talented poet, artist, and friend...
Anita Rivera at Castles Crowns and Cottages 
as she takes us on a beautiful, poetic journey of her own....
Enjoy!

xoxo