NZ Montana Poetry Day 2009

Today is National Poetry day, and while I know many of you may not be in love with this literary form like I am, I thought in today’s post I’d simply share some favourites of mine. All 3 are by New Zealand poets, and have that uncanny ability, that poems do, to reach out and encourage me to marvel- at how one can pen words so succinctly, or unashamedly indulgently without clichés; how you want to simply pause for a moment; how they describe terms, or rites of passage, or everyday thing with words not used before. When the latter occurs, you can sometimes be left wondering how you've not used these very lines or words or 'new' phrases yourself, given you immediately identify with them.

My favourite poems tend to be those that comment on human nature, friendship, family, the impact of our surroundings on our souls, and of course as a quintessential romantic at heart, love! Poetry is soul food. Thank god I found poetry- those Chicken Soup for the Soul books were never going to stand the test of time...my god I shudder just thinking about them.

Enjoy these poems, and enjoy the weekend.

Matins

Clear, tranquil, calm,

the morning's luminous.

The art's in deflection

if we're to avoid

.

Dante's worst torment

which was to have recognised happiness

only after it had passed.

Even truth's available,

and so we speed on

pre-destined, complete.

.

-Brian Turner, Taking Off, 2001

Calculations

The fire that lights a candle

cannot be shared between the wick

and the match, it has to be given

like a life.

The body lying on the wet sand

must leave an impression deeper

than the shallow water

coming to erase it.

May you never recover

from the lightness of my touch.

-Kapka Kassabova, Someone Else's Life, 2003

What It's Like

Well, it's kind of like

you're hanging over a

steep drop, fingers

cracking on some old

root or other and below

there's sand or river,

boulders worn to solid

spheres, and you say to

yourself, 'Now, I could

let go.' And what do

you know?

You do.

And then, it's kind of like

singing with your feet off

the pedals, bush lining a

damp black road downhill

to the corner and a creek

like a crowd hanging about

in dappled shade for you

to whistle by.

.

And then, it's kind of like

lying on a hillside, sun

full on and a gum tree

rattling away like streamers,

and there's a whole kind of

shining party going on,

and you're at it.

-Fiona Farrell, The Inhabited Initial, 1999

NB: this morning Jenny Bornholdt was announced as this year's winner of Poetry Book of the Year for The Rocky Shore. I've read through this volume, and it's pretty innovative in terms of contemporary free verse. Made up entirely of 6 long poems, according to the judges it 'broke the rules'...obviously rather successfully. I enjoy Bornholdt's work; it's comforting, motherly, quietly observant, sometimes stark but never morbid...it's poetry that comments on family life and dwells happily on the comforting things in life whilst exploring feelings that one might sometimes think should be kept under wraps: in that very typical old fashioned NZ way of thinking...

Last night Cilla McQueen was announced to succeed Michelle Leggott with the next two year tenure of being the country's Poet Laureate. It will be interesting to see if the National Library and IIML roll with a repeat of last year's fantastic opportunity of having all living Poet Laureates in one room...I look forward to the publication of Leggott's work over the past couple of years.