What's your favorite poem (in English)?
Since I'll eventually be using my first class blogs for literature classes, I'd like to ask my B4B colleagues to join in a dry run: Leave a comment with one of your favorite poems (title and author, and text if it's not too long).
I can't wait to see what gems we come up with - Thank you for your help!
Here's one of mine:
The Vacation Wendell Berry
Once there was a man who filmed his vacation.
He went flying down the river in his boat
with his video camera to his eye, making
a moving picture of the moving river
upon which his sleek boat moved swiftly
toward the end of his vacation. He showed
his vacation to his camera, which pictured it,
preserving it forever: the river, the trees,
the sky, the light, the bow of his rushing boat
behind which he stood with his camera
preserving his vacation even as he was having it
so that after he had had it he would still
have it. It would be there. With a flick
of a switch, there it would be. But he
would not be in it. He would never be in it.
5 comments:
Hi Jenny,
Here is a poem that I enjoyed studying as a second language learner: Demain des l'aube (Tomorrow at Dawn) by Victor Hugo. The link is to the English translation of the poem!
I originally read it in French class, and it was one of the first poems I studied in French. After reading the poem, our teacher asked us to write our own poem beginning with the line "demain des l'aube" (tomorrow at dawn...)
Your literature class sounds great and I'm looking forward to hearing about more favorite poems!
Hi, Jenny!
As a poet, it is so hard to have one favorite poem. So, here is an offering of several short poems.
First Fig by Edna St. Vincent Millay
My candle burns at both ends
It will not last the night
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends —
It gives a lovely light!
***********************************
Hyacinths
When of thy worldly goods
Thou find thyself bereft,
And from the goodly store
Two loaves alone are left...
Sell one, and with the dole
Buy hyacinths to feed thy soul.
Persian proverb
**********************************
I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!
by Emily Dickinson
This is such a neat idea. I can't wait to check back and see what other poems you receive.
Peace, Linda
Early Winter
The weather reporter warns us
of the approaching cold front
with a blue line marking the border
between autumn and winter—
A rapid drop in temperature,
the rush and blast of wind,
approaching sleet and snow—
We're in the mood to handle
what lies ahead—
end of semester blues,
rush toward the holidays,
and wild future hopes
that peace will descend on earth—
I change the tv channel
thinking that the forecast
might be different on
the other side of town—
it's not—it's the same
for the kids out of school
who want enough snow
to build snowmen and forts
or skate down the street
out of breath
awaiting tomorrow
and the onset of early winter.
Bertha Wise
November 30, 2006
This one from my American e-friend.
My favourite poem in English is
"Love", by Emily Dickinson (1830–86):
LOVE is anterior to life,
Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
The exponent of breath.
I love its simplicity, which allows me to share it even with beginning FL learners, and the way it describes this feeling... :))))
Hope others like it too!
Gladys
A poem that I enjoy very much and definitely identify with is "Forgetfulness", by Billy Collins. This link http://www.contemporarypoetry.com/dialect/poetry/collinsforgetfullness.htm should take you to Collins reading his poem, which is about how one's memory starts to go as one gets older.
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