I’m not that big a fan of honoring every random thing with its own calendar slot,* but I like poetry so it seems fitting to send off National Poetry Month with at least one post on the topic. The whole idea of favorite poets does a disservice to the art, since we go through times when any of two dozen poets and specific works speaks to us more strongly than the others. I have had Donne periods, Frost, Pound and Wislawa Szymborka. Often I switch between being mesmerized at the mythic renderings of Gary Snyder’s beatnik life and frustration with the way that he poemizes ordinary journal entries by adding arbitrary line breaks. For a few demented nights in college I was a Neruda guy.
So instead of picking our favorite poets, let’s use this thread to recall the poems that we can write down without looking them up. By definition that will make this a thread for poetry wonks, as if that is a bad thing. I will lead off with one of the few poems that I both like and (hopefully) remember in full.
Fire and Ice
Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire,
some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if I had to perish twice,
I think I’ve known enough of hate
to say that for destruction ice is also great
and would suffice.
***
(*) Please remind me when Intergalactic Coblogger Week comes around this year. For some stupid reason I keep missing it.