Short Rilke poem translated by Edward Snow, from the Uncollected Poems of Rilke's.
Reading/video:
Books you don't finish reading
are like mountains you don't
finish climbing or comparisons
like this that don't seem quite right.
They are like acquaintances who
don't become friends. (This seems
better.) You have been told or
think you see what's up ahead,
but a weariness sets in. Let
the book be great for others,
you think. Just leave me out of it.
I've resigned from the reading of
The Fairie Queen, Clarissa, The
Castle of Crossed Destinies,
The Charterhouse at Parma,
countless portly mystery novels.
I pretended to finish Paradise
Lost but, as with the film,
The Titanic, I had guessed the ending.
I forced myself to climb Mann's
Magic Mountain. It took
decades, and it wasn't worth it.
When Sam Johnson (who
said of Paradise Lost, "No one
wished it longer") got tired
of a book, he threw it across
the room. Bolder than I,
he didn't resign from reading.
He fired the book.
hans ostrom 2017
Reading/video of a poem by French Symbolist and so-called Decadent, Paul Verlaine (1844-1896)--translated by Richard Greene:
One of the better known poems by Tagore (1861-1941), poet, composer, philosopher, fiction writer, artist--astoundingly talented. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1913.
Reading/video:
Reading/video of a short poem that, in a flash, presents a theory of creativity. Luis Cernuda was a Spanish poet who spent much of his life in exile from Franco's regime.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Lsiw5zTWf8
Reading/video of a poem by Neruda, translated by W.S. Merwin:
Video/reading of a poem by Emily Dickinson--number 407 or 670, depending upon the numbering system.
