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January 27, 2006 New Rule, Anne Carson 
The thing you need to know is: I love poetry. I can't write it; I've tried from time to time but it all turns out self-indulgent crap, and I suppose like any craft if you try hard enough you can learn, but I don't have the passion for it to make years of patient practice seem worthwhile. But I love to read it. I believe that language is born in poetry. Well, that and on the streets, in common usage; but poetry is the other side to that, and not one I think we can dispense with. A beautiful poem can give me something that feels like a heart attack--when the lines and meter and breaks and words and images come together and the whole thing comes alive. So. I love poetry. And I'm really looking forward to this Friday poetry blogging thing because it's not something one gets much of a chance to indulge in everyday life. Reading it, yes; enjoying it communally, no; at least, not unless one is Jane Dark and studying poets in a graduate English program. The rest of us read poetry in private, have private ecstasies, private questions, and so on. I'm not even sure how many people to count among "us" in my previous sentence. Poetry is the most fundamental of the word arts. All of the techniques and skills the other word arts build on--rhythm, sound, emphasis, image, and so on--find their truest form in poetry. I'm starting myself off with a piece I love by a fairly well-known modern-day Canadian poet, Anne Carson, who not only writes beautiful pieces but also proves that poetry is something one can do on the side, as her day-job is professor of classics at a Canadian university. This one I read in her book, Men In The Off Hours. The whole book is tremendous; I'm starting with this poem because it is not only lovely, but also accessible; she's not drawing on her extensive knowledge of the Classics here. I don't feel the need I often do when reading her work to find an encyclopaedia: ~~~~~ New Rule A New Year's white morning of hard new ice. down at me, clutching his branch as it bobbed clinked. I fear? I countered, looking up. The man blade left open on the stair? The squirrel bounced down a branch afterwords ~~~~~ "His empire of branches slid against the air." "The squirrel bounced down a branch / and caught a peg of tears." I could read those lines alone for hours. Yes, I'm a geek. I'm looking forward to seeing what other people post. Posted by Andrea at January 27, 2006 7:29 AM under Friday Poetry Blogging EMAIL this entry (comments fields are below this section) Trackback Pings TrackBack URL for this entry: Comments Reading this poem is a nice way to begin my day. Thanks! And I really love what you had to say about poetry. Posted by: jo(e) at January 27, 2006 9:07 AM
Well, you know I am among the 'us', excaliming over beautiful lines and rhythms of poetics. Anne Carson is one of the women poets I like too. This was a beautiful selection. Do you want people to post poems on their blogs? I just posted Auden's funeral blues earlier this week. I'll go find something else to make one squeal. I'm pretty sure my work is more in the eye rolling category, however. ;) Posted by: rachel at January 27, 2006 10:31 AM
This was jo(e)'s idea, actually--you'll have to link back to jo(e)'s page. jo(e), thanks. :) I don't often get a chance to rant about poetry, so I took advantage. Posted by: Andrea at January 27, 2006 10:55 AM
I especially love the ironic juxtaposition of said my true love And I too second what you said about poetry. It sounded, well, poetic. I think you might be wrong about your abilities! (By the way, I had a really hard time reading the poem, maybe because of the combination of the small font against the darkish background. Part of the problem might be that I also don't have the world's best monitor, but I had to copy the poem, paste in into Word, and enlarge the font just to read it. That was a first for me.) Posted by: Bitty at January 27, 2006 11:19 AM
Sorry..the background wasn't darkish on the original post, just here on the comments. In fact, the comments are easier to read (larger? sharper?) than the main page of the blog. Wonder why? Posted by: Bitty at January 27, 2006 11:22 AM
Sorry, Bitty. I'm trying to figure out why the text shows up so small on teh front page. It's very frustrating. It's supposed to be 11 pixels, and it's not. But I'm working on it! Posted by: Andrea at January 27, 2006 11:24 AM
It looks to me like the text on the main page might be verdana or some other minimal font (Century schoolbook?) while this page looks like arial, which presents bigger even when they are both 11 point. By the way, I posted my poem post. Posted by: rachel at January 27, 2006 2:12 PM
Ah, the empire of branches :) Love the last lines, too. Posted by: Running2Ks at January 27, 2006 2:42 PM
I came across your site because someone on Yahoo! Answers asked for an explanation of Anne Carson's poem "New Rule." I can't resist reading and interpreting poems, so I searched for this one and found it here on your site. I just have this to say. You are more impressive in stating, in prose, your position with regard to poetry than is this sample of poetry, and I am baffled that you are so ecstatic about it. Posted by: Harold Pohl at June 2, 2006 9:29 PM
Different strokes, I guess. I love the stuff. Posted by: Andrea at June 3, 2006 10:11 AM
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