Reginald Shepherd RIP

Reginald Shepherd died on September 10 after a prolonged struggle with cancer. He was an immensely gifted poet and literary critic.

He had been hospitalized for a month and almost died the first week of that hospitalization. He told his partner, "Sometimes it takes a while to die."

True words. We begin dying the moment we are born. The central task of life is to die daily to self so that before our heart ceases to beat we are already gone to that existence that God intends for us from before time. May such be the case for Reginald.

Dostoevsky's Confession

"It is not as a child that I believe and confess Jesus Christ. My hosanna is born of a furnace of doubt."


Fyodor Dostoevsky

Books Endure

John Updike, who I met at the Kent State Writers' Conference some years ago, has written:

"By and large, times move with merciful slowness in the old-fashioned world of writing. The 88-year-old Doris Lessing won the Nobel Prize in Literature, Elmore Leonard and P.D. James continue, into their 80s, to produce bestselling thrillers. Although books circulate ever more swiftly through the bookstores and back to the publisher again, the rhythms of readers are leisurely. They spread recommendations by word of mouth and 'get around' to titles and authors years after making a mental note of them. A movie has a few weeks to find its audience, and television shows flit by in an hour, but books physically endure, in public and private libraries, for generations."

From "The Writer in Winter" by John Updike, published in AARP, Nov.-Dec. 2008, p. 42.

Another Poem by Juana de America

Juana de Ibarbarou was also called Juana de America. Here is another of her poems, with an English translation and comment by the translator.

El afilador

Este dolor heroico de hacerse para cada noche
Un nuevo par de alas…
¡Donde estarán las que ayer puso sobre mis hombres
El insomnio de la primera hora del alba!
Día, afilador de tijeras de oro,
Y puñales de acero, y espadas de hierro.
Anoche yo tenía dos alas
Y estuve cerca del cielo.
Pero esta manaña
Llegaste tú con tu flauta, tu piedra,
Tus doce cuchillos de plata.
Y lentamente me fuiste cortando las alas.

The knife-grinder

This epic pain of making, each night,
a new pair of wings…
Those wings I put on my shoulders yesterday will become
insomnia, at dawn’s first hour!
Day, sharpener of golden scissors,
and steel daggers, and iron swords.
Last night I had two wings
and was nearly in heaven.
But this morning you came with your flute, your whetstone,
your twelve silver knives.
And slowly you started cutting off my wings.

From La rosa de los vientos, 1930

The translator of this poem was told by her father that in Caracas or maybe Maracaibo "there were guys who would indeed ride their bikes around town playing a litttle flute and advertising themselves as knife grinders."

Call for Holiday Poems

Holiday Word Selection Writing Project


Student Publish Here! is seeking holiday poems from students around the world. Send your entries to aproeditor-at-gmail-dot-com.

The best poems will be published between Dec. 22 and Jan. 5

By using pre-selected words, students’ imaginations are less restrained by the limits of their vocabulary. The poem is their creation, but they have to work within the boundaries of natural word choice on a given topic.

There is no true randomness to this project. As my friend Ed Pacht has written: "...the very existence of a word is a powerful attack upon randomness. Every word or phrase, even a bit of nonsense like 'slithy tove', is a purposeful ordering of reality to an end."

Using words from the list below, write a poem about Christmas, Chanukah or Epiphany. The poem must be at least 12 lines long. You shouldn’t try to use all the words, unless you want the challenge of trying to do so.

Blessed Babe
torn
candle glow
recite the ancient words
soaring song
greater gifts
stone-hard
gentle hands
a new temple
shining pillar of hope
fragrance
sparkling
cough in the night
delight
puzzle
looping
trembling
bright mist of angels
bread of misery
eternal
Great Star
cast wide
through the ages
murmur of miracles
eight-day dedication
freely give
oil
cheer the heart
beyond the night

For samples of other poems that have been produced using this method go here and here.

Juana de Ibarbourou

Juana Fernandez Morales (1895 - 1979) era poetisa uruguaya, considerada una de las voces más personales de la lírica hispanoamericana de principios del siglo XX.

A los veinte años se casó con el capitán Lucas Ibarbourou, del cual adoptó el apellido con el que firmaría todas sus obras.

Tres años después de casarse, se trasladó a Montevideo, donde vivía hasta su muerte.

Sus primeros poemas aparecieron en periódicos, principalmente en La Razón (periódico principal de la capital).

Comenzó su travesía lírica con los poemarios Lenguas de diamante (1919), El cántaro fresco (1920) y Raíz salvaje (1922), todos ellos marcados por el modernismo, que expresó con abundancia de imágenes sensoriales y cromáticas, alusiones bíblicas y míticas.

El poema que sigue, escrito en 1960 para Nimia Vicens, una amiga puertorriqueña como "pequeño regalo de Pascuas", es representante de su obra.

RECONQUISTA

No sé de donde regresó el anhelo
De volver a cantar como en el tiempo
en que tenía entre mi puño el cielo
Y con una perla azul el pensamiento.

De una enlutada nube, la centella,
Súbito pez, hendió la noche cálida
Y en mí se abrió de nuevo la crisálida
Del verso alado y su bruñida estrella.

Ahora ya es el hino centelleante
Que alza hasta Dios la ofrenda poderosa
De su bruñida lanza de diamante.
Unidad de la luz sobre la rosa.
Y otra vez la conquista alucinante
De la eterna poesía victoriosa.

Juana de Ibarbourou


The dramatic opening of this poem is beautiful even in English:

I don't know from where the yearning returned
to once again sing as in the time
when I held the sky in my fist...

Welcome, Olivia Eastham!

Who I Am
Olivia Eastham, Grade 9

I am from many hours of four wheeling,
Farming and fishing at dark on the lake.
From front porch rocking chairs
And long walks along the creek
Catching crawdads and snakes.

I am from fresh corn on the cob
Green beans with fatback
Juicy watermelon on the back porch
With my Dad.
From running barefoot on gravel without complaining.

I am from huge family reunions with horse shoes,
Corn hole and hanging out.
From a tiny church where everyone knows each other
And no one is too shy to say hello.
From a place where it doesn’t matter what you wear.

I am from trail rides and cantering through fields
On my paint Tarzan.
From weekends spent team roping and barrel racing
And from the smell of dirt and sawdust in the arena.
I am from the country.

I am from a big move to the city with cars and exhaust fumes,
Malls at every turn and eating out at restaurants…
Far from the place of rodeos and family churches.
Here you have to leave home fifteen minutes early
To beat the rush hour.

I am not in that small town where I once lived.
I am a city girl now, leaving the country behind,
Not by choice.
I would give anything to go back
To where I am who I really am.